History
The glee club was founded in 1893 with 11 members, under the direction of Lafayette organist, Cyrus Dadswell. At the time, Purdue University was an agricultural and engineering school without a strong musical tradition. In 1910, under the direction of E.J. Wotawa, the Glee Club composed the fight song “Hail Purdue”, originally titled "Purdue War Song". During the 1920s and 1930s, directors Paul Smith and Albert Stewart led and expanded the organization. Stewart was refused funding by the university president, so some of the early funding for the Glee Club came from Indianapolis pharmaceutical magnate, Josiah K. Lilly Sr. Lacking regular rehearsal space, the organization was considered a campus orphan. Lillian Stewart, wife of then comptroller R.B. Stewart, offered her living room as rehearsal space. However, as the Glee Club gathered more admirers, University President Edward C. Elliot yielded and formalized Stewart's position, hired a staff, and provided rehearsal space. The first official space for the Glee Club and the Purdue Musical Organization was in the “Music Penthouse”, the top floor of University Hall.
Read more about this topic: Purdue Varsity Glee Club
Famous quotes containing the word history:
“History is more or less bunk. It’s tradition. We don’t want tradition. We want to live in the present and the only history that is worth a tinker’s damn is the history we make today.”
—Henry Ford (1863–1947)
“This is the greatest week in the history of the world since the Creation, because as a result of what happened in this week, the world is bigger, infinitely.”
—Richard M. Nixon (1913–1995)
“What would we not give for some great poem to read now, which would be in harmony with the scenery,—for if men read aright, methinks they would never read anything but poems. No history nor philosophy can supply their place.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)