History
An Act of the Twenty-sixth General Assembly of Illinois, approved March 9, 1869, created Southern Illinois Normal College, the second state-supported normal school in Illinois. Carbondale held the ceremony of cornerstone laying, May 17, 1870.
In 1869, SIU was founded as a teacher's college named Southern Illinois Normal College. It began with twelve academic departments and an initial class of 143.
After World War II, there was more of a push towards higher education. Southern Illinois University grew rapidly in size from 3,500 to over 23,000 students between 1950 and 1980.
The university continued as a teacher's college until Delyte W. Morris took office as president of the university in 1948. Morris was SIU's longest serving president (1948–1970). During his presidency, Morris transformed SIU, adding Colleges of Law, Medicine, and Dentistry.
In 1957, a second campus of SIU was established at Edwardsville. This school, now known as Southern Illinois University Edwardsville, is now an independent university within the SIU system.
In 2005, then-SIU chancellor Walter Wendler unveiled a comprehensive plan called Saluki Way, which will reshape the Carbondale campus over a 15-year period. Since the unveiling, much progress has been made in completing the Saluki Way project. This includes a new Football Stadium, a renovated SIU Arena, and many cosmetic changes for the campus. Also part of Saluki Way, The groundbreaking for a New Student Services building is set for early 2012.
Read more about this topic: Southern Illinois University Carbondale
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“The history of this country was made largely by people who wanted to be left alone. Those who could not thrive when left to themselves never felt at ease in America.”
—Eric Hoffer (1902–1983)
“In the history of the United States, there is no continuity at all. You can cut through it anywhere and nothing on this side of the cut has anything to do with anything on the other side.”
—Henry Brooks Adams (1838–1918)
“What is most interesting and valuable in it, however, is not the materials for the history of Pontiac, or Braddock, or the Northwest, which it furnishes; not the annals of the country, but the natural facts, or perennials, which are ever without date. When out of history the truth shall be extracted, it will have shed its dates like withered leaves.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)