Eastern Connecticut State University

Connecticut

This university began with thirteen women taking classes on the third floor of a savings bank.

historicalpeople

The whole school started with thirteen students, all of them women, meeting on the third floor of the Willimantic Savings Institute. That was 1889. The Connecticut General Assembly had just created a normal school here, meaning a place that trained schoolteachers, and a bank's upper floor was where the training happened. The first male student didn't arrive until 1893. In 1890 the town of Windham handed over six acres to the state for a real campus, and the buildings were finished five years later. The first dormitory came much later still, in 1921. The original Normal School building burned down, and the hall that replaced it was dedicated in 1946. The name kept changing as the ambitions grew. Teachers college in 1937, once it started granting bachelor's degrees. State college in 1967. University in 1983. The campus now covers a hundred and eighty-two acres.

This is the first of 2 parts. The rest runs about 2 minutes and is read to you as you drive past. Hear the whole piece.

What this was written from
The first class was of thirteen female students, who attended classes on the third floor of the Willimantic Savings Institute.

Written from Wikipedia, used under CC BY-SA 4.0.

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