Get to know your city!
East Lansing’s rich history is present all around you just by living in the area. Many of you will recognize the landmarks and founding figures mentioned in the following sections as the current names of roads in East Lansing or buildings on and off campus. This history can help you form a personal connection to history.
Indigenous history- prior to 1855
Who Lived Here First? The Three Fires Confederacy
Michigan State University and the City of East Lansing occupy the land of the Anishinaabeg – the Three Fires Confederacy of Ojibwe, Odawa, and Potawatomi peoples.
According to the University archives, the earliest settlers of the university traded with the native population who at the time lived across the Red Cedar. As such, native people have always been and continue to be a part of Michigan State University’s history.
Today, many employees and students at the University include a Land Acknowledgement in their email signatures, printed materials, or preceding an official speaking event. This Land Acknowledgement is meant to acknowledge the past of settler colonialism and how the violence and land expropriation its legacy carries has benefitted and continues to benefit the institution of Michigan State University. To read more about the University’s role in perpetuating settler colonialism and the Land Acknowledgement, click here. To read an essay from a current Native American from the Ojibwe tribe defining and unpacking settler colonialism and its effects both in Michigan and abroad, click here.
The “Pioneer” College
With this acknowledgement in mind, MSU was established by the State constitution, which encourages “the promotion of intellectual, scientific, and agricultural improvement; and shall, as soon as practicable, provide for the establishment of an agricultural school”. The land East Lansing currently occupies was ceded in the 1819 Treaty of Saginaw. Seven years after the college was founded, the University became a land grant college under the Morrill Hill Act in 1862. While this land was ceded, it is understood that the terms of this treaty were unfair, and the Morrill Hill Act was government-sanctioned land theft from the native population. Nevertheless, the intention behind the Morrill Act and the land grant institutions that followed was to provide a broad and accessible educational foundation. Funny enough, MSU claims to be the “pioneer land grant institution” but it depends on what you count as “pioneer” as both Kansas State and Iowa State preceded land grant accreditation
What Came First? The City or the University? - Collegeville
What’s Collegeville?
Michigan State University (then called Agricultural College of the State of Michigan) did not decide to come to East Lansing, rather East Lansing formed around the University! Therefore, it is important to understand the founding of the University to understand the history of the city.
The first man to build a home on Michigan State University’s campus was Robert Burcham in 1851. Just four short years later, in 1855, the University was born as “Agricultural College of the State of Michigan.” A year after the University opened, College Hall was built. This was the first academic building on campus of what would eventually become East Lansing. The Beaumont Tower now stands where College Hall once stood. In 1857, the first homes were built on campus, in a community called “Collegeville.”
The founding of the city of East Lansing is officially considered to be in the year 1907. The following names were considered for the city before the Michigan Senate decided on East Lansing: Collegeville, Agricultural College, Oakwood, College Park, Montrose, and East Lansing. Guess which name the residents chose at the time? College Park. At the time, it was quite rare for an unchartered territory to jump right into city status, which includes special rules for running the local government. However, the current residents felt strongly about chartering their land as a city. To learn more about East Lansing city government today, click here.
At the time the city was chartered, the population was around 700 residents. One hundred years later, in 2007, the population was about 50,000, with 45,000 residents being students. The city especially grew in population throughout the 1950s and 1960s, where it surpassed 3,000 residents and officially became a “legal” city.
East Lansing has a very unique history since the majority of its residents have always been students. Additionally, the University is the largest employer in the city, contributing to the connection many residents have with the University.
Hopefully after reading this section, you can see how connected the City of East Lansing and Michigan State University has always been. To read more about the history of Michigan State University, continue reading!
MSU Grows in Size and Relevance
From 1857 to 1941, MSU slowly began to broaden its scope of educational opportunities, moving beyond a midwestern agricultural school to one that provides courses in engineering and the liberal arts. Not only was MSU diversifying its curriculum, but it remained steadfast in its commitment to produce a student body that centered civic duty in its ranks. In 1861, the first graduating class of M.A.C. volunteered on behalf of the Union to fight against the confederacy. One of these students was a junior named Samuel Alexander, who was a part of a mass exodus of M.A.C students. Alexander is reported to have brought his textbooks to the battlefield, reading them in his downtime. A M.A.C. professor organized the “Plow-Boy Guards”, a group of student volunteers for Michigan’s war effort.
In 1931, The Michigan State College of Agriculture and Applied Science received accreditation from the Association of American Universities, a milestone in the university’s history which allowed graduates of MSU to find work easier and apply to other graduate schools easier. From 1931 to now, Michigan State University has climbed the ranks to become a top 200 university globally and a top 50 school in the US. As far as major universities go, a humble beginning.
