University of Oregon

“ The university of Oregon was established by the legislature in 1872, and is under the control of a board of nine directors, six of whom are appointed by the governor. It receives from the state as an endowment the “university fund,” amounting to more than $50,000. Grounds have been selected and buildings erected near Eugene City, but the institution has not yet (1875) been opened.—According to the census of 1870, the number of libraries was 2,361, with 344,959 volumes, of which 2,195, with 273,427 volumes, were private. Those not private were classified as follows: 1 state, 3,578 volumes ”

“ Here is an added reason why the site of Columbia College should be marked, for out of it grew, indirectly, the University of Oregon, which should be and is the foremost educational in- stitution in the State. Wherever settlements have been made within territory be- longing to the United States, Uncle Sam's strong arm has ex- tended its protection over his people and courts of justice have been organized. ”

“ The institution opened October 16, 1876, with 80 pupils in the collegiate and 75 in the preparatory departments; 43 in the collegiate department were non-paying, the university law allowing one free scholarship to each county, and one to each member of the legislature. Owing to the want of money, there was not a full board of professors; those who were first to organize a class for graduation had many difficulties to contend with. ”

“ Watts, the republican elector from Oregon was counted, without which Hayes could not have been elected to the Presidency.
Univenity of Oregon. The predecessor of the University of Oregon was Columbia College. This college, which was located (1660) by the Presbyterians at Eugene, Oregon, trained many prominent men and women, among whom was the poet, Joaquin Miller. However, the school languished for want of patronage: and it became evident that a stronger organization was necessary to continue an institution of higher learning in that locality under conditions then prevailing. ”

“ This university has never received one dollar from the state, or any public tax or emolument; and is now after all these years of labor able to offer instruction in a college of Liberal Arts, and in schools of Theology, Law, Medicine, Oratory, and Music, with a corps of fifty-four professors and teachers. The activities of the University are carried on in seven buildings, all of which have been the gifts of enthusiastic Oregon friends. Recently a cash endowment of half a million dollars has been raised by friends of the institution in and out of Oregon ”

“ The religious influences are Congregational, but the institution is not a denominational one. It stands on an independent basis, embodying clear and pronounced educational ideas of its own. It is attaining a growth as one of the distinctive institutions of Oregon, and its prosperity seems assured." In connection with the university is an academy for young ladies, some of the students of which also take the college course. ”

“ The manual-labor school building, which had cost the Mission between $8,000 and $10,000, with the farm belonging to it, and the mill site, was sold to the trustees of the Oregon Institute for $4,000, and that institution was removed from the site first selected on Wallace Prairie by Jason Lee, to the larger and better building on Chemeketa plain, where in the autumn of 1844 a school for white children was first opened by Mrs Chloe A. Clark Willson, from which has grown the Methodist college known as the Willamette University. ”

“ It may take fifty years to carry out large plans that will make Oregon a witness to the best in the past, but the preparation will foster reverence and stimulate ambition. It is significant to the youth of our State that the oldest building on the campus of the State University is named Deady Hall in memory of one who for nearly twenty years as first president of its board of regents was devoted to its interests. Villard Hall keeps ever before them the generosity of a benefactor, the faith of Henry Villard in the West and in higher education. ”

“ During the 6o's, J. W. Johnson, later the first president of the University of Oregon, served four years as principal. In 1922 its name was changed to Linfield College. The following song, copyrighted in 1917, was a belated original production for so old a school:
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To You We're Always True With purpose true as heart of oak that stand beside her door, With heart as pure as snow-crowned hills that look her campus o'er, Our college stands for all that's true in learning, work, or play; For truth and right, we'll win the fight, we'll win for you today. ”

“ Their graduates could deliver eloquent orations, and preach good sermons on Sundays, and could write fair prose on practical or philosophic subjects, even if it was somewhat thickly sprinkled with quotations in sign of learning. And in text at least their songs average much higher than other Oregon songs.
These are of much later vintage than would be looked for in institutions of such long histories. Willamette University is the oldest university west of the Rocky Mountains, and on the campus of Pacific University is the old Tualatin Academy building that has been in constant use since 1851. ”

“ Pacific University at least does not think she has lived altogether in vain.
Her growth has been slow partly because the population of Oregon has never been great. When Dr. Atkinson came to Oregon there were not more than 7,000 people in the state.
In 1870 Oregon, Washington and Idaho combined had only 130,000.
The rush for gold in '48- '49 drew one-half or two-thirds of the able-bodied men from Washington County. And yet in 1912 Oregon ranked third in having the highest percentage of students in college or one to every 150 of the population. ”

“ Some of these institutions died early; others, as at Monmouth and Corvallis, were merged into state institutions. A few survive as Christian academies and colleges.
Among those which perished were the Clackamas "female seminary" at Oregon City, a college at Eugene, and academies at Sheridan and Santiam. Among the surviving schools are Willamette University, Pacific University, Albany College, and McMinnville College. To this last was turned over the remnant of the property of that Oregon City college, whose early history is given in these letters. ”

“ The graduates of Pacific University number less than 400 its student body has never been large but among that small number have been some of the ablest and finest men and women who have helped to make Oregon, and that noblest thing in a state, a noble citizenship. ”

