Included with GeorgiaRoam+Oglethorpe University Campus Tour
Collegiate Gothic towers, a museum, and a time capsule sealed until the year 8113
Self-guided walking tour in Brookhaven · 0.8 mi · walking · ~1h 10m · 5 stops
The Tour
Founded in 1835 and reborn in Brookhaven in 1915, Oglethorpe wears its English-inspired Collegiate Gothic architecture proudly, four of its buildings sit on the National Register of Historic Places. This compact loop takes in the carillon tower of Lupton Hall, the basement vault where the world's most famous time capsule waits out the millennia, a free art museum, and the oldest college football stadium in the South. It's a short, self-contained walk of under a mile.
Oglethorpe University Campus Tour is a self-guided walking tour of Brookhaven, built around its campus side.
The walk covers 5 stops over about 0.8 miles and roughly 1 hour 10 min, entirely at your own pace. Each stop's story unlocks on your phone the moment you arrive — GPS-triggered, hands-free, no guide and no tour group to keep up with.
What you'll see
Oglethorpe's campus looks like a piece of Oxford set down on Peachtree Road, and this short walk takes in its best-known corners. The front of the campus is Lupton Hall, completed in 1919 of gray granite, with a battlemented clock tower that holds a 42-bell carillon. If you're there at noon, you'll hear it.
The most unusual stop is underground. Beneath Phoebe Hearst Hall is the Crypt of Civilization, a steel-doored chamber that Oglethorpe's president Thornwell Jacobs filled with microfilmed books, voice recordings and everyday objects, and then sealed in 1940. It isn't meant to be opened until the year 8113. Nearby, the Oglethorpe University Museum of Art has changing exhibitions and a permanent collection, and general admission is free. You'll also pass Hermance Stadium, which joined the National Register of Historic Places in 1994 along with Lupton, Hearst and Lowry halls.
The whole loop is under a mile and takes about an hour and ten minutes at a relaxed pace. Afternoons from Tuesday to Sunday line up best with museum hours. Spring and fall, when the quad is green and busy with students, are the most pleasant times to go. The Georgia Roam app tells each building's story as you arrive.
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