ARIA Students Reimagine Historic Selma Hospital

ARIA Students Reimagine Historic Selma Hospital

An iconic civil rights site in Selma, Alabama, closed in 1983 and fallen into disrepair in recent years, was the subject of a fall semester Interior Architecture (ARIA) studio led by Program Chair and Associate Professor Kevin Moore.

The Good Samaritan Hospital’s history goes all the way back to an earlier structure built in 1922, but the current facility, affectionately called “Good Sam” by the locals, was built in 1964 by the Sisters of St. Joseph and the Edmundites, two Catholic Missions.

At that time, it was the only hospital serving African Americans within a six-county area, and as a result, it played a significant role in the voting rights campaign and the infamous 1965 “Bloody Sunday” march across the city’s Edmund Pettus Bridge.

Marchers injured in Bloody Sunday were brought to Good Sam for treatment. Though the Catholic sisters who ran the hospital could not march by order of their bishop, they also opened the hospital and convent as a meeting and resting place for the demonstrators who poured into Selma from across the country.

“Good Sam is well known as an important site in the Civil Rights Movement, and the Delta Regional Authority approached Auburn’s Rural Studio about its revitalization,” explained Moore of how the project originally came to his attention.


Because the building is idiosyncratic, I thought the student projects would be similar, but every project was different.

Associate Professor & Chair of Interior Architecture, Kevin Moore

The Rural Studio suggested that students in the School of Architecture, Planning and Landscape Architecture (APLA) study the building as an exercise in developing a wide range of ideas. As my students researched the history of Good Sam, its significance as a training ground for African American medical professionals really stood out.”

The result was Moore’s fourth-year studio. In 2023, an EF-2 tornado touched down in Selma. Good Samaritan Hospital was the gateway to one of the city’s most severely damaged neighborhoods, and Moore and his students took on the task of creating proposals to transform the empty shell of Good Sam into multi-family housing. The student proposals explore a range of options including affordable housing for seniors, supportive housing, intergenerational living and even options for extended families.

“Because the building is idiosyncratic, I thought the student projects would be similar, but every project was different,” Moore said. “They ultimately developed a variety of floor plans.”

The student proposals have recently been gathered into the booklet “Good Samaritan Hospital” (Interior Architecture Fall 2023). Moore hopes it will generate excitement about the hospital’s potential and lead to funding.

“The Rural Studio’s Front Porch Initiative is currently working on high performance homes for the adjacent neighborhood, but the cost to renovate a large structure like Good Sam Hospital has slowed plans for its revitalization,” Moore noted. “However, Interior Architecture documented the students’ work in a booklet to help keep the hope for the future of the project alive.”

Related people:
Kevin Moore