President's Report 2007 - Benedict College

Strategic Direction 5
Physical Resources
To anyone who’s ever said, “I’ll believe it when I see it,” come take a look. The latest
expansion and improvements of Benedict’s physical facilities continue what has indeed
become an source of pride of the school for and its surrounding neighborhood.
A HOME BEFITTING A CHAMPION
The new Charlie W. Johnson Football Stadium – standing prominently on 61 acres
of open land at Two Notch Road and Read Street – is the centerpiece of the College’s
most with physical expansion in several decades.
Named after Benedict’s current board chairman, Charlie Johnson, for his outstanding
commitment and support to the College, the spectacular 11,000-seat, $13.6 million
facility becomes without a doubt the premier stadium in all of Division II football.
The Charlie W. Johnson Football Stadium features a dramatic, five-story entrance,
state-of-the-art audiovisual equipment, and a professional-grade artificial turf
surface. New Head Football Coach Stanley Connor guides the Tigers in their new
environs. Connor previously led Alabama A&M to several SWAC Eastern Division titles,
including a SWAC Championship in 2005.
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TIGER TRADITIONS
The new stadium, along with a new but, seasoned coach continues to add marks of
achievement and pride for the 12 year old Tiger football program. A far cry from the
current purple and gold, Tiger frenzy accompanying home football contests, Benedict
football first took to the gridiron in 1911 thanks only to the efforts of then-Professor
Ralph Fleming Bates. Bates founded the College’s baseball team four years earlier. In
1938 the mascot – originally a Deacon – was changed to a Tiger. Benedict did not field
a football team for three full decades, from 1965-1995.
The College’s aggressive
approach to physical plant
upgrades is essential to its
future. The Charlie W. Johnson
Stadium and the Alumni Hall
labs are testaments to this
thrust. They are landmarks
for the ‘new’ Benedict College.
They speak to the generosity
of resources and spirit that
propels Benedict toward a
bright future.”
– Dr. David H. Swinton