Benedictine Hall

Benedictine Hall is located on the Green Campus of Oklahoma Baptist University in Shawnee, Oklahoma. It was the central feature of the now-closed St. Gregory's University (also known as St. Gregory's Abbey and College), housing its administration, library and most of its classes. Designed by St. Louis architect Victor Klutho, the facility opened in the fall of 1915. St. Gregory's College grew from the Sacred Heart Mission in Sacred Heart, Oklahoma. Established in 1876 in what was then called Indian Territory, the mission school considered moving to a more populated area in the 1890s. After a 1901 fire that destroyed much of what was then called the "Catholic University of Oklahoma", the decision was made to move the high school and college to Shawnee, 35 miles (56 km) to the north. Viktor Klutho was hired to design the new facility. A specialist in Tudor Revival architecture, Klutho designed a massive five-story brick building to combine church, school and abbey in a single edifice, opening to 40 boys in the fall term of 1915. This served until the 1940s when a new church was built nearby, and in the 1950s the abbey moved to a new campus adjoining the school. In the 1960s the school discontinued high school education and admitted women to the college.