“ But this institute formed a nucleus around which all the Methodist sentiment and action rallied; and out of it grew the more pretentious enterprise of the Willamette University. And the University Sun had in turn its satellites, the Wilbur Academy in Umpqua county, the Sheridan Academy, the Dallas Academy, and the Santiam Academy at Lebanon in Linn county, and the Portland Academy. A seminary for young ladies was established at Oregon City, in 1851, and controlled and managed jointly by the Methodists and Congregationalists and of which Rev. Harvey Clark was the first teacher. ”

“ A Pioneer Heroine — A Founder of Pacific University in order to be with her sons and grandchildren that had removed to Oregon, she crossed the plains with an ox team, coming into Oregon by the Southern route, and suffering the extremity of dangers and trials on the trip. The experience of Mrs. Brown in her life and death struggle to reach Oregon will be good for the pupils of Pacific University to read while they are getting an education in the college she founded, surrounded by every comfort and convenience. ”

“ The institution struggled on, but in 1856–7 some of its most advanced students left it to go to the better endowed eastern colleges. This led the trustees and president to make a special effort, and Marsh went to New York to secure further aid, leaving the university department in the charge of Rev. H. Lyman, professor of mathematics, who associated with him Rev. C. Eells. The help received from the college society and others in the east, enabled the university to improve the general régime of the university. ”

“ In explaining the origin of Pacific University it may be said that it was, in general, the outcome of those forces in American life which have been instrumental in starting educational institutions everywhere along the line of settlement as it has extended westward; more particularly the institution was the product of that religious and missionary zeal which has played so prominent a part in the development of the West; and most directly the institution owes its existence to a few sturdy and benevolent personalities who will always be known as its founders. ”

“ The methodist church at The Dalles was built in 1862 by J. F. Devore, at a time when mining enterprises were beginning to develop the eastern portion of the state.
The methodists have been foremost in propagating their principles by means of schools, as the history of the Willamette University illustrates. In new communities these means seem to be necessary to give coherence to effort, and have proved beneficial. Willamette University, which absorbed the Oregon Institute, was incorporated January 12, 1853. ”

“ Here we only wish to point out that the university movement grew out of a high-school agitation, and that this was the result of a deep-seated desire on the part of representative citizens to have a school of higher grade within their midst, both on account of its benefit to the town, and because they naturally preferred to educate their sons and daughters at home. It is noteworthy that several of the leaders in the university movement had, twelve years before, been students of Columbia College. ”

“ Or, what is worse, leave the rising generation in Oregon unprovided with even the means of acquiring a business education, and our churches uncared for in the great work of raising up a living ministry in our midst? Will you once more send us a man for Oregon City University? ”

“ Deady's motion to strike out the provision for a state university ls for, he said, experience had demonstrated that state universities were of little use to anybody. Mr. Reed thought that every avenue to the acquisition of knowledge should be opened. Mr. Peebles stated that the University of New York was in a flourishing condition. Mr. Boise said the situation in Oregon was peculiar. Other institutions in the older states were so far away that the parents did not want to let their children go so far from home at such an early age. ”

“ Joseph Schafer makes this a fitting time to recognize the important part which he played from 1900 to 1920 in promoting historical studies in Oregon. In the primary responsibility of developing the department of history in the University, he succeeded largely because of a certain contagious enthusiasm in research, particularly in the field of Oregon and western history. The students in his classes felt that history was a living subject and that they could further it. ”

“ By the Donation Act of September 27, 1850, each family settled in Oregon was entitled to a section and each unmarried man to a half-section. The reservation of sections 16 and 36 for schools was reaffirmed, and these public lands of the people of the territory were supplemented by a grant of two townships, and the unsold remnant of the "Oregon City claim," to aid in the establishment of a university. The special liberality to Oregon settlers was continued down to 1855. ”

“ It is interesting to note that the presence of the university in Eugene is used as an argument in favor of the building project. "We cannot go before the legislature with very good grace and ask for state aid for the university when we do not show enterprise enough to have a decent, respectable district schoolhouse." ↑ While the school was not yet wholly free, it was nearly so. In 1878 the directors asked the patrons to pay a rate of fifty cents per quarter for each pupil. ”

“ Then comes that heroic pioneer Methodist missionary, Rev. Jason Lee, whose mission, as often has been the case, was to found schools as well as churches; and in 1842 the Oregon Institute at Chemeketa or North Salem, was begun primarily as a school for Indian children though the school was not formally opened till 1844. Out of this grew in time Willamette University, which received its college charter from the Territorial Legislature in 1853, just one year before Pacific University received its charter. ”

“ An agricultural college was established by simply paying for the tuition of twenty-three pupils at an ordinary academy, at ordinary academy charges. [66] A university was established, by requiring the town where it was located to furnish a site and a building, and paying the faculty out of the university fund. The Modoc war, also, which occurred during Grover s term of office, added some consequence to his administration, which, excepting that of Governor Gibbs, was the most busy, for good or evil, of any which had occurred in the history of the state. ”

“ The sale included, in addition to the real property, the bell, seats, and other equipment. The money received by the conference from this sale and from the rent due was transferred to the endowment fund of Willamette University. The piano belonging to the seminary was given to Umpqua Academy and the books and apparatus were given to the Portland Academy.
Thus the Methodist educational activities came to an end, just as all of the private and religious schools of early Oregon City were destined to do. The competition of the public school was too great for private enterprises. ”