A pioneering Baptist college in antebellum West Virginia, active 1839–1855.
Rector College was established in 1839 as a Baptist educational institution in Pruntytown, Taylor County, West Virginia. Founded through collaboration between the Western Virginia Educational Society and wealthy Baptist preacher Rev. Enoch Rector, the college was chartered in 1842 and operated as both a college and girls' seminary. Under the leadership of Rev. Joshua Bradley (a Brown University graduate) and later Rev. Charles A.M. Wheeler, the institution flourished with a student body numbering in the hundreds.
The college faced three critical challenges in the early 1850s. A typhoid fever epidemic swept through the region in summer and autumn of 1850, disrupting classes. President Wheeler's health declined during the same period, likely from tuberculosis, and he died on July 11, 1851. The final blow came on March 25, 1855, when a devastating fire destroyed the college's buildings, library, and museum. The institution never reopened.