Telfair Hodgson

Telfair Hodgson (March 14, 1840 – September 11, 1893) was an American Episcopal priest and academic administrator. He was the dean of the Theological Department at Sewanee: The University of the South from 1878 to 1893, and vice chancellor from 1879 to 1890. He was a co-founder and the managing editor of The Sewanee Review.

Early life Telfair Hodgson was born on March 14, 1840, in Columbia, Virginia. He attended Princeton University, where he joined the Kappa Alpha Society and graduated in 1859. He entered the General Theological Seminary in New York City. A few years after the war, Hodgson went to Europe, where he lived in 1869–1870. Some of his sermons were about the Confederate fallen. In 1876 he gave Sewanee: The University of the South $10,000 to build a library; it was the first building in Sewanee to be constructed of stone.

Theological education had been a growing concern at Sewanee since it began admitting students in 1868, and shortly thereafter it merged with the Sewanee Training and Divinity School. It had no dean of theology until Hodgson was hired as dean in 1878. He served as dean until 1893, and also served as vice chancellor from 1879 to 1890.

Personal life, death and legacy Hodgson married Frances Glen Potter, the daughter of a slave-owning planter from Savannah, Georgia. They had two sons, Telfair Hodgson Jr. and J. H. P. Hodgson, and a daughter. His son Telfair Hodgson Jr. was the treasurer of the University of the South from 1908 to 1949.

The Sewanee Review is the oldest continuously published literary quarterly in the United States.