James Piper, James

James H. Piper

James H. Piper

James Piper was the fourth president of the University of Tennessee (as East Tennessee College) in 1833–34. A native of Rockbridge County, Virginia, he earned the AB from Washington College (later Washington and Lee) in 1819 and the AM from East Tennessee College in 1830, when he joined the faculty. At the time he became president, he had served as president of Columbia College in Columbia, Tennessee, for two years and as professor of mathematics and natural science at East Tennessee College for three years. He was the first alumnus to serve as president.

After one year, Piper resigned as president and moved to Wythe County, Virginia, where he became assistant state surveyor, state senator (1840–46), chief clerk of the US General Land Office (1846), and acting commissioner of the General Land Office (1847). In 1847 he returned to Wythe County, where he served as president of the Southwest Turnpike Company, laid out Wytheville, and conducted an academy.

He was best known, perhaps, for having been the first non-Native American known to have climbed, in 1818 while a student at Washington College, to the top of Natural Bridge, owned at the time by Thomas Jefferson. The feat was detailed in an 1838 article in the Knickerbocker, a New York monthly magazine, written by one of his companions on the climb, Dr. William Alexander Caruthers.

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  • Title James H. Piper
  • Author
  • Keywords James H. Piper
  • Website Name Volopedia
  • Publisher University of Tennessee Libraries
  • URL
  • Access Date January 30, 2025
  • Original Published Date
  • Date of Last Update March 1, 2019