On a beautiful hillside just off one of the main highways in North Georgia, in 1919 Franklin Springs Institute was born, with students, faculty, and staff utilizing several wooden structures that had been built some time before to accommodate visitors who came to the Franklin Springs resort to rest and enjoy the surroundings as well as the spring water rich in minerals thought to be beneficial to the consumer. Mineral springs were popular resort areas in the nineteenth century, and Franklin Springs was typical. By 1917 there were two hotels and a skating rink on the property. These buildings formed the facility first used as a school campus.

The first brick veneer building to be erected on church property in 1919 housed printing equipment to publish church literature. This building later became the college's Music Hall and then Nash Hall. Then in 1923 President G. F. Taylor began construction on a large concrete and stone academic building not on the site of the other structures but on a hill two blocks away toward Royston. After two years of struggling to secure funds to finish this facility, it finally opened in May of 1925. Later abandoned by the college and used as a publishing house for the church, this large stone building was demolished in 1967. The next building was begun in 1928 and still stands as phase one of Jackson Hall, a women's residence. The large three story administration-classroom building known today as the Aaron Building was constructed in 1940. The main campus quadrangle was further developed in 1948 when the Taylor Memorial Building was completed. Then in 1953 phase two, a large addition to Jackson Hall, was completed.

Wellons Hall, a men's dormitory, was completed in 1958, and Drum Hall, another residence building, was occupied in 1975. The Shaw-Leslie Learning Resources Center, is a beautifully designed structure and was completed in 1981. During the 1990's the Student Activities Center, Wellons Science Center, King Street Dorm and Melton Hall were built. In 2000, Emmanuel remodeled the old Westclock building into the John W. Swails Center and built the Teacher's Education building.