Sesquicentennial Gate (aka Hedding College Pillars)

Posted on May 7, 2019 by Meg Miner

It’s almost twenty years since the pillars were installed by Felmley-Dickerson as our main campus entry! This post commemorates that legacy due to newly re-discovered images you will find below and a recently digitized film of the dedication. The text that follows is from this August 23, 2000 press release by Bob Aaron. [Photos were not part of the original press release. Click to enlarge. Additional images are available in the online historical collections.]

The University’s Sesquicentennial Gateway, located at the corner of Park and Empire, was dedicated on Oct. 14, 2000 as part of Homecoming festivities. The two-section curved gateway to the campus features two inscriptions: “Illinois Wesleyan University” and “1850 Scientia et Sapienta 2000” (the University’s motto, “Knowledge and Wisdom”).

Four pillars are the gateway’s architectural highlight. They were key design features that
straddled the entrance to a building at Hedding College, an Abingdon, Ill., campus, that merged with IWU in 1930.

: Advertisement for Hedding College showing the Main Building, ca. 1922

: Postcard with Hedding College’s Main building

The four limestone pillars are composed of eight segments each. Each pillar is about 25-feet tall. They stand on a wall five-to-six feet tall.

The Rev. Henry M. Bloomer, president of Hedding’s Board of Trustees, preserved the pillars in the hope they would one day be used to honor his mother and father and the joint heritage of Hedding College and IWU. His son, H. Harlan Bloomer, presented the pillars to IWU to commemorate the university’s sesquicentennial. The late Harlan Bloomer was married to Florence Bloomer, who is the granddaughter of Joseph Fifer, governor of Illinois from 1889-93, an 1868 graduate, and the 37th student to earn an IWU diploma.

: Segments at the Bloomer farm

: Segments in the IWU Park Street parking lot area

Help preserve our heritage!

Posted on May 1, 2019 by Meg Miner

The Society of American Archivists promotes May 1 as a day for all cultural heritage institutions to take time to consider how well their collections are protected.

At IWU’s University Archives, (located in Tate Archives & Special Collections, 4th floor, The Ames Library) we conduct collection assessments and use high quality material to protect the analog items in our care. We also subscribe to high quality digital preservation services and redundant storage media to protect historically important electronic files. Physical Plant’s Heating/Cooling crew conducts regular maintenance to make sure our environmental conditions are efficient and effective. Other maintenance personnel and cleaning crews from Physical Plant keep our building in good condition, too.

Protecting our collections is one of our fundamental responsibilities as archivists. But sometimes disasters are so devastating that all we can do is offer funding to support clean up and recovery. That was true in 2018, when Hurricanes María and Irma wreaked havoc on repositories in Puerto Rico and the US Virgin Islands.

The SAA Foundation’s National Disaster Recovery Fund for Archives was there to help, providing more than $37,000 in grants to support our colleagues. Here at the Ames Library, we also take a building-wide approach to disaster preparedness by conducting fire drills, having regular site visits with the crews of Bloomington’s Fire Department both to familiarize them with our floor plans and collection concerns and to give us their insights into our safety practices.

The whole reason we can have repositories for cultural heritage like archives and museums is because people have saved items significant to their lives and our collective history. Here’s what you can do to help:

1. Take a look around your home or wherever you store the mementos of your life and the lives of people who are important to you. Is a lot of it in long-term storage? Is the storage room subject to temperature and humidity fluctuation?

TIP: You don’t need to have cold storage to make paper and print photographic collections last. Constant levels of each are the most important thing. 70 degrees F is the upper recommended limit, but keeping storage spaces well-ventilated and preventing frequent fluctuation can help your stuff go a long way into the future.

2. Are your mementos sitting on the ground? Try putting a pallet underneath boxes or raising them 4-6 inches off the floor with something else.

3. Avoid stacking boxes directly on each other if at all possible. Open shelving is optimal: leaving space on all sides of stored material promotes air circulation and limits the chance that mold will develop.

4. Do you have digital files? Do you back up your hard drive or use a commercial company for online storage? If you’ve got a back up hard drive, is it located near your primary digital storage place? Explore ways to back up your important files and keep them in a separate location to lessen the chance for loss if there’s a fire or natural disaster in your area.

5. Are your digital images labeled? File names like DSC7723, DSC7724, and so on can accumulate faster than you think. After awhile, how will you know what you are saving?

TIP: At a minimum, make folders with event names and dates to store photos in or create an index that associates this information with the program-generated file names.

