Bentley Hall is a historic building located on the campus of

Allegheny College Allegheny College is a private liberal arts college in Meadville, Pennsylvania, United States. Founded in 1815, Allegheny is the oldest college in continuous existence under the same name west of the Allegheny Mountains. It is a member of the G ...

at Meadville,

Crawford County, Pennsylvania Crawford County is a county in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. As of the 2020 census, the population was 83,938. Its county seat is Meadville. The county was created on March 12, 1800, from part of Allegheny County and named for Colonel W ...

. It was built between 1820 and 1835, and is a vernacular brick and stone building with a Federal style center building and

Greek Revival Greek Revival architecture is a architectural style, style that began in the middle of the 18th century but which particularly flourished in the late 18th and early 19th centuries, predominantly in northern Europe, the United States, and Canada, ...

style wings. The central section measures three stories and 60 feet wide and the two-story wings are 30 feet wide each. It is topped by a distinctive

cupola In architecture, a cupola () is a relatively small, usually dome-like structure on top of a building often crowning a larger roof or dome. Cupolas often serve as a roof lantern to admit light and air or as a lookout. The word derives, via Ital ...

. It was the first building built on the Allegheny College campus, and the only building until Ruter Hall was built in 1853. It is named for Rev.

William Bentley William Bentley (June 22, 1759 – December 29, 1819) was an American Unitarian minister, scholar, columnist, and diarist. He was a polymath who possessed the second best library in the United States (after that of Thomas Jefferson), and was a ...

, an early benefactor. ''Note:'' This includes It was added to the

National Register of Historic Places The National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) is the Federal government of the United States, United States federal government's official United States National Register of Historic Places listings, list of sites, buildings, structures, Hist ...

in 1977.

References

{{National Register of Historic Places in Pennsylvania School buildings on the National Register of Historic Places in Pennsylvania Greek Revival architecture in Pennsylvania School buildings completed in 1853 Buildings and structures in Crawford County, Pennsylvania Meadville, Pennsylvania National Register of Historic Places in Crawford County, Pennsylvania