College Hall is the oldest building on the West Philadelphia

West Philadelphia

West Philadelphia, nicknamed West Philly, is a section of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Though there is no official definition of its boundaries, it is generally considered to reach from the western shore of the Schuylkill River, to City Line Avenue to the northwest, Cobbs Creek to the southwest, and...

 campus of the University of Pennsylvania

University of Pennsylvania

The University of Pennsylvania is a private, Ivy League university located in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States. Penn is the fourth-oldest institution of higher education in the United States,Penn is the fourth-oldest using the founding dates claimed by each institution...

. Prior to its construction, the university was located on Ninth Street in Center City, Philadelphia

Center City, Philadelphia

Center City, or Downtown Philadelphia includes the central business district and central neighborhoods of the City of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States. As of 2005, its population of over 88,000 made it the third most populous downtown in the United States, after New York City's and Chicago's...

. The building was designed by Thomas Webb Richards and completed in 1873. The characteristic green color of the building is due to its composition of green serpentine stone

Serpentinite

Serpentinite is a rock composed of one or more serpentine group minerals. Minerals in this group are formed by serpentinization, a hydration and metamorphic transformation of ultramafic rock from the Earth's mantle...

.

College Hall was placed on the National Register of Historic Places

National Register of Historic Places

The National Register of Historic Places is the United States government's official list of districts, sites, buildings, structures, and objects deemed worthy of preservation...

 February 14, 1978. It is also a contributing property

Contributing property

In the law regulating historic districts in the United States, a contributing resource or contributing property is any building, structure, or object which adds to the historical integrity or architectural qualities that make the historic district, listed locally or federally, significant...

 of the University of Pennsylvania Campus Historic District

University of Pennsylvania Campus Historic District

The University of Pennsylvania Campus Historic District is listed on the National Register of Historic Places as a historic district on the campus of the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, eastern USA...

.

The building currently houses the undergraduate admissions office, the university president's offices, and classrooms. College Hall is also home to the Philomathean Society

Philomathean Society

The Philomathean Society of the University of Pennsylvania is a collegiate literary society, the oldest student group at the university, and a claimant to the title of the oldest continuously-existing literary society in the United States.This claim is disputed between the Philomathean Society and...

, a student organization founded in 1813.

There is a legend that College Hall was a model for the Victorian Gothic mansion in The Addams Family

The Addams Family

The Addams Family is a group of fictional characters created by American cartoonist Charles Addams. As named by Charles Addams, the Addams Family characters include Gomez, Morticia, Uncle Fester, Lurch, Grandmama, Wednesday, Pugsley, and Thing....

 cartoons, drawn by Charles Addams

Charles Addams

Charles "Chas" Samuel Addams was an American cartoonist known for his particularly black humor and macabre characters...

, who attended Penn in the 1930s.