In 1963, University President Douglas Knight commissioned Alden B. Dow to design an official residence.

[2][4][6] On April 6, 1968 the Silent Vigil at Duke University, a week-long silent demonstration following the Assassination of Martin Luther King Jr., kicked-off with 450 students marching two miles from campus to Knight House to deliver a list of demands to Douglas Knight for a restructuring of Duke University, so that the institution would be less threatening to African-American students and employees.

[7][8] The demands included that Knight publish an advertisement in the Durham Morning Herald calling for a day of mourning for Rev.

Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., that he raise the minimum wage to $1.60 for university employees, and that he resign from the then-segregated Hope Valley Country Club.

[7] Knight received the students during the protest, and invited them into the house, spending the entire night negotiating the terms of their demands.