Wilbour Hall

Wilbour Hall on the corner of Prospect and George Streets was formerly the Dorrance mansion, owned and occupied by Delta Phi fraternity and since 1949 the home of the Department of Egyptology. It was named for Charles Edwin Wilbour 1854, in whose memory a chair of Egyptology was established by his daughter. The original plans for the Rockefeller Library included the razing of Wilbour Hall, but the plans were changed to accommodate Professor Otto Neugebauer, whose office was in the building and who had been quoted as saying, if asked to move his books once more, he would move them to Princeton. Wilbour Hall was saved, and it was later revealed that Neugebauer’s statement was only a well-placed rumor instigated by another resident of the building, Egyptologist Richard Parker.