The old Newark Academy building, on Main Street in Newark, is the predecessor to the current University of Delaware. The school was founded in 1743 in New London, Pennsylvania. It moved to Newark in 1769, and was located at the town’s market square. The school was a Presbyterian rival to Princeton University in New Jersey. In 1833, Newark Academy received a charter to begin Newark College, and the original school became a preparatory school. The original building was replaced with this building, still on the old market square, in 1841. The school closed in 1898, and the building is now used for the University of Delaware. Photo by xzmattzx.
Daily Delawhere for May 25, 2020
Edgar Poe once gave a lecture in this building in the mid-1840s, during the same visit when he supposedly issued his legendary curse on the people of Newark, As the story goes, he was angry after falling into the mud while getting out of a carriage outside the St. Patrick’s Inn, which stood where the Deer Park does today.