Washington State University - Chinook Yearbook (Pullman, WA)

Page 25 text:

Dr. Enoch A. Bryan EXPANSION A COMPLETE file of the Chinook, from the small thin blue book published thirty years ago to the present volume, is the best illustration possible of what the word “ex¬ pansion means in the life of this great uni¬ versity. I use the word “university advisedly, for no one who knows the facts in the case, and who makes a careful use of words, can deny that this institution measures up to the full standard of the name “university in view of its five large colleges and a like number of well equipped schools, its broad curriculum, its standard requirements for admission and graduation, its faculty, its student enrollment, and its facilities for graduate study. There is nothing paradoxical in saying “The State College is a University. It is the thing itself and not its given name that deter¬ mines its genera and species. This college has grown from small things to great, and its genus and not its name determines its classi¬ fication. On the 12th day of January, 1892, this institution opened its doors with sixteen stu¬ dents. Twenty-four years later, it closed the year with an enrollment of 1760. This year, its enrollment will record double that num¬ ber. This is expansion in numbers. Were we to examine in detail other things: financial resources, equipment, curricula, serv¬ ices rendered, or position among its kind in our greater national commonwealth, we would be confronted with the irrefutable evidence of the expansion of the college. Material things are not the only ways in which an educational institution may expand. Such a corporate existence seems to be the em¬ bodiment of a soul. It is our chief concern, in accordance with the law of life itself which seeks expansion and the fullest expression, that we should so live and so direct our aspi¬ rations and activities that the expansion of this institution shall be of that beneficent spir¬ itual type which will be a blessing to our fel¬ lows and to the race. — 21 —

Page 24 text:

EXPANSION E XPANDING from a tiny three-building in¬ stitution comprised of a heating plant, a barn, and a farm house in 1893, into a cam¬ pus including 49 buildings of various size and with entirely modern equipment in 1929, the State College of Washington has more than kept pace with the forward movement of the twentieth century. One hundred ten freshmen, who made up the entire student organization, answered the first roll call, coming to the college certainly not for the gaiety that makes up the present- day campus social curriculum; rather for the opportunity offered for industrial and com¬ mercial study. The Pullman they found was a boardwalk city with a population of 1300, alive with the activity that accompanied a Palouse country farming town of that day. Two railroads and two banks were the prin¬ cipal centers of interest, carrying on their business with the mechanical aid of a few car¬ bon electric lights, telephoneless, citizens go¬ ing from place to place by some means of horse-locomotion. At the present time, more than 3000 stu¬ dents attend the State College, supplementing the courses taken in the well-equipped lab¬ oratories and lecture rooms with social activ¬ ity centering about 34 group houses, as well as dormitories and off-campus organizations. Downtown, the growth is reflected in an in¬ crease , of 1200% in bank business, while churches, business houses, and general civic improvements speak for the rating of the Pullman Chamber of Commerce. The years have wrought great changes, and in all we have a better college than in the early days;, the young people are quite as ear¬ nest as were their predecessors; their morals are high; their business understandings are better, because general present-day conditions offer improved opportunities which the stu¬ dents as a whole are eagerly taking advantage of. — 20 —

Page 26 text:

DEAN OF WOMEN GROWTH is an indication of life. Growth is necessary if life continues to be valu¬ able, or even to be. When a person or an institution ceases to grow, deterioration and decay set in and the end is only a matter of time. Enlarged bulk and augmented numbers are often signs of growth, but heightened ideals resulting in increased efficiency offer a still higher test. This institution has grown phe¬ nomenally in numbers, but I see with greater pride our best expansion indicated by the heightened purposes which challenge the best efforts of faculty and students, through growing intellectual appreciation, through enlarged sympathies, through a finer way of life whose ‘‘reach and grasp” shall both, year by year, continue to extend. — 22 —