6. Are your physical collections falling apart? Books, photo albums, scrapbooks and textiles need attention if they are to last. Taking photos out of old albums whose adhesives are failing and making sure they’re labeled is a good start. Some books may be rebound, but many will survive well into the future in a box or wrapper designed for them. Photocopying or scanning newspaper clippings can preserve their information without the worry of deterioration due to typically acidic scrapbook pages and/or newspaper itself.

TIP: Don’t seal anything in a plastic bag! Condensation forms quickly in plastic and damp, airless environments promote mold growth.

If you have concerns about any of your personal collections, I’m happy to talk with you about them. Use the Library of Congress’s Personal Archiving tips and the American Library Association’s Preservation Week as opportunities to take stock of what you’re keeping, why it’s important to you and how you can act in ways that will keep your heritage safe for years to come!

Note: more ideas are available in one of my previous blog posts.

Named places: Buck Memorial Library

Posted on April 25, 2019 by Meg Miner

Buck Memorial Library is named for Rev. Dr. Hiram and Martha A. Buck. The Bucks became benefactors of the University starting in the 1890s with a donation of farmland. Hiram served as a trustee and Martha became IWU’s first female trustee on his death. On Mrs. Buck’s death a gift to the University included a request that funds be designated for a library and World Culture Center

Rev. Dr. Hiram Buck

Martha Buck

Buck was IWU’s first free-standing library and served our community in that capacity from 1923-1968. It continues to fill Martha Buck’s wishes as home to IWU’s World Languages, Literatures and Culture department.

More information on the Bucks is available in IWU’s Historical Sketch and Alumni Record (1895) pp. 50-53 available online at https://bit.ly/2QX8865

First African-American PhD in Sociology

Posted on April 12, 2019 by Meg Miner

This guest post was contributed by Carl Teichman, Director of Government and Community Relations, IWU President’s Office, and member of the Class of 1980. Teichman created this biographical summary through information found in Randall K. Burkett’s book Black Redemption: Churchmen Speak for the Garvey Movement (Temple University Press, 1978).

James Robert Lincoln Diggs was awarded a Ph.D. in Sociology from Illinois Wesleyan University in 1906, thereby becoming the first African-American to earn a Ph.D. in that discipline and the ninth to earn a Ph.D. in any field in the United States.

Diggs, whose Ph.D. thesis was titled “The Dynamics of Social Progress,” graduated from Wayland Seminary in Washington, D.C., in 1866, and went on to earn the A.B. and A.M. degrees from Bucknell University in 1898 and 1899.

After completing his academic training, Diggs was the head of several small black Baptist colleges in the south, including State University in Louisville, Ky., Virginia Theological Seminary and College in Lynchburg, Va., and Selma University in Selma, Ala. In 1914, he was named president of Clayton-Williams University in Baltimore. A year later he was called to the pastorate of Trinity Baptist Church in Baltimore, and he served as the minister there until his death in 1923.

Diggs was a colleague of W.E.B. DuBois and was one of the few black educators to participate in the Niagara Movement. Diggs was among the group of 29 prominent African-Americans who met secretly in Niagara Falls, Ont., in 1905 and drew up a manifesto that called for full civil liberties, abolition of racial discrimination, and recognition of human brotherhood. The Niagara Movement was the forerunner of the NAACP.

At the Niagara Movement’s Harper’s Ferry Convention in 1906, the year he received the Ph.D. from Illinois Wesleyan, Diggs lectured alongside Du Bois and Reverd D. Ransom. He was also a principal financial backer of the Niagara Movement’s journal, the Horizon. An early member of the NAACP, Diggs was president of the Baltimore division. He was also a member of the national Equal Rights League and served as its national vice president. Diggs was regarded for his scholarly sermons, including an eloquent defense of Marcus Garvey during the third International Convention of Garvey Universal Negro Improvement Association in August 1922.

Named places: Harriet House

Posted on March 30, 2019 by Meg Miner

Harriet Rust

Harriett House completes the Dodds/Dolan/Magill housing quadrangle. It opened in the Fall of 1997 and was the first new residence hall built on the IWU campus since 1970. At first only known as “New House,” the hall was renamed on May 10, 1999 to honor Harriett Fuller Rust, an Illinois Wesleyan trustee and president of the Illinois Wesleyan President’s Club from 1983 until her death in July 1997.

Mrs. Rust was actively involved in the campus and local community. At the time of the hall’s naming, then-president of the Board of Trustees Craig Hart said, “Her enthusiasm and energy has helped IWU in so many ways, but especially her strong commitment to our students makes this tribute especially appropriate.”

