Truman State University

Truman State University is a public liberal arts and sciences university in Missouri. It is located in the city of Kirksville in northeastern Missouri, and is named after President Harry Truman, the only American President from the state. Up until 1996, the school was known as Northeast Missouri State University. The name was changed, along with its mission statement, in order to attract more attention from the media, state government, and potential students.

Campus

Situated in the southern portion of the city of Kirksville, Truman's main campus is situated around a slightly wooded quadrangle.

By longstanding policy, the entire campus is officially "dry," meaning that alcohol is not allowed (though the president of the university has the authority to make exceptions, and past presidents have, for example, permitted alcoholic beverages at special gatherings in the University Residence).

Buildings on the Quad include Baldwin Hall, Pickler Memorial Library, the Kirk Memorial, Kirk Building (the oldest building on campus, built in 1922), and Ophelia Parrish (visual and performing arts educational facility). Other structures are generally situated behind or near buildings on the Quad, and these include the Missouri Hall dormitory, the Blanton-Nason-Brewer Hall complex dormitory, the Dobson Hall dormitory, Violette Hall (educational facility), a Career and Health Center, and Magruder Hall (a newly renovated science facility).

Four university buildings are situated along the border of the traditional university on Franklin Street to the west, including Barnett Hall (science and nursing education facility), the Student Recreational Center, Centennial Hall dormitory, a new suite-style dormitory for upperclassmen (yet to be named), the Student Union building, and McClain Hall (administration and education facility). To the south of the original campus includes Ryle Hall dormitory, Fair Apartments (including a small convenience store operated by campus food service, Sodexho), E.C. Grim Hall dormitory, and the Pershing Building athletic facility.

Pickler Memorial Library is the main library. It is named after Samuel M. Pickler who donated funds to rebuild the library after it was destroyed by fire in 1924. It was renovated in 1993. It is home to main computer lab on campus. The library contains a total of approximately 450,000 volumes.

The aforementioned Kirk Memorial is a small, domed structure near the geographic center of the campus. It is built almost entirely with materials from Missouri. The structure is a memorial to John Kirk, fifth president of the university. Currently, it houses Truman's renowned debate team, in addition to a museum of Missouri history and classrooms for the university.

History

Truman State University was founded in 1867 by Joseph Baldwin as the First Missouri Normal School and Commercial College. Baldwin is considered a pioneer in education and his school quickly gained official recognition in 1870 by the Missouri General Assembly, which designated it as the first public teaching college in Missouri. The Joseph Baldwin Academy, a current summer program, is housed at Truman. It was named after Joseph Baldwin.

A region of 25 Missouri counties was designated as the school's college district and still remains. The counties are as follows: Adair, Audrain, Boone, Callaway, Chariton, Clark, Howard, Knox, Lewis, Lincoln, Linn, Marion, Macon, Monroe, Montgomery, Pike, Putnam, Ralls, Randolph, St. Charles, Schuyler, Scotland, Shelby, Sullivan and Warren.

The school continued to grow and Basil Brewer wrote the school song "The Purple and White" in 1902. The song's popularity prompted the university to adopt the school colors as purple and white.

Thirteen years later, in 1915, the bulldog became the official mascot of the college (two bulldogs are currently the "mascots" of the university, Spike and Simone). In 1924 a massive fire destroyed Old Baldwin Hall and the library. Both Baldwin Hall and the library were rebuilt, with funds for the new library donated by alumnus Joseph Pickler. The broad pond in the quadrangle (a prominent feature in pre-1924 photographs of the campus) was pumped dry in a futile attempt to put out the fire. The depression was filled in with debris from the ruined buildings and covered over.

The college was renamed Northeast Missouri State University in 1972, and in 1983 the university was awarded the G. Theodore Mitau Award for Innovation and Change in Higher Education by the American Association of State Colleges and Universities.

Northeast Missouri State continued its push for excellence and had not gone unnoticed by the state government. On June 20, 1985, Governor John Ashcroft signed a bill that designated the university as Missouri's only statewide public liberal arts and sciences university. This changed the school's mission to a state-wide rather than a regional (northeast) objective. As such, nearly 100 programs were dropped in the span of six years, including all two-year programs and those not fulfulling the liberal arts mission.

