Wake Forest University honored the legacies of Professor Beth N. Hopkins and Dr. Larry D. Hopkins at a formal dedication ceremony of Hopkins Hall on Saturday, Oct. 25. The honorific renaming of the former South Residence Hall was announced in February 2025.
Homecoming weekend brought alumni of all generations to campus, many of whom gathered in front of Hopkins Hall for the ceremony, alongside current students and staff. President Susan R. Wente opened the ceremony, and was followed by many guests who spoke of the impact of Beth and Larry Hopkins.
“There are so many reasons to celebrate this building being named for Beth and Larry Hopkins,” J. Reid Morgan, former senior vice president and general counsel member for Wake Forest, said in his speech. “It is certainly a way of expressing the gratitude and admiration in our hearts today. And, it is a way of honoring model lives and their golden, magical story at Wake Forest.”
Beth Hopkins’ impact on the University began when she first set foot on Wake Forest’s campus in 1969 as one of the first two African American female students to live in a residence hall. As an undergraduate student, she worked purposefully towards her goal of becoming a lawyer and to push through the prejudice that her and fellow Black students faced.
“We had decided that nobody was going to outwork us,” Hopkins said in an interview with the Old Gold & Black. “So, we were really very determined, very academically oriented, very goal-oriented and we were unified.”
Upon graduation, Beth Hopkins attended law school at the College of William & Mary. Following several years working for prominent law firms in Virginia and Louisiana, Hopkins returned to Winston-Salem with her husband and began working in Wake Forest’s history department and law school, while her husband went into medicine.
The most rewarding part of her work here, Hopkins said, was “being in the classroom, watching minds evolve, listening to really good discussions about how one culture perceived the other culture, and how we could come to an understanding as to what was important to each culture.”
Charlie Crisp, a 2021 graduate of Wake Forest, attended the dedication ceremony in support of her former teacher, Hopkins.
“To me, it seemed like a big world, so there was a lot that I didn’t know about race and she exposed me to a lot. She opened my eyes to so much and challenged how I saw the world,” Crisp said. “I just appreciate her so much for that and the difference she made for me in broadening my horizons. So, I owe her a lot.”
Larry Hopkins entered Wake Forest in the fall of 1970 on a football scholarship and was the Demon Deacon’s starting running back for two years. He graduated in 1972 as the first African American at Wake Forest to earn a degree in chemistry.
After graduating from Wake Forest School of Medicine in 1977, Larry Hopkins completed his residency at Virginia Commonwealth University. He served in the United States Air Force for several years before returning to Winston-Salem to practice obstetrics and gynecology at Forsyth Hospital and Baptist Hospital.
Larry Hopkins passed away in November 2020. Hopkins considers her husband’s greatest legacy to be his instrumental role in convincing Forsyth Hospital to build a center in the Boston Thurman section of Winston-Salem, an area that, at the time, had the highest infant mortality rate in the United States.
“They will remember Dr. Hopkins as one who was committed to serve all of his patients, irrespective of their economic resources,” Hopkins said. “In fact, his motto was to treat every patient as he would have treated his mother or me.”
The Hopkins mentored hundreds of students in their time as Wake Forest trustees. The lasting impact they had on the community was undeniable during the dedication ceremony. Friends, students, colleagues and family spoke towards the guidance, love and encouragement that the Hopkins gave to everyone they met.
To many attendees of the event, the naming of Hopkins Hall is symbolic of the history and strength of Black culture on the Wake Forest campus.
“This is a celebration that we’ve been waiting for at Wake Forest,” class of 2012 alumna Carmen Lee Hazel Green said. “It [marks] the long-term development and cultivation of multicultural studies, of Black history on this campus and maintaining that through a stamp like this of having a residence hall.”
The last speaker of the ceremony, Hopkins, shared her thanks on behalf of herself and her husband. Her words mirrored the love and selflessness at the heart of the Hopkins’ legacies, and she called current and future generations towards hope and justice.
“Together, our community will traverse the current storms,” she said. “Many of us have been working and praying for humanity a long time. I ask that you sing for justice, that you run for fair play, that you shout for the greater good. And as a Wake Forest and Winston Salem community, let the world know that we are not afraid to march for the truth.”
