College Beginnings

Creating a College Campus

Preparing for a New Century

Cadwallader Washburn

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1951
A summer curriculum workshop brings 170 Sisters to campus for study. Sisters visiting for the summer workshop enjoyed Edgewood’s beautiful surroundings.

1952

• Edgewood Campus School construction begins; the school opens in 1953. The campus school, designed by Lewis Siberz, was actually the first building project undertaken by the College, which was still located in the high school building.
   

• Sister Nona McGreal and Sister Sister Joan Smith develop a program of education piloted at Edgewood and adopted by Catholic schools across the country called Guiding Growth in Christian Social Living. The program prepares students for “good citizenship, guided by the principles of religion and democracy, which demand the recognition of the rights of man as an individual and the acceptance of his duties as a member of society to assure fellow human beings equal rights.”


 
• “Plan for Personal Development,” a continuing education program for women, offers professional training courses as well as liberal arts courses.
   
• The first Holiday Inn opens in response to the increasingly mobile U.S. public who want overnight accommodations as they travel by car. Motor hotels known as “motels” boom during the 1950s and 1960s.

• The College seal, designed by Sr. Teresita Kelly, is adopted. “The black and white Dominican shield was overlaid by a scarlet shield with the Greek letters Chi-Rho to symbolize Christ as the center of the College. Three vertical lines, the center one mereged with the Christ symbol, form the ancient symbol for the active intellect. Another ancient sign, hovering dovelike over the Chi-Rho, shows the divine wisdom of the Holy Spirit. Scarlet was added to indicate the Sacred Heart of Jesus as patron of the College and to display the colors of the school. The seal is completed by the College motto, Cor ad Cor Loquitur, heart speaks to heart, and the name of the college encircling the whole.”

1954
The first McDonald’s hamburger stand opens in San Bernardino, California. The company gives up numerating the sandwiches sold in the mid-1980s, simply claiming “billions and billions!”

1955

• Construction of the Mazzuchelli Biological Station, designed by architect Lewis Siberz with direction from Sisters Nona McGreal and Jeanette Feldballe, is begun in November and completed for use in 1956.
   
• “Little Marshall,” an addition to the residence hall, is built.

1956
Groundbreaking ceremonies for Regina Hall are held on September 27.

1957

• Regina Hall construction is completed and students move in from Marshall Hall in December.
   
• The College Library is moved from the Academy building to the basement of Regina Hall.
   
• Bachelor of Arts degrees in fields other than education are offered for the first time.
   
• A step toward the establishment of a lay Board of Trustees is taken as Sister Nona McGreal organizes an advisory board, the President’s Council with 15 members, some of whom would later serve on the Board beginning in 1969.
   
• Professor Vernon Suomi from the University of Wisconsin comes to campus to talk about space flight.
   
• The Soviet Union launches the first man-made satellite, Sputnik, setting off the international space race.

1958

• Construction is completed on St. Joseph Chapel (architects Lewis Siberz and Lloyd Kreuger design the building with Sister Teresita Kelly). Sr. Teresita spends the next four years painting the twenty-two foot encaustic mural of St. Joseph.
   
• Accreditation is received from the North Central Association of Colleges.

1960

• Edgewood admits student nurses for preparatory classes.
   
• Recognition is received from the National Council for the Accreditation of Teacher Education.
   
• Construction begins in February on the gymnasium. Architect Lloyd Kraemer is influenced by the work of Frank Lloyd Wright in his design. Neighbors and students watch in amazement as the huge supporting beams are brought down Woodrow Street on a flatbed truck. The building is completed in 1961.
   
• DeRicci Hall is built, containing classrooms and offices.
   
• The first male student is a military student from Truax who takes several classes.
   
• The Curriculum Materials Center collection of educational materials begins with contributions from over 125 publishers.
   
• Political interest and participation among Edgewood students picks up with the arrival on the political scene of Catholic presidential candidate, John F. Kennedy.
   
• With the construction of DeRicci Hall and the gymnasium, the College comes into its own as an independent campus.

1961

• Madison Summer Symphony begins offering its season of concerts on the lawn behind DeRicci Hall. Summer concerts continue at Edgewood until 1981.
   
• The Berlin Wall is erected, giving a tangible face to the Iron Curtain which Winston Churchill said had fallen across Europe at the end of World War II.
   
• The Soviets launch the first manned spaceship and are followed a month later by the Americans when Alan Shepard becomes the first American in space.

1962
Governor Gaylord Nelson and Secretary of State Robert Zimmerman deliver campaign speeches at Edgewood in their bids for the Senate.

