In 1853 James Buchanan, president of the Board of Trustees and later the fifteenth president of the United States, chose this as the site of the newly merged Franklin & Marshall College. The College Building, which became known as Old Main in the twentieth century, is an early and distinctive use of the Gothic Revival style for an American college campus. Designed by the Baltimore architectural firm Dixon, Balbirnie & Dixon and constructed beginning in 1854, the College Building was dedicated on May 16, 1856. It was flanked by two student literary society buildings. Goethean and Diagnothian Halls, which opened in 1857.

Shadek-Fackenthal Library and Keiper Liberal Arts buildings, erected in 1937 and 1935, respectively, define the southern and northern ends of Alumni Greens.

Old Main is listed on the National Register of Historic Places.

The symbolic heart of the campus, Alumni Green honors Frank E. '42 and Eva L. Manning as well as members of the Franklin & Marshall Alumni Association who have contributed generously to the college.

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Benjamin Franklin
John Marshall
Whitehead Plaza
Klauder-Apple Walk
Franklin & Marshall College September 11 Memorial
The Water Towers in Buchanan Park
The Richard Kneedler Sculpture Garden
In Memory of World War I Heroes, a War Memorial
Abraham de Peyster
U.S.S. Maine Memorial

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