When a new law school building was built in 1952, the name Petigru College was given to it and the 1919 building was renamed Currell College to honor William S. Currell, USC's president when it was built, and it was then used by the history department.

[3] The building's redbrick exterior was a departure from USC's standard of gray-painted stucco over brick on all of its previous buildings, except the South Caroliniana Library and Lieber College, and according to USC historian Daniel Walker Hollis: " ... it has been something of an architectural misfit on the inner campus ever since.

The annex, while built of redbrick, is utilitarian and does not continue the collegiate Gothic features of the original building.

Currell College today is the home of the USC Department of Criminology and Criminal Justice.

The Currell College Annex houses the USC Office of Special Events/[5] The 1919 building excluding the annex is a contributing property in the Old Campus District, University of South Carolina, which was added to the National Register of Historic Places on June 5, 1970.