The school continued to win praise from such publications as US News and World Report and its reputation spread. Many of the students by-passed crowded and costly alternatives in favor of Truman's small size, pleasant small-town atmosphere and rigorous academic studies in the liberal arts and sciences.

By the 1990s, the university no longer was solely a teachers' college. The college had a nationally-known accounting division, schools of science and mathematics, computer science and literature. Indeed, just 10 years after Governor Ashcroft's designation, Governor Mel Carnahan signed legislation renaming the school Truman State University. Several schools had petitioned for the Truman name, but only Northeast Missouri State University demonstrated the academic excellence and national reputation worthy of being named after Missouri's only president. Truman State University has since become Missouri's premier public liberal arts and sciences institution, informally dubbing itself the "Harvard of the Midwest". Over the years, students have come up with various jests on this nickname, such as the "Princeton of the Prairie" and "MIT of Highway 63", especially after several other schools began to identify themselves as the "Harvard of the Midwest".

Currently, there are approximately 6,000 students earning degrees in 43 undergraduate and 9 graduate programs. Ninety-four percent of graduates go on to work and study fields related to their degree of study. President Barbara Dixon is the current president of the university. She is the 14th president of the school. The names and legacies of past university presidents continue to live on in buildings and monuments around campus.

Campus Lore

The weathervane atop Kirk Memorial is welded in place so that it always points northeast, in honor of the school's previous name and identity.
"The Ghost of Centennial Hall" is named "Joan," said to be a student killed in an auto accident in the 1970s. "Charlotte" and an unnamed little boy have haunted Grim Hall for 70 years, and "Gina" watches over the women of Ryle. See external link "Truman Ghost Stories," below.
Students traditionally stuck their chewing gum on a redbud on the east side of campus, and the "gum tree" was covered in colorful wads. The University Physical Plant cut down the tree in 2000, but students quickly adopted another tree.
For many years, an irregularly-shaped portion of sidewalk was called the "sacred potato," and was the focus of a number of rituals and superstitions: one should never step on it if one had a test that same day; sticking a knife into a potato on the spot at midnight warded off a flunking grade. Else stepping on the sacred potato had been rumored to cause one to either fail their next test or become pregnant. Around 2002 campus facilities replaced the sidewalk, sparking student complaints.
The sunken garden, site of many student weddings, is actually the cellar left from the Baldwin Hall fire of 1924.
Because of the frequency of student weddings at the sunken garden, a campus myth came into common circulation. It is alleged that if a new couple has their first kiss at midnight on one of the two benches that are located in the sunken garden, that couple will eventually get married.
Many wonder who "Smarsh" was; a brass plaque beneath a tree just north of Ophelia Parrish Hall honors the senior euphonium and bass trombone performer, killed in a car accident July 3, 1994. He is also remembered with the Robert Scott Marshall Memorial Scholarship.

Previous names

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Years	Name
1867-1868	North Missouri Normal and Commercial School
1868-1870	North Missouri Normal School
1870-1918	North Missouri Normal School of the First District
1918-1968	Northeast Missouri State Teachers College (Commonly called Kirksville State Teachers College)
1968-1972	Northeast Missouri State College
1972-1996	Northeast Missouri State University
1996-	Truman State University

University presidents

Truman State University maintains a long tradition of naming its campus buildings, including educational facilities and dormitories, after its previous university presidents.

Joseph Baldwin (1867-1881)
William P. Nason (1881-1882)
Joseph Blanton (1882-1891)
William D. Dobson (1891-1899)
John R. Kirk (1899-1925)

Contrary to popular belief, the city of Kirksville was not named in honor of John R. Kirk.

