in December of the following year. He remained president of the board until his death in 1882. In 1847, Caruthers and his brother, Abraham Caruthers, founded the Cumberland School of Law, one of the first law schools in the South. The school, which had an initial enrollment of seven students, held its first classes in Robert Caruthers' law office. As an instructor, Abraham Caruthers abandoned the lecture system, and instead assigned a chapter from a law text, and quizzed each student on the chapter the following day, considering this the best way to determine the areas in which a student was struggling. He also held moot courts. During the Civil War, Nathan Green, Jr., whose father had been succeeded by Robert Caruthers on the Tennessee Supreme Court in 1852, managed to keep the school open. Caruthers joined the Cumberland School of Law's faculty as a Professor of Law in 1868, replacing Judge Henry Cooper. In 1878, in memory of his brother, Abraham, he funded the construction of Caruthers Hall, which housed the law school for several decades. He resigned from the faculty in 1880. In 1961, Cumberland University sold the law school to Birmingham-based Samford University. Death and legacy Caruthers died in Lebanon on October 2, 1882. He was buried in the city's Cedar Grove Cemetery. His gravestone contains the Latin inscription, "semper verus, semper sapiens, semper fidelis" ("always true, always wise, always faithful"). Along with being an elder in the Cumberland Presbyterian Church, Caruthers was the Grand Master of the Grand Lodge of Tennessee Free and Accepted Masons. His house, built in 1828, still stands on West Main Street in Lebanon. The house was designed by Henry Reiff, who built the original Hermitage mansion for Andrew Jackson in Hermitage in 1819. Since 1938, the Caruthers house has been home to the Ligon and Bobo Funeral Home. References External links 1800 births 1882 deaths 19th-century American politicians Deputies and delegates to the Provisional Congress of the Confederate States Governors of Tennessee Grand Masters of the Grand Lodge of Tennessee People from Carthage, Tennessee People of Tennessee in the American Civil War Justices of the Tennessee Supreme Court Tennessee lawyers Whig Party members of the United States House of Representatives from Tennessee 19th-century American judges 19th-century American lawyers