A video that pays tribute to Rust as a Bloomington-Normal “Woman of Distinction” is available at https://digitalcommons.iwu.edu/memorials/7.

IWU Firsts

Link

This timeline of IWU Firsts brings together research compiled for a variety of purposes into one interactive place. Contact the archivist (archives@iwu.edu) for further details on these people and events.

IWU Firsts timeline title card — Launch the timeline linked above or at https://tinyurl.com/y3v7bgwd

Research files: IWU Baseball & segregation

Posted on February 17, 2019 by Meg Miner

IWU Athletics made history with a 1930 spring Baseball training trip to the South (See the 1932 Wesleyana p. 133). A brief mention in the 1950 Wesleyana says IWU was the first school to take a team on this kind of trip annually. The trips spread IWU’s reputation and so were a good recruiting tool for out-of-state students. The Argus often attributes the success of our baseball teams to these non-Conference games and from the first mention on April 16, 1930 (p.6) it was clear that extra practice time was the primary goal.

A recent research request raised the question of our involvement with segregated schools during these trips. I have yet to find mention in the earliest articles on the subject, but in 1955 the Board of Trustees issued a statement that included a point about discrimination based on religion and race with regard to education. Our records are not clear about why such a policy was implemented but this was the year of the Montgomery Bus Boycott, so it is not difficult to imagine how topics in the larger world could influence decisions inside the Wesleyan Bubble.

Statement of Policy excerpt — Excerpt from a three page May 1955 IWU Bulletin insert titled “A Public Statement of Policy.”

More to the point of this post, on December 3, 1956 the Faculty Meeting Minutes show a question raised about policies regarding “colored players on our baseball trips and on other sports teams.” The Athletics Committee of the Board of Trustees took up the question.

IWU Board of Trustees' Committee on Athletic Relations with the stated purpose of reviewing athletics' policies and schedules. — 1956 committee details are unavailable. The 1958 Board of Trustees committee name and purpose is pictured here.

The committee brought a policy back to the faculty on January 7, 1957 which was debated and approved. The policy below was written by the Committee on Improvement of Athletics Relations on December 13, 1956.

A 1958 restatement of the 1956 policy that IWU would not schedule games with athletic teams that discriminated against members of IWU teams. — 1956 policy on athletics (Click to enlarge.)

A revision reported to the faculty on October 6, 1958 is pictured below and is attributed to the Committee on Athletic Policy. No separate records of these groups exist in the University’s archives and this statement was actually found in the March 1965 Faculty Meeting Minutes. It does not explicitly mention race and instead defines two criteria IWU uses, and expects its opponents to use, in determining eligibility of players.

Of course, agreed upon policies don’t always translate into actions. By early 1965 the faculty raised the question again. A February 5 (p. 3) Argus article implies that the Southern trips to segregated schools continue “because we at present have no Negro on the baseball team….” That statement is affirmed in a quote attributed to Jack Horenberger in the February 12, 1965 Argus (p. 1). Horenberger “agreed ‘in principle to the recommendation'” and added “that the present policy has never been fully invoked due to the fact that ‘he (sic) has never had a Negro come out for baseball.'” The same article mentions a new proposal that would prohibit IWU scheduling games with segregated schools regardless of the presence of an IWU athlete who is black.

A motion from the Human Relations Committee, which the February 5, 1965 Argus reports was recently formed, is raised at the March 1965 Faculty Meeting and is more explicit than previous statements regarding integrating athletic teams. It appears to receive approval and yet the record pictured below concludes that it is the 1958 policy that is ultimately affirmed.

This document shows the faculty affirming an explicit statement about playing only racially-integrated teams but the less explicit 1958 policy is affirmed. — March 1965 Faculty Meeting (click to enlarge)

At least one alumnus, the person who most recently prompted this inquiry, feels the policy was enforced. A further search of the student newspaper only reveals a later interview with a faculty member reminiscing on the controversy in the 1960s (February 22, 1985 Argus p. 6). She thought the lack of black athletes on IWU’s teams wasn’t a coincidence considering the poor climate of social justice on campus in the 1960s. Alumnus Luther Bedford (’59; track and 3x football letterman) shared his experiences, including examples of discrimination in this era, in a 1999 interview for the Minority Alumni Network.