1963

• Ruth Mary Fox, emeritus professor of English from UW-Milwaukee, becomes a professor-in-residence (literally!) at Edgewood, adding a three-room apartment to Regina Hall with a study area on a lower level. She donates her collection of books to the library in 1967.
   
• President John F. Kennedy is assassinated.

1964

• Bishop O’Connor’s Golden Jubilee dinner is held in the Edgedome, attended by Cardinal Meyer, Governor Gaylord Nelson, the mayor, 4 archbishops, 26 bishops, 40 sisters, and 400 priests.
   
• Philosophy professor Jim Guilfoil becomes the first layperson to chair a department at the College.
   
• The College takes a firm stand in support of its African American students when, in summer, a landlord asks the administration not to allow “colored students” to live in Aquin House, a rented house near campus. The administration refuses to renew the lease, and students are sent a letter explaining the situation that “As Americans and Christians we cannot have any part in such an agreement.” The displaced students are eventually found housing in an apartment building on Milton Street.
   
• Congress approves the Tonkin Gulf Resolution, authorizing President Johnson “to take all necessary measures to repel any armed attack against armed forces of the United States and to prevent further aggression” in Vietnam.

1965

• Weber Hall, named for Sr. Jane Frances Weber, former dean of students, is built.
   
• Edgewood College has a “Think Day” devoted to discussing ways to improve the campus and campus life.
   
• Sr. Catherine Moran of the Foreign Languages Department travels as a Fulbright lecturer to teach at a university in Argentina.
   
• The first teach-ins against the Vietnam War are held on college campuses; the selective service is rejected by draftees who flee to Canada and burn their draft cards in public protests.

1967

• Male students from Holy Name Seminary begin attending classes at the College.
   
• The College hosts a symposium on the works and life of theologian and mystic Teilhard de Chardin.
   
• U.S. popular sentiment turns increasingly against American involvement in the Vietnam war as more troops are shipped overseas and casualties continue to mount.

1968

• Sr. Cecilia Carey assumes the presidency of Edgewood College until summer 1977.
   
• Edgewood College offers the first Black Studies courses: “The Negro in American History” and “Black History Forum” appear in the timetable.
   
• In the height of space age fascination, the College has architect’s renderings drawn up for its own observatory. After lengthy discussion and planning, however, the project is abandoned.
   
• Civil rights leader Martin Luther King, Jr. is assassinated and Edgewood College classes are cancelled on the day of King’s funeral, April 9. A month later, classes are again cancelled for a Teach-In called “Crisis in America,” where panels and groups of students discuss “The Black Student Experience,” “The Problem of Poverty,” and the Kerner Report. A month later the campus shares the nation’s shock at the assassination of presidential primary candidate Robert F. Kennedy.
   
• Presidential candidate Eugene McCarthy speaks at a rally on campus hosted by the Students for McCarthy and their advisor, history professor Michael Lybarger. McCarthy returns on several other occasions over the years.

1969

• Sr. Mary Ann Schintz of the History Department spends a year in Hong Hong and Taiwan as a Fulbright-Hays  Research Scholar.
   
• On October 18 an auction is held for the furnishings of the old academy building, Sacred Heart Hall, to help defray the cost of razing the building. Items sold include chapel stalls, stained glass windows, bronze doorknobs and antique furniture. In December, the building is demolished.
   
• The first three lay members are elected to the College's Board of Trustees: Carl Mayer, John Sonderegger, and Gerald Sttles.
   
• In the summer, nearly half a million people gather on a farm in upstate New York for what was planned to have been a paid musical concert but grew into the phenomenal countercultural gathering known as Woodstock.
   
• American Astronauts Aldrin and Armstrong land on the moon, taking “one small step for man; one giant leap for mankind.”

1970

• In January, Edgewood College becomes officially co-educational; 30 years later, men are about one-third of the total student population.
   
• The number of Sinsinawa Dominicans serving on the faculty and staff reaches a peak of 37.
   
• The nation, rocked by student protests, is stunned when Ohio National Guardsmen fire on students at Kent State University, killing four and wounding nine others on May 4. Ten days later, two young black men are killed by police during a protest at Jackson State University. The University of Wisconsin responds by canceling final exams. Then on August 24, a powerful bomb goes off in Sterling Hall, bringing the war to the homefront as a graduate student is killed and four others are wounded.

1971

• The Continuing Education program begins offering a range of short courses to the general public.
   
• The Don Cossack Chorus and Dancers from Russia draw an audience of more than 900 to Edgewood during Parents Weekend.
   
