Furman University
private liberal arts college in Greenville, South Carolina, United States
Furman University is a private university in Greenville, South Carolina, United States. Founded in 1826 and named after Baptist pastor Richard Furman, the liberal arts university is the oldest private institution of higher learning in South Carolina. It became a secular university in 1992, while keeping Christo et Doctrinae (For Christ and Learning) as its motto. As of Fall 2021, it enrolls approximately 2,300 undergraduate students and 150 graduate students on its 750-acre (304 ha) campus.
History
Beginnings (19th century)
Furman Academy and Theological Institution was established by the South Carolina Baptist Convention and incorporated in December 1825 in Edgefield. With 10 students, it held its first classes January 15, 1828; although another source says it opened in January 1827. Through 1850, average enrollment was 10 students, and it was at constant risk of insolvency. From 1829 to 1834, it operated in the High Hills of the Santee (now Stateburg, South Carolina). Furman closed from 1834 to 1837. When the school reopened, at the urging of the Reverend Jonathan Davis, chairman of the Board of Agents, the school moved to his native Fairfield County, near Winnsboro.
Begin with the source’s own compact description: “Furman University” is private liberal arts college in Greenville, South Carolina, United States. The dossier treats that line as a proposition to test through Furman, University and private, not as a finished interpretation.
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Named sources, stable identifiers and responsible institutions provide the strongest route from overview to verifiable evidence. The source revision retrieved here is dated Jun 16, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q1475020. VIAF identifies the subject as 148942231. The Library of Congress control number is n82036427. Authority coordinates are 34.926, -82.436. 3 of 5 selected statements include explicit references; 1 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1826, 1992, 2021 and 1825.
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This entry incorporates text from “Furman University” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.