Reflecting on the First Day of Classes in 1899

As NMU students arrive on campus this week in advance of Fall Fest and first day of classes on Monday, it is intriguing to reflect on the institution's hurried and humble beginnings 125 years ago. After Michigan's governor signed the bill establishing Northern State Normal in Marquette in April 1899, there was too little time for a campus to take shape by fall. The first class of 32 students convened on Sept. 19 in rented quarters in old City Hall, with Dwight B. Waldo as the school's principal. By the end of the second week, 61 students had registered.

Soon after Gov. Hazen Pingree signed the bill establishing Northern, the State Board of Education had been authorized to buy land, erect buildings, hire a faculty and establish a curriculum for "instructing persons in the several branches pertaining to public education, and in the science and art of teaching the same."

At a special election in June, Marquette residents voted 318-9 in favor of the city selling bonds to raise the $5,000 the state legislature asked them to contribute to the new Normal School. However, the city fathers denied the State Board's request that they also donate free light and water.

The campus would have been located on the south side of the city had Marquette founder, businessman and philanthropist Peter White's generous offer of six lots proceeded smoothly. It was largely through his efforts that Northern State Normal was established. But according to the late Miriam Hilton's book Northern Michigan University: The First 75 Years, clear titles couldn't be secured for all of the lots, so the State Board of Education chose a different site: John M. Longyear's 20-acre hilltop in the north part of the city.

In his A Sense of Time: The Encyclopedia of Northern Michigan University, history professor emeritus Russell Magnaghi states that the hill is part of a beach-head from the Ice Age. It was inhabited by Paleo-Indians after the glacial retreats.

Hilton wrote that on July 16, 1899, three members of the State Board, Dwight Waldo and Longyear took carriages out to the 'Northern Knoll' to stake out the location of the buildings. The next day the Board announced its intention to start classes in rented quarters.

"On Sept. 6, Principal Waldo and D.F. Charleton, the architect for the new school, attended a common council meeting to request use of the space on the second floor of City Hall for classrooms," Hilton wrote. "The appropriate committee met in an adjoining room long enough to grant the request on condition that the State Board would pay for the extra heat and janitor service and would 'see that good order was kept and that the building was not injured through the school's occupancy.'

The next day's Mining Journal newspaper reported that the Common Council "has given further evidence of the readiness of the people of Marquette to do all in their power to help the Northern Normal on its way to assured success."

With the school now celebrating its 125th anniversary and still going strong, that statement proved to be prophetic.

For the full schedule of anniversary events and individual recollections, visit nmu.edu/125.