In its first year, it boasted 314 students and eight faculty.
The first day of classes was Sept. 12, 1871, but, due to a “lack of furnishings” the formal dedication of the Oshkosh Normal School was postponed for five days, according to “Here to Serve: The First Hundred Years of The University of Wisconsin Oshkosh,” by Dr. Edward Noyes with Tom Herzing.
UW Oshkosh, now with more than 13,600 students and 1,700 faculty and staff, has come a long way in the 140 years since its founding.
By the book, the University turned 140 on Sept. 12, 2011 – 140 years to the day those first classes were held. At the time, Ulysses S. Grant was president. Only a few weeks after the school’s opening, northeastern Wisconsin would endure the horrific Peshtigo Fire of 1871.
At the Sept. 19, 1871 dedication, the institution’s first director, George Sumner Albee, was handed the Oshkosh Normal School building keys – both figuratively and literally – and, according to Noyes and Herzing’s book, observed: “Intelligence for the many, not the few is our motto. Intelligence permeating every neighborhood, reaching every hamlet, every cottage is the need; but this necessity has not been realized. We need more, therefore, here we stand, a band of laborers ready to do what we can; not self-sufficient, but hopeful that we may be able to do some good… We ask your cooperation and support that this material may reach forward and make its impress on the immaterial, and thus take hold of a glorious hereafter, lifting humanity to higher, nobler life.”
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