• The first men’s basketball team has a 7-6 record and goes to the consolation finals of the Small College Classic Tournament in Iowa.
   
• The Edgewood Summer Theatre in Baraboo is established.
   
• Unable to have its own facility on campus, Edgewood acquires from Mrs. John Griswald the use of a telescope/observatory with an 8-inch lens permanently mounted at her home. (The property on which it was located is later sold to Dr. George Shock and what became of the arrangement is unknown.)
   
• The “old enough to fight, old enough to vote” movement succeeds with passage of the 26th Amendment (the most recent to be adopted) which lowers the voting age to 18.

1972

• Thirty years after presenting its first four-year degrees, Edgewood presents its first honorary degree to Mark Ingraham who was Dean of the UW College of Letters and Science from 1942 to 1961. In 1969, he had been appointed by UW to act as a consultant in conjunction with setting up a collaborative arrangement between the University and Edgewood. He had served as an advisor to the College in its 1970 revision of its liberal arts curriculum.
   
• Sharon Brokish, Class of 1972, is sworn in as a staff sergeant as the first woman missile maintenance officer in the United States Air Force.
   
• Michael Lybarger and Sr. Pauline Lambert are the first two faculty members to serve on the Board of Trustees.
   
• The first video game to be marketed, Pong, is released.
   
• The arrest of five men for breaking into the Democratic Party national headquarters at the Watergate Hotel sets off a constitutional crisis as members of the administration all the way up to the President are implicated.

1973

• Arthur Schulkamp, a Madison businessman in banking and the insurance industry, and a longtime friend of the College, leaves a record (until then) bequest of $50,000.
   
• Edgewood begins a program granting registered nurses 30 hours of credit for their professional experience toward earning a bachelor’s degree in another major; nursing is not itself offered as a major until 1982.
   
• A nursery school is established in the upper level of the former powerhouse and laundry adjacent to Marshall Hall.
   
• Siena Apartments and Rosewood House are built in response to the need for housing for the sisters at Edgewood. Designed to be converted to student housing as the number of sisters declined, Siena houses 20 sisters with an additional six living in Rosewood.
   
• A cease-fire is declared in Vietnam and the United States begins withdrawal of troops.
   
• The U.S. birthrate falls below replacement level with an average of fewer than 2 children per couple.

1974

• “Design in the Universe,” celebrating the 700th anniversary of the death of St. Thomas Aquinas, attracts 400 scholars from throughout the Midwest for a symposium featuring keynote speaker George Wald, a Harvard biologist and Nobel Prize recipient.
   
• Intercollegiate women’s basketball is started and after one year joins the Wisconsin Independent Colleges’ Women’s Athletic Conference for the 1975-76 season.
   
• Richard Nixon is the first President to resign from office. Gerald Ford, the first unelected vice president, having been selected as a replacement for Spiro Agnew, assumes the presidency and grants clemency to Nixon.

1975

• Descendants of Governor Washburn are guests for Washburn Day, reviving what had been a traditional annual celebration observed with music recitals, plays, and readings. An exhibit of 40 etchings by Washburn’s namesake nephew are displayed in the Gallery. These etchings are eventually given to the College. Most are sold at auction, but several remain in the permanent collection.
   
• American troops and personnel evacuate Vietnam.

1976

• The men’s basketball team takes its first championship title as it wins the Wisconsin Conference of Independent Colleges.
   
• The US celebrates its bicentennial.

1977

• Sr. Cecilia Carey is elected prioress of the Sinsinawa Dominican Congregation and in the summer, resigns from her position as president of Edgewood College.
   
• Sr. Alice O’Rourke begins a presidency she will hold until 1983. The college is in economic trouble, as enrollment has continued to slip and inflation grows.

1978

• The North Central Association of Colleges and Schools gives notification that the College has been reaccredited, as does the National Council for the Accreditation of Teacher Education.

1979

• The Weekend Degree Program, offering a bachelor’s degree to working adult students who wish to attend classes two weekends a month, is initiated. It rescues the College financially, raising the school’s enrollment to a total of 667, including 365 full-time students and 302 part-time students.
   
• A baccalaureate program in nursing is begun.
   
• The three schools of Edgewood announce a combined capital campaign—Edgewood Century II—intended to raise $1 million by 1981, the campus’ centennial year, with the resulting funds to be divided among the schools for physical improvements or endowment.
   
• The Music Department entertains with troubadors and minstrels at a Medieval Banquet.
   
