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Moravian College • Preservation Master Plan
Chapter Three
Moravian College in Context
3.0 Introduction
Moravian College and its parent institutions hold
a unique place when considered through the lens
of larger movements and trends over the past
260 years. The cultural forces that resurrected
the Moravian faith from longtime secrecy, and
created safe havens for the Moravian missionaries
first in Saxony and later in North America, were
ultimately strong enough to result in a nearly
undiluted transplant of Moravian culture to
Bethlehem. The Moravian settlers and community
of early Bethlehem differed from other European
colonists in myriad ways. Their viewpoints on
religion, community planning, societal constructs,
evangelism, and education were markedly different
from other demographics. Bethlehem itself, with
its initial adherence to the Economy and role as the
hub of the North American Moravian missionary
network, developed physically to an extent far
beyond other Moravian settlements, but differed
from these and other American settlements in
its adherence to the detailed planning directives
issued from Herrnhut. As time passed, however,
Bethlehem was secularized and began to grow in
ways more consistent with other American cities of
the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.
Similarly, the Moravian schools for men and
women began as distinct, high-quality educational
institutions, and were all the more remarkable
when compared with the paucity of educational
opportunities available to most North American
youth prior to the availability of public education.
Again, as the Moravian culture grew more secular
and the adherents assimilated into the larger fabric
of American lifeways, both the women’s and men’s
schools developed physically and architecturally
in ways consistent with larger American
educational trends. The merger of two schools to
the current Moravian College resulted in continued
development along these lines.
Finally, Moravian College occupies a unique place in
historic preservation history. The 1950s partnering
of the school and Historic Bethlehem to work
toward the preservation, restoration, and adaptive
reuse of its Hurd Campus buildings represents a
prescient and innovative effort to revitalize the
historic downtown.
This chapter explores Moravian’s role throughout its
historical periods, both as an innovative and unique
exception to the surrounding cultural norms, and
as a reflection of larger trends and values shared
with other American communities and institutions.
In particular, it places Moravian and its parent
schools along the continuum of American higher
education and campus planning history.
3.1 Community Planning
and Development
Moravian Settlements in North
America
Bethlehem was from the beginning the capital
city of Moravianism in North America. Unlike
other Moravian settlements, it communicated
directly with the church leaders at Herrnhut,
and planning for new settlements was done at
Bethlehem. Bethlehem was also designed as the
central industrial processing facility for crops
and raw materials generated by the outlying
settlements and farms. It carried on trade with other
settlements, accepting raw materials in exchange
for the manufactured goods it produced. The
congregation at Bethlehem was thus at the center
of the Moravian New World, and set precedents
for other Moravian congregations. Its buildings
represented the most direct translation of European
Moravian architecture into an American settlement
(Murtagh 1967:19).
Each Moravian settlement in North America shared
the trait of having been carefully planned, with a
predetermined role to play in the greater Moravian
world. Nazareth, only nine miles from Bethlehem,
was the “manor town,” second in command to
Bethlehem. Lititz was intended to be an educational
center. Emmaus and Lebanon, PA and Hope, NJ
were agricultural centers. Nain and Gnadenhuetten
were missionary outposts which evangelized
Native Americans and housed converts (Murtagh
1967:19).
John Milner Associates • October 2009 • Chapter 3 • College Context • 35