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A SALUTARY INFLUENCE James Strong, Philip H. Glatfelter, Charles M. Stock, and J. Emory Bair members of a building committee and charged them with constructing two or more dormitories. Using the plans which John A. Dempwolf prepared, they advertised for bids. In July 1897 they entered into a contract, amounting to $14,782, with a local builder, Merville E. Stallsmith, to construct the first of what was intended to be a series of three new dormitories. By September the walls were going up. The students first occupied South College, as it was called (it was not named KcKnight Hall until 1916), when they returned to the campus early in January 1898. The total cost of the building was $19,242. Constructed of brick, with Indiana brownstone trim, South College was eighty-five by thirty-four feet. Rooms located on its three floors could accommodate about fifty students, some in single and others in double rooms. There was hot and cold water on each floor and lavatories in what were described as convenient places.94 "The erection of this dormitory has proved very advantageous to the College," wrote a proud President McKnight in his report to the board of trustees in January 1898. "It has already secured for us four South College First occupied as a dormitory in January 1898, this building was renamed McKnight Hall in 1916. 94When McKnight Hall was connected to the heating system, Stevens Hall was disconnected and given its own system. 26