• The Pax Christi student group sponsors a debate on the SALT II talks and the nuclear arms race.
   
• On November, militants in Iran seize the US embassy in Teheran and hold Americans hostage despite a failed rescue attempt which dooms the reelection of Jimmy Carter as President. The hostages are released 145 days later, coinciding with Ronald Reagan’s inauguration.

1980

• The first graduate of the Weekend Degree Program, Barry Fewson, receives his degree in December.
   
• In what is to be a “turn-around” year for the College, the budget ends in the black for the first time in four years and fall enrollment climbs to 728.
   
• Sally Christensen, the women’s basketball coach, is named athletic director, probably the first woman athletic director among Wisconsin’s coeducational colleges.

1981

• Using funds raised during the Century II campaign, groundbreaking ceremonies are held for the Activities Center, containing a student lounge, snack bar, recreation center, computer lab and offices. The addition to DeRicci Hall is the first new building on campus since the construction of Weber Hall in 1965. [The Activities Center has since been leveled and replaced by the Predolin Humanities Center.]
   
• Sandra Day O’Connor is the first woman appointed to the Supreme Court.
   
• Prince Charles, heir to the British throne, weds Lady Diana Spencer.

1982

• The Education for Parish Service program is started, enrolling 51 men and women in its first term. A two-year cycle of classes coordinated by Sr. Marie Stephen Reges, EPS is designed to meet the needs of the increasing number of lay ministers in the Madison Diocese.
   
• 63% of the student body is over age 23; 72% are from Dane County; nearly a third of all students are enrolled in the Weekend Degree Program.

1983

• Sr. Mary Ewens is appointed president and serves until 1987.
   
• Faced with renewed financial difficulties and a $100,000 deficit, a freeze is placed on faculty salaries. The College manages to end the fiscal year barely in the black, thanks in part to a $370,000 bequest from the Catherine Sage estate.
   
• The library, located in the basement of Regina Hall, is remodeled and expanded to the dining hall area [currently the Washburn Heritage Room] and the Ruth Mary Fox apartment. What had been a student lounge in Regina becomes the new dining area.
   
• The National League of Nursing confirms accreditation of the baccalaureate program in nursing.
   
• The Honda Accord is the first Japanese car to be manufactured in the United States.
   
• The first CD player is marketed. In less than a decade, vinyl records virtually disappear off of store shelves, replaced by the small disks.

1984

• Continuing financial deficits lead to cuts in student services positions, academic programs, theatre productions and intercollegiate athletics. Faculty and staff volunteer to help keep some sports operating and take on responsibility for running the Human Issues program.
   
• The enrollment of 443 part-time students exceeds the enrollment of 374 full-time students.
   
• A campus day care center is set up in the lower level of Weber Hall.
   
• DRASTICS, the adult students’ association, initiates participation in the Luke House Meal Program, every second Sunday of the month. The group, with help from faculty and staff, prepare, serve, eat, and clean up after a meal for those who are hungry and come to Luke House in need of food assistance.
   
• The US Democratic presidential ticket of Walter Mondale and Geraldine Ferraro takes on incumbent Republican Ronald Reagan in the hope that the women’s vote will support the first female candidate for the vice presidency.

1985

• Graduate studies in business administration, education, and religious studies are added to Edgewood College’s degree programs.
   
• The Women’s Studies program is started, introducing a new interdisciplinary academic minor.
   
• Only 27% of the student body is under age 23 and full-time enrollment has dropped so low that Marshall Hall is not used as a residence hall; the few male resident students are housed in a wing of Regina Hall.
   
• The legal drinking age in Wisconsin is raised from 19 to 21, an age requirement last experienced in 1972.

1986

• Sr. Mary Ewens offers her resignation to the Board of Trustees in November, effective July 1, 1987. The Board decides, with the agreement of the Sinsinawa Dominicans, to open the search for a new president to lay candidates as well as Sinsinawa Dominicans. The year ends with administrative offices vacated by the president, the provost, and the directors of admissions and development.
   
• People watch TV in horror as the space shuttle Challenger explodes, killing its seven crew members including a teacher, Christa McAuliffe, the first “civilian” to participate in a space flight.
   
• The Chernobyl nuclear power station in Russia coughs up a volcano-like explosion and a cloud of radioactive particles quickly spreads over the skies of northern Europe and Asia.
  
• On the shore of Lake Wingra, the Edgewood College campus as it appeared in the 1980s up until a major transformation that was to occur in the 1990s, bringing new facilities, additional parking, a new campus entrance and enhanced landscaping.