Call for participation from Meg (your archivist):
A review of the sources for this post reveals several mentions of College Conference of Illinois and Wisconsin (CCIW) policies regarding scheduling competitions. It would be an interesting exercise to compile a list of the IWU Spring schedules in this era in order to identify segregation policies of the schools we played and to look at the development of specific rules for CCIW schools. I would also be interested in hearing stories from IWU athletes during this time period and from any others who were impacted by these decisions. You, too, can contribute to our knowledge of IWU’s history! Any takers? Contact archives {at} iwu.edu

Research files: MLK Day Teach-in history

Posted on February 7, 2019 by Meg Miner

This post provides a timeline for the student and faculty activism that led to the designation of an annual Teach-In day in honor of Martin Luther King, Jr.

[N.B., Many governance records, like Faculty and Student Senate Meeting minutes, are accessible online. If using the site from off campus, an IWU login is needed. I have summarized my findings for those who lack the necessary credentials.]

First mention of the issue being raised is in January 17, 2000 (pdf p. 3) by Faculty Meeting by Jared Brown. The minutes note that “a large number of faculty supported closing the university on this date. Other faculty spoke against closing fearing a lack of student participation in the many events the university plans to celebrate this day. “

Corresponding Student Senate minutes for March 5, 2000 (pdf p. 5) ask for a Senator’s participation on CC to draft a proposal.

There is a call-to-action in a January 20, 2006 Argus (p. 4) Editorial that provides some comparisons to the 2000 proposal but emphasizes that classes should be canceled on this national holiday as is the practice elsewhere.

A Faculty Meeting packet dated February 13, 2006 (pdf p. 17) contains a CC proposal from 2000 that suggests several ways in which the holiday might be celebrated:
“Curriculum Council recommends that IWU expand its current celebration by creating a three-day symposium that would celebrate King’s life and values in a variety of ways.”

Discussion on Martin Luther King day continues at the March 6, 2006 (pdf p. 8) Faculty Meeting.

Political Science honor society Pi Sigma Alpha sponsors a teach-in, reported in the January 19, 2007 Argus (p. 1) and some faculty bring their classes.

The issue is brought up in Senate again February 25, 2007 (pp. 10-12) and in the March 11, 2007 (p. 6) minutes, the Senate President announces the group reached a consensus on their desires for the day that will go to the President’s Office but the statement is not explicitly defined. At the October 7, 2007 (pp. 8-9) meeting, Senators state they want to revisit the issue.

The Action Research Center and Pi Sigma Alpha sponsor the next Teach-in. The January 18, 2008 Argus Editorial (p. 4) again calls for a day off.

The Teach-in became a regular, cross-campus offering in 2010. (See Argus article on January 22, 2010.) The class schedule for the day remained unchanged but the Argus notes that “Students came in waves from their classes….”

Named places: Hansen Student Center

Posted on January 20, 2019 by Meg Miner

The Hansen family is shown in the center at the ribbon cutting at the dedication on January 12, 2002

Hansen Student Center is named in honor of lead donor Tom Hansen, Class of 1982. His gift made it possible to remodel the Memorial Gymnasium, the first athletic facility on IWU’s campus, which was built in 1922. The building was dedicated to IWU students who died in World War One and their names can still be seen at the entry to the main court, across from the Information Desk. The basement, now Tommy’s, once contained IWU’s first swimming pool. A dedication ceremony for Hansen took place on January 12, 2002.

The campus announced Hansen’s gift in an October 28, 1999 press release and the IWU Magazine ran a post-renovation feature story titled A Place to Call Their Own in the Summer 2002 issue.

Photo selections from the Memorial Gym’s early days are available online; more of these and of Hansen are held in the University’s archives online.

Examining a scale model of the Memorial Gym/Hansen renovation

Named places: Wilson Atrium

Posted on January 7, 2019 by Meg Miner

President and Mrs. Wilson, November 16, 2010

The Wilson Atrium in the Center for Natural Science Learning and Research (CNS) is named in honor of IWU’s 18^th President Richard F. Wilson (2004-2015 and interim in summer 2019) and his wife, Patricia L. Wilson. Wilson gave special attention to developing a strategic plan for Illinois Wesleyan, strengthening the University’s financial position, and conducting the largest fund-raising campaign in the school’s history. Along with financing The Wilson Atrium seal, plaques and lettering, members of the Board of Trustees furnished the atrium with new chairs and couches to make the space more comfortable and functional in honor of Richard and Patricia Wilson.

Unveiling the seal at the Wilson Atrium dedication, May 7, 2018.

Archives & Special Collections

Collection highlights and information about IWU's Tate Archives & Special Collections

Author Archives: Meg Miner