The Andersen Library Blog

This post was created by UW-Whitewater student Morgan Zdroik

As we celebrate the University of Wisconsin Whitewater’s 150th anniversary, you may wonder what 1868, the first year of, then Whitewater Normal was like. Who were the faculty? What did campus look like? What classes did they offer?

This semester I was an Archives and Area Research Center intern and dedicated my internship to researching and creating an exhibit that commemorates the founding year of Whitewater Normal School.

I started my process by reading chapters from different books about the first year of Whitewater Normal. The chapters provided me with majority of the information I needed to complete my exhibit.

Next, I began to look at photographs of the faculty and campus from the 1800s. This was by far my favorite part of the process. After carefully looking through the images, I selected the best ones and photographed, edited, and printed them.

Reading through newspaper articles from the Whitewater Register about the beginnings of Whitewater Normal was the next step of my process. After looking at the collection online, I was able to look at the original newspapers from 1868, another one of my favorite steps. I then photographed the articles and printed the photos.

After hours of planning, printing, taping, and, cutting . . . I was finally able to put my exhibit together!

Displaying vintage photographs and newspaper articles allowed me to give the public a glimpse into the year the university was established.

The exhibit includes information on the first faculty who taught at the school, along with student and campus life.

The First Year: A Glimpse into the Beginnings of Whitewater Normal

Faculty

The first faculty of Whitewater Normal consisted of individuals who were scholars in Mathematics, Moral Philosophy, Grammar, Geography, History, Music, Latin, and the Natural Sciences.

The faculty, their fields of instruction, and the years they taught at Whitewater Normal are listed below:

• Oliver Arey, Mental & Moral Philosophy and Pedagogic and President, 1868-76
• T. Lovewell, Mathematics, 1868-72
• H. E. G. Arey, Rhetoric and Drawing, 1868-76
• Emily J. Bryant, Grammar, Geography, and History, 1868
• J. Brown M. D., Natural Science, 1868-69
• Harvey H. Greenman, Vocal Music, 1869-74
• Virginia Deichman, Instrumental Music, 1868-77
• Clarinda D. Hall, Grammar, 1868-70
• Catherine H. Lilly, Teacher Grammar Department 1868, Grammar and Latin 1871-77
• Ada Hamilton, Teacher Intermediate Department 1868
• Sarah A. Stewart, Teacher Primary Department 1868-69, Geography and History, 1869-72
• C. Chamberlain, Natural Science, 1869-73
• Eliza Graves, Teacher of Intermediate Department, 1869
• Helen M. Bowen, Teacher of Grammar Department, 1869
• Etta Carle, Intermediate and Academic Departments 1869-70
• E. Vansickle, Teacher Intermediate Department 1869-70
• Mary A. Brayman, Teacher Primary Department 1869-71

Whitewater Normal also had a president who began when the university first opened. The first president was Oliver Arey. As listed above, Arey was also a Mental & Moral Philosophy and Pedagogic teacher.

His wife, Mrs. H. E. G. Arey was one of the first teachers at Whitewater Normal and was often considered a second mother to the students.

Oliver Arey remained president while he and his wife taught until the pair left in 1876.

Students and Student Life

During the first term at Whitewater Normal, spring 1868, there were 48 students enrolled in the Normal Program and 102 in the Training School. The second term, fall 1868, enrollment in the Normal Program climbed to 105 students while the Training Program had 98 students.

Whitewater Normal offered three courses of study; an elementary course of two years, an institute course of one term, and an advanced course of three years.

In order to be a student at Whitewater Normal, one had to be very serious about school. Students partook in required study hours throughout the day. The hours were 6-7am and 9am-12pm in the morning and 2-5pm and 7-9pm in the afternoon and evening.