Eugene Fair (1925-1937)

A native of Harrison County, Missouri, the annual football game against Northwest Missouri State University was established in 1930 when Northwest president Uel Lamkin sent Fair a polished hickory stick from the farm where Fair was born. The "Hickory Stick" has since been contested annually. ^*

Walter H. Ryle (1937-1967)
F. Clark Elkins (1967-1969)
Eli F. Mittler (1969-1970)
Charles J. McClain (1970-1989)
Robert A. Dager (1989-1990)
Russell G. Warren (1990-1994)
W. Jack Magruder (1994-2003)
Barbara Dixon (2003-Present)

Board of Governors

Truman State's Board of Governors consists of ten members. Each member is appointed by the Governor of Missouri to serve a four-year term, with a student representative serving for two years. The ten members must meet residental requirements defined by Missouri law as follows:

Four voting members from inside Truman's regional boundary, provided that not more than one person from the same county is selected.
Three voting members from in-state, provided that not more than one person is from the same college region defined by Missouri state law. (For example, Missouri Western State University's college region consists of the counties of Andrew, Buchanan, Clinton, DeKalb, and Platte counties. Therefore, if a current member is from St. Joseph the governor cannot appoint someone from any of those five counties.)
Two non-voting members from out-of-state. Current Housing and Urban Development secretary Alphonso Jackson, a graduate of Truman, served on the board in this capacity for two terms.
One non-voting member who is a current full-time Truman student. Student groups including the Bulldog Party have lobbied the state to allow this member to vote. The Truman Student Senate recently passed a unanimous resolution calling for a student to become a voting member of the Board of Governors and sent the resolution to every member of the Missouri Legislature.

Residence Halls

In the 1960s the university built Dobson Hall (1961), Ryle Hall (1963), Missouri Hall (1965) and Centennial Hall (1967). There are two other dormitories on campus: Blanton-Nason-Brewer (1948, Brewer added in 1959) and Ezra C. Grim Hall (originally a local home, later incorporated as a dormitory in the 1920s).

Dobson Hall

Dobson Hall is coed by wing and houses roughly 400 students who share community bathrooms. As of the spring semester of 2006, keypads have been installed and will be used as opposed to keys. Each floor is equipped with a lounge and a kitchenette (except first floor). There is a pool table and foosball table on the first floor and a ping-pong table has recently been added. Mail is distributed in a common mail-box area and packages are picked up by residents at the hall desk. The hall houses a computer lab and in-house laundry facilities. It does not have a cafeteria, so students usually travel to nearby Ryle Hall for meals, though some travel to Missouri Hall or to Centennial Hall. Dobson has an in-house radio station (Dobson Radio) that broadcasts to the university.

Ryle and Centennial halls

Ryle Hall is the third largest hall and Centennial Hall is the largest. These two coed dorms each house nearly 600 students in suite-style rooms. The standard arrangement is two rooms, or four people, sharing one bathroom. Floors three, four, and five feature kitchenettes, and every floor except the first has a lounge. Ryle also has a spacious main lounge that is often used for small on-campus events. The two dorms also feature dining rooms, computer labs, mailboxes, vending machines, laundry rooms, and each also has a classroom used by the Residential College Program. The primary difference between the two dorms is that Ryle's cafeteria is located on the first floor, beneath its large lounge area. Centennial's slightly smaller cafeteria bisects the second floor, and the smaller lounge area sits directly below. Both cafeterias serve similar cuisine.

Missouri Hall

Missouri Hall is a coed residence hall and houses nearly 650 students, making it the second largest on campus. Missouri Hall is made up of seven different wings. On both the north and south sides of the building, three wings join with a common lounge. The two common lounges are linked by a seventh "crossover" wing. From overhead, the building is shaped like an elongated asterisk. While each wing is either male or female, each "house" (the north or south side of a single floor) includes both male and female wings. The building also houses a large cafeteria, billiards (pool table) room, laundry facilities, and several public kitchenettes.

Missouri Hall opened its doors in 1965 as an all-male residence hall. Construction delays prevented the entire building from being ready for the 1965 season. Because only the north side had been finished, many students who were originally supposed to be housed on the south side instead had to share beds with other students in the on-campus apartments. Eventually those men were permitted to move into the building as construction completed. Truman's Residential College Program, in its earliest manifestation, was located in Missouri Hall. With a high percentage of first year students each fall term, more students get their start at Truman in Missouri Hall than any other place on campus. During the mid 1990s, Missouri Hall was converted from an all-male dorm to the current coed facility.

