Indiana's state government in Corydon founded Indiana University in 1820 as the "State Seminary." It was originally located at what is now called Seminary Square Park near the intersection of Second Street and College Avenue.[9] The 1816 Indiana state constitution required that the General Assembly (Indiana's state legislature) create a "general system of education, ascending in a regular gradation, from township schools to a state university, wherein tuition shall be gratis, and equally open to all." It took some time for the legislature to fulfill its promise, partly due to a debate regarding whether the Indiana Territory's land-grant public university—what is now Vincennes University—should be adopted as the State of Indiana's public university or whether a new public university should be founded in Bloomington to replace the territorial university. While the original state-issued legislative charter for IUB was granted in 1820, construction began in 1822; the first professor was hired in 1823; classes were offered in 1824. The first class graduated in 1830. Throughout this period and until the rechartering of Vincennes University from a four-year institution to a two-year institution in 1889, a legal-cum-political battle was fought between the territorial-chartered public university in Vincennes and the State of Indiana on behalf of the state-chartered public university in Bloomington, including the legal case (Trustees for Vincennes University v Indiana, 1853) which was appealed to the Supreme Court of the United States.
IU developed rapidly in its first years. The hiring of Andrew Wylie, its first president, in 1829 signified the school's growing professionalism. The General Assembly changed the school's name to "Indiana College" in the same year. In 1838 the legislature changed the school's name for a final time to Indiana University.
Wylie's death in 1851 marks the end of the university's first period of development. IU now had nearly a hundred students and seven professors. Despite the university's more obviously secular purpose, presidents and professors were still expected to set a moral example for their charges. It was only in 1885 that a non-clergyman, biologist David Starr Jordan, became president.
Between Wylie and Jordan's administrations, the University grew slowly. Few changes rocked the university's repose. One development is interesting to modern scholars: the college admitted its first woman student, Sarah Parke Morrison in 1867, making IU the one of the first state universities to admit women on an equal basis with men. Morrison went on to become the first female professor at IU in 1873.
IU developed rapidly in its first years. The hiring of Andrew Wylie, its first president, in 1829 signified the school's growing professionalism. The General Assembly changed the school's name to "Indiana College" in the same year. In 1838 the legislature changed the school's name for a final time to Indiana University.
Wylie's death in 1851 marks the end of the university's first period of development. IU now had nearly a hundred students and seven professors. Despite the university's more obviously secular purpose, presidents and professors were still expected to set a moral example for their charges. It was only in 1885 that a non-clergyman, biologist David Starr Jordan, became president.
Between Wylie and Jordan's administrations, the University grew slowly. Few changes rocked the university's repose. One development is interesting to modern scholars: the college admitted its first woman student, Sarah Parke Morrison in 1867, making IU the one of the first state universities to admit women on an equal basis with men. Morrison went on to become the first female professor at IU in 1873.
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