Students also had to follow a point system. Each student began with 100 points and lost points depending on their bad behavior and actions:

• Absence from prayer, declamation or recitation = 2 points
• Unexcused tardiness = 1 point
• Exam absence = 10 points
• Entering a saloon or barroom = 5 points
• Personal violence = 50 points

President Arey created a day in which the entire faculty stayed at home and an elected student from each class would take over and teach the class that day. He called this day Students Day and created such a day to test the student’s leadership skills and devotion to their schoolwork.

Although school appeared to be all work and no play, students of Whitewater Normal developed their own organization during the first year.

Before fraternities and sororities, students created literary societies. Whitewater Normal students developed the Lincolnian literary society towards the end of the 1868 spring term. This organization consisted of smart, well-informed men and women. To be a member of the society, student were required to pay dues of $.50 and fines for overdue library books. The society was finalized on May 1, 1868.

The graduation process in 1868 was much different from today’s graduation. In order to graduate and receive a diploma a student had to be at least 19 years old, an academic resident for one year, and obtain a certificate of attendance from the president.

Unfortunately, similar to today, some students were kicked out of school for their grades or behavior. At Whitewater Normal, some students were publicly expelled. For example, students Orvis C. Flanders and Minerva Richmond were expelled for displaying characteristics unbecoming of a teacher.

Campus and Campus Life

Construction of Old Main, the school building, began on October 2, 1866. Due to various delays in the building’s construction, Whitewater Normal was not dedicated until April 21, 1868.

Students at Whitewater Normal were very fortunate to receive free tuition for those enrolled in the Normal Program. Board was $3.00-$3.50 per week and students could rent library books and textbooks for $1.

Tuition for the training program, however, had different rates depending on the training. It cost $.30 a week for primary training, $.40 a week for intermediate training, and $.70 a week for academic training.

Students could also take piano and oil painting lessons, which cost $12 each or linear and watercolor drawing lessons, which cost $6 each.

Conclusion

Overall, my internship and exhibit have allowed me to grow as a historian and become more comfortable as a writer. I hope to one day become a museum exhibit designer and create exhibits for a larger audience.

I encourage you go to look at what I have worked on all semester. My exhibit is currently on display in the three display cases outside the entrance of the library. I hope you not only enjoy what I have created but also learn something new!

This post was created by UW-Whitewater student Brendan Knoflicek.

This spring semester of my junior year of college I had the opportunity to work as a public history intern at the UW-Whitewater Archives and Area Research Center in Andersen Library.  I was tasked with working with the H. Gaylon Greenhill Collection, a former Chancellor of UW-Whitewater.

The Greenhill collection contains a variety of items in the scrapbooks and files.  The scrapbooks contain newspaper clippings, photos, letters, and documents that display Greenhill’s and UW-Whitewater’s successes. The Greenhill file contains photos, letters, pamphlets, quizzes, and booklets more specifically related to Greenhill.  Initially I was tasked with creating a historical note of the overall collection. This provides any researcher the necessary background information on the collection to determine its significance to their project. After the historical note, I was tasked with creating an exhibit on Greenhill.  The main materials used for my Greenhill exhibit were the clippings, photos, and letters as they display Greenhill’s personality in the best way. I began choosing items as if it were a job interview. The main items selected were to show Greenhill’s talents and his traits he had as a person. However, it was not an easy task narrowing down successes of a self made man who’s lasting legacy was immortalized by naming UW-Whitewater’s arts building, the Greenhill Center of the Arts.  H. Gaylon Greenhill was one of UW-Whitewater’s most successful hires in the school’s history, making it difficult to narrow down his successes for an exhibit.

Before Whitewater, Greenhill earned a bachelor’s degree from UW-River Falls and a masters and PhD from University of Illinois-Urbana Champaign. While many remember Greenhill as UW-Whitewater’s Chancellor, Greenhill was initially hired as an associate professor of political science. The exhibit has two cases that are split into Greenhill’s achievements before becoming Chancellor (Case 1), and Greenhill’s achievements as Chancellor (Case 2).  

