"A Plan of Belle-Air."

This map details the 197 acre property purchased by the Augustinian community for the sum of $18,000 on 13 October 1841 from the estate of the late John Rudolph. Rudolph had been a Catholic merchant in Philadelphia and an officer during the American Revolution. (Photograph of a hand-drawn map which was printed in Reverend Thomas C. Middleton, O.S.A., D.D., Historical Sketch of the Augustinian Monastery, College and Mission of St. Thomas of Villanova, 1893.

This is Belle-Air; the John Rudolph mansion built in 1806, as it looked in 1842 when the Augustinians acquired the house and surrounding grounds.

This 1856 photograph shows the enlarged and renovated Belle-Air mansion on the left, the 1848 College Building (Alumni Hall) in the center, and the old Rudolph barn on the right. (Photograph by J. E. Mclees, Philadelphia).