Duke Divinity School’s Addition Named for the Rev. Hugh Westbrook; Existing Facilities Named for Thomas Langford

December 6, 2004
Note: This article was updated on Feb. 9, 2006

Duke Divinity School will celebrate its past and its future in naming its addition as well as its 1972 wing.

Westbrook

The addition, slated for completion this spring, will be named in honor of the Rev. Hugh A. Westbrook, a 1970 divinity graduate who co-founded and is former CEO of VITAS Healthcare Corp. of Miami. He and his wife, Carole Shields Westbrook, have given or arranged for gifts of nearly $20 million in recent years to support a variety of projects in the divinity school, most notably the Duke Institute on Care at the End of Life, said Dean L. Gregory Jones.

The portion of the divinity school completed in 1972, formerly known as New Divinity, has been renamed The Thomas A. Langford Building in honor of the former school professor and dean who later served as Duke University provost. Langford, who died in 2000, was associated with the university for five decades.

The original divinity building, which also houses Duke Universitys Department of Religion, still will be called the Gray Building.

The namings were approved by the Duke University Board of Trustees Dec. 3.

The Westbrook Building will include Goodson Chapel, substantial classroom space and offices for the Duke Institute on Care at the End of Life. The $22 million addition also will provide student life offices, a refectory and other spaces to accommodate learning and prayer. The project includes 53,000 square feet of new and renovated space.

"Hugh Westbrook has been a pioneer in hospice and end-of-life care, and we have been blessed by the Westbrooks’ love for Duke Divinity School and their philanthropy in launching our Institute on Care at the End of Life," Jones said. "Their commitment to improve care for people at the end of life has been pivotal in enabling us to build our addition, and it is fitting that the building that will house the institute’s offices will bear their name."

The institute, begun in 2000 with gifts arranged by Westbrook, works to improve research, education and practice in the care of those near death through multi-disciplinary study and collaboration across campus and beyond. Activities include research; classroom teaching; training for health professionals, pastors and other caregivers; and offering information and educational programs to the public.

While earning his master’s degree at Duke, Westbrook focused on ethics and pastoral care. For the next decade, he served as a pastor in North Carolina and Florida and worked as a hospital chaplain caring for terminally ill patients and their families. In 1978, he and Esther Colliflower founded VITAS, which provides hospice care to about 50,000 patients and bereavement services to more than 125,000 people each year.

Langford

Langford began his association with Duke University as a student, earning bachelor and Ph.D. degrees. He became a professor, joining the university’s faculty in 1956, and he was dean of the divinity school from 1971 to 1981. He served as the university’s provost from 1990 to 1994.

Langford was known across Duke for maintaining high standards of scholarship and teaching as well as service to the university community.

"Tom Langford’s half-century of distinguished leadership is well-remembered in the Divinity School and across Duke University," Jones said. "His incisive mind, wise counsel, gracious spirit and faithful commitment to both church and academy were gifts to all who knew him. I especially appreciated him as a teacher and mentor. We are thrilled to honor his legacy by naming the Old Divinity and New Divinity buildings, in which he worked and served, in his memory."