Case 1

Case 1 covers a time span from 1962-1991, where Greenhill had to establish himself as a top scholar and worked his way up to Vice Chancellor. In 1967 when Greenhill published his Labor Money in Wisconsin Politics 1964, which received praise from politicians and fellow academics.  This piece displayed Greenhill’s talents and earned him promotions, first to the Dean of Summer School in 1967 and Extension Services and then to Vice Chancellor in 1980.  As Vice Chancellor, Greenhill displayed his talents and skills that foreshadowed his later promotion to Chancellor. Greenhill became a familiar site in newspapers as he made many public appearances as Vice Chancellor where people began to see the more friendly and personable side of Greenhill.   Since his graduation from UW-River Falls, Greenhill has had a successful career, for which he earned the Distinguished Alumni award in 1984 from the university. This award recognizes students who have made strides of excellence in their fields since graduation, which Greenhill had done up to that point.  

Case 2

The exhibit then moves to case 2, which is bigger than case 1 and displays Greenhill’s successes as Chancellor of UW-Whitewater. As Chancellor Greenhill was able to achieve more of his goals for UW-Whitewater, which required more space to display his accomplishments. Case 2 covers Greenhill’s years as Chancellor from 1991-2000.  It begins with Chancellor Connor retiring after his seventeen years of service in 1991. Following Connor’s retirement announcement, many academics suspected that Greenhill was next in line for the job. Shortly after Connor’s retirement the UW System Regents backed Greenhill, leading to his selection as UW-Whitewater’s new Chancellor.  For his opening remarks Greenhill gave an emphatic speech on an excellence standard he wanted UW-Whitewater to reach. In his speech Greenhill states that UW-Whitewater needs to hire top faculty members, which will then attract the top high school students. Greenhill would act on his own words immediately as he starting the building of the Irvin Young Auditorium building in 1991 and finished in 1993, showing Greenhill’s and UW-Whitewater’s motivation to achieve excellence. Chancellor Greenhill was seen often around campus as he interacted with the student body, as he participated in homecoming games with students and attended many of the football teams games.  In 1994 Greenhill privately began creating an “Excellence Fund” that was set to raise ten million dollars and be used on renovating Warhawk Stadium, Hyer Hall, and the Connor University Center. The majority of the fund was allocated for student scholarships. When Greenhill announced the “Excellence Fund” to the public it was an immediate success. Though the ten million for the fund was reached by 1996, it stayed open until 1998 when it raised twelve million dollars. Students who received money from the “Excellence Fund” often wrote letters to Chancellor Greenhill and his wife thanking him for the opportunity they otherwise couldn’t have afforded. In 1999 Greenhill announced his retirement from UW-Whitewater.  Greenhill’s retirement ceremony drew a large crowd as academics and politicians from Wisconsin attended. After retirement Greenhill and his wife Hannah donated $500,000 to Whitewater. In return the university renamed the Center of the Arts building, to the Greenhill Center of the Arts.

Working in the school’s archives was great because it has taught me skills I need to further my career in public history.  I learned how to create historical notes for collections, how to organize collections, and how to label collections.  The archival work was more interesting than I had initially thought, as I was able to learn a lot about a specific collection and place my influence on the collection by organizing it.  When creating my exhibit I learned how to use Photoshop, how to organize an exhibit, and how to provide concise text for an exhibit. Photoshop allowed me to edit photos so they could be easily seen for any viewers.

Organizing the exhibit was especially important for case 2 as images between rows needed to be spaced out enough so viewers know they are separate, while images that were related needed to be closer together so viewers know they are connected.  Creating short amounts of text was difficult sometimes as I wanted to provide more info on the images. After finalizing the exhibit I found a good medium of text that provided necessary information, while keeping it short and to the point. Overall working at UW-Whitewater’s Archives and Area Research Center in Andersen Library has provided beneficial experiences as I continue to pursue a career in public history.  

The exhibit is located in the Archives and Area Research Center on the 1st floor of Andersen Library.