From the archive · since 1867

Centenary University

By The Fiedler Family · July 9, 2026 · HKT-1867-001 · Story · since 1867

Centenary University's historic three-story main building with a golden dome and clock, seen in daylight from the front gate lettered 'Centenary University' under a blue sky.
The historic main building — Old Main, today the Edward W. Seay Administration Building — crowned by its golden dome, on the Centenary campus in Hackettstown.
Photograph by January O'Neill

Centenary University has stood in downtown Hackettstown since 1867, when the Newark Conference of the Methodist Episcopal Church chartered it as the Centenary Collegiate Institute. The name marked the centennial of Methodism’s beginnings in America. The town secured the school by out-bidding rival New Jersey towns: ten Hackettstown citizens put up $10,000 and ten acres of land to bring it home.

The cornerstone of the main building was laid in 1869, and the Institute opened to students by 1874, holding its first commencement on June 25, 1875. On Halloween 1899, its five-story main building burned — the fire left only portions of the brick walls standing, with the men’s and women’s gymnasiums the only buildings to survive. The glow was reportedly visible twenty miles away in Morristown. No one died. Townspeople fought the blaze and took students into their homes, and classes carried on in local churches.

The replacement, “Old Main,” rose by 1901 to a design by architect Oscar S. Teale. It stands today as the Edward W. Seay Administration Building, listed on the National Register of Historic Places on June 13, 1997.

The school changed shape many times. A coeducational preparatory school became a girls’ school in 1910, Centenary Junior College in 1940, Centenary College for Women in 1956, a four-year women’s college in 1976, and fully coeducational again in 1988. In 2016 it became Centenary University.

An equine studies major took root in the late 1960s, and the intercollegiate riding team was founded in 1973; in 2009 the team won a national championship. The university’s Equestrian Center sits on 65 acres of preserved farmland in Washington Township, about seven miles from the Hackettstown campus.

The ties run both ways. The university’s baseball field, opened in 2019, is home to Hackettstown High School’s team.

The Centenary main building lit up at night, its golden dome glowing, with a bare tree silhouetted in the foreground against a black sky.
The main building at night, its golden dome lit above the campus.
Photograph by January O'Neill
A close view of the building's golden dome and white cupola, topped by an American flag and a POW/MIA flag and flanked by two black-faced clocks, against a blue sky.
The golden dome and clock cupola that crown the main building.
Photograph by January O'Neill
A black-and-white view of an old classroom in the main building: modern wheeled desks on a carpeted floor, tall windows, and rhetoric terms posted on the walls.
One of the oldest classrooms in the main building — photographed by January O'Neill, who taught here as an adjunct professor.
Photograph by January O'Neill

Sources

  • Centenary University — "An Historical Note"
  • Taylor Memorial Library Archives, Hackettstown
  • Town of Hackettstown — town history
  • Wikipedia — Centenary University

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