After celebrating its 40th Anniversary, Missouri Hall will close in May 2006 with the completion of a new residence hall on the west side of campus. During the 2006-2007 school year, Missouri Hall will be completely renovated. In addition to behind the walls and cosmetic upgrades, the building will feature retrofitted air conditioning, renovated bathrooms, wiring upgrades, and improved community spaces. Missouri Hall will reopen in the fall of 2007, likely with a large emphasis on first-year student housing.

West Campus Suites

The West Campus Suites, just northwest of Centennial Hall, is under construction. It is scheduled to open its doors in the Fall of 2006 and will house 416 students. The first three floors will house upperclassmen and the top floor in the four-story building will house first-year students. Each room (with the exception of single rooms for eight student advisors and apartments for the hall director and community coordinator) will be comprised of two bedrooms attached to a central living room and independent climate control systems. Each floor will have its own dedicated lounge, study rooms, laundry facilities, trash and recycling center, and end-of-the-hall study carrels. The name of this building was approved by the Board of Governors in mid-June 2006.

Student organizations

Truman is host to a variety of student organizations. The Greek community contains almost 20% of the campus in nineteen fraternities and eleven sororitiesThere are numerous other professional, religious, honorary, cultural, and special interest organizations on campus [http://studentinvolvement.truman.edu/studentorgs.php, including an excellent debate team.

Debate

A notable feature of Truman State University is its nationally-renowned debate team. With a history of excellence stretching back to the late 1800s, Truman has won several national titles in parliamentary debate, competing in the National Parliamentary Debate Association national tournament. Truman won the 2000 NPDA final round on a 7-0 decision, as well as the 2004 NPDA final round on a 9-0 decision.

Truman also won the 2004 and 2001 Round Robin Tournament of Champions, the MAFA state debate tournament in 2004, 2003, and 2002, and had the first and second speaker at the 2004 NPDA national tournament.

Campus Media

Although its journalism program is within the communication discipline of the Division of Language and Literature, Truman State boasts award winning publications. Publications include the semesterly Detours travel magazine, Echo yearbook, Index, the weekly newspaper distributed every Thursday, and literary journal, Windfall. Broadcasting options include two radio stations—the alternative format KTRM 88.7 FM "The Edge" and 89.7 FM, a National Public Radio feed of KBIA-FM in Columbia. Its range extends roughly ten miles (15 km) from campus. The University maintains an information channel (CableOne Channel 36), where News 36 airs twice a week.

Alternative media options include The Monitor, published every 2-3 weeks, and 107.5 FM, whose studio is in Dobson Hall.

Athletics

Truman is a member of NCAA Division II and plays in the Mid-America Intercollegiate Athletic Association conference. The athletic department sponsors 19 teams (10 men's and 9 women's) more than any other school in Missouri. Among Truman's most recent successes include four regional championships for women's volleyball, a regional berth for men's basketball in 2006, and an undefeated regular season for men's soccer. In March 2006, the women's swim team won their sixth consecutive national title, beating rival Drury University after losing to that team earlier in the year. The team holds the record for most national titles won in their division.[http://www.ncaasports.com/swimming/womens/championship-results/2006/0311recap/div2

Indoor sports play in the Pershing Arena, named for famed general John J. Pershing, who attended school on the campus in the 1880s. Stokes Stadium is the site for home football games and track meets.

In addition to intercollegiate athletics, recreational teams exist for lacrosse, rugby (Bulls and Bullets), Ultimate (JujiTSU and TSUnami), men's volleyball and women's soccer.

Notable Athletes

Truman has been home to such athletes as:

Harry Gallatin, men's basketball, NBA Hall of Famer
Glen Jacobs, football and men's basketball, WWE wrestler best known as "Kane"
Ken Norton, boxer, one of the few to beat Muhammad Ali

External links

Educational institutions established in 1867 | Liberal arts colleges | Universities and colleges in Missouri | Truman State University

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