Charles Willard Turner joined the faculty of the College of Law in 1892. He received the BA (1861) and MA (1892) degrees from Amherst. At Amherst, he was a member of Phi Beta Kappa. He was admitted to the bar in Boston in 1867 and practiced in Boston from 1867 to 1891. He came to Knoxville in 1891 and became associate professor of law in 1892. From 1893 to 1895, he served as lecturer on history and then as acting professor of history from 1895 to 1897, when he became acting professor of law and constitutional history.
Turner was named dean of the College of Law in 1915, succeeding Dean Henry Ingersall, who died in March 1915. Turner served until 1920. He enlivened his classes by using examples of contracts for “rabid-jawed mules warranted sound and kind, which turned out to be kickers and cribbers”; and for “Berkshire hogs that turned out to be ‘razor-backs.’”