History of Michigan State University - Big Ten University

Big Ten University

In 1941, Secretary of the State Board of Agriculture John A. Hannah was appointed President of M.S.C. Hannah began the largest expansion in the school's history, aided by the G.I. Bill. Enacted in 1945, the law helped World War II veterans fund post-secondary educations. During this time the bulk of the South Campus was quickly built to allow for an ever-growing influx of students. One of Hannah's strategies was to build a new residence hall, enroll enough students to fill it and then use the income to start construction on a new dormitory. In the process the president built the nation's largest university housing system. Under Hannah's plan, enrollment increased from 15,000 in 1950 to 38,000 in 1965.

While Hannah was working on increasing the size of M.S.C.'s student body, he also expanded the school from a regional college to a nationally recognized research university. When the University of Chicago eliminated varsity football and withdrew from the Western Conference (now the Big Ten) in 1946, Hannah lobbied hard to take its place. The Big Ten finally admitted M.S.C. in 1949. After joining the conference, head football coach Clarence L. "Biggie" Munn led the Spartan football team to the Rose Bowl in the 1953–54 season, beating UCLA 28–20. Successor coach Hugh "Duffy" Daugherty lead the football team to a second Rose Bowl where it again defeated UCLA, 17–14.

On the school's centennial year of 1955, the State of Michigan officially made the school a university. M.S.C. thus became Michigan State University of Agriculture and Applied Science. The State of Michigan did not allow the university to remove its "agriculture" moniker until the ratification of the Michigan Constitution of 1964. With this enactment, the university's governing body changed its name from the State Board of Agriculture to the Michigan State University Board of Trustees. Since 1964, the school has been known simply as Michigan State University.

In the 1960s MSU expanded its reputation as a world-grant university, including responding to the invitation of Nigerian President Nnamdi Azikiwe to partner with Nigerians to build the first land-grant model university in Africa, the University of Nigeria at Nsukka. The many years of faculty experience in Nigeria created the foundation for a major MSU African Studies Center . By the 1990s MSU had the largest faculty in the nation of Africa specialists (170) and was producing more Ph.D.s on Africa, offering more study abroad in Africa (26), and teaching more African languages (30) than any other university. The faculty is deeply engaged in many African development problems in food security, health (especially tropical diseases such as malaria, river blindness, and filariasis), education, and gender equity. In 1978, MSU divested the stocks of companies doing business in apartheid-governed South Africa from its endowment portfolio.

By 1969, the student body had become politically active over issues such as civil rights and the Vietnam War. Protests led to the resignation of President John A. Hannah and the blocking of the construction of Interstate 496 through the campus. In 1970, the Board of Trustees appointed President Clifton Wharton, MSU's first African-American president and the first minority president of a major public American university. Under Wharton, the University created co-ed residence halls and residential colleges. In 1988, the university won its third Rose Bowl, this time beating USC 20–17.