The story of Mary Anne Mayo is inspiring, as she helped pave the way for women’s education at M.A.C. Mayo Hall in North Campus bares her namesake. As we may know, women in the past were deprived of educational opportunities due to widespread sexism, but Mayo fought and advocated for women in higher education, especially for the wives of farmers, just like her. Mayo’s persistence led the college to establish a “Women’s Course” and embrace the benefits that come along with diversity. A detailed breakdown of MSU’s inclusive history can be found here.
Mayo’s story of civic duty towards fellow rural and low-income women of her time demonstrates the power that individuals carry to create societal change. But, 26 years before the creation of M.A.C’s Women’s Course (later to be called Home Economics), ten women would enroll in the college, participated in the same field courses as the men, and earned their place at the college. Newspapers of the time would document the positive impact that the ten female students had on their male counterparts. Here we see the unequivocal benefits that come from diversity, and this positive impact has held strong 130 years after the fact.
From 1941 to 1969, MSU’s most consequential president, John A. Hannah entered office and oversaw the most monumental transformation the university would undertake, going from a midwestern agricultural college to a top global research university.
MSU Goes Global
Just like in the Civil War and First World War, MSU played a civic role during the Second World War. M.S.C. (MSU’s name at the time) established fast-track programs to ensure that students could complete their coursework and earn their degrees. In fact, over half of all students on campus were soldiers assigned for training, and by 1943, over 4,000 students were serving in the war effort. The campus, both during and after the war, served as a hub of civic flourishing doubling in size after the defeat of Japan. After the war, M.S.C. offered temporary housing to returning soldiers, with large help from the G.I. Bill. Jenison Fieldhouse became a temporary home for 600 veterans while construction of their temporary housing was underway.serving in the war effort. The campus, both during and after the war, served as a hub of civic flourishing doubling in size after the defeat of Japan. After the war, M.S.C. offered temporary housing to returning soldiers, with large help from the G.I. Bill. Jenison Fieldhouse became a temporary home for 600 veterans while construction of their temporary housing was underway.
President John Hannah, a globalist and idealist, as well as the rest of the MSU administration would engage in technical assistance for higher education in developing nations. The Fulbright Act of 1946 and Fulbright-Hays Act of 1961 facilitated such cultural exchanges from universities such as MSU to all over the globe, with MSU being a top producer of fulbright scholarships.
MSU continues to make its mark on the global stage, hosting presidential debates, as it did in 1992, and hosting presidents as Bill Clinton did in 1995 addressing MSU’s graduating class, as well as Barack Obama signing a Farm Bill almost 20 years later alongside Senator Debbie Stabenow.
Nation-Building Gone Awry
One of these efforts to provide technical assistance, most notoriously, occurred in South Vietnam. MSU would assist South Vietnam’s president Ngo Dinh Diem. MSU would advise and train South Vietnam’s civil servants as well as its police force, often collaborating with the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). Diem’s rule over the country was so brutal and unstable that the Kennedy administration assisted in a coupe to topple Diem. When the news broke of MSU’s involvement, students and professors protested the Hannah administration. Demonstrating on the streets is one way to voice your politics – your beliefs, but MSU students took it further, holding “teach-ins”: informal lectures that contained more diverse opinions than a rally but not as organized as a debate.
MSU was on both sides of the war: forming a complicated legacy. But the student body has a different story. During the Vietnam War, a wave of alternative media sprang up fueled by angst on America’s involvement as well as civil strife at home. At the same time MSU became a political hotbed protesting Vietnam, prominent civil rights leaders, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and Malcolm X spoke on campus. MSU would become home to The Paper, one of the first underground newspapers in US college life.
This parallels with the recent protests calling on MSU to divest from Israel. More can be found in the Manual’s youth civic engagement section.
The Quiet Pioneer and Multiculturalism of the Late 20th Century
Similar to female empowerment and women pioneers, the African American history at MSU stretches back far in history and is endemic to the identity of the university. The core mission of the "land grant institution" attracted Black students as early as 1900, and MSU, thereafter, became home to many firsts for the nation. Most notable among these “firsts” was the first Black president of a predominantly white university in American history, Clifton R. Wharton. Wharton lived for 98 years and was known as the “quiet pioneer”, as many of his barrier breaking feats went largely unnoticed to the wider public. Dr. Wharton routinely mentioned he persisted in the face of systemic discrimination, and relentlessly advocated for the economically disadvantaged, and saw the science of agriculture as a means to achieve economic growth globally.
The university would host prominent civil rights leaders such as Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. as well as Malcolm X. MSU is not only a place where figures of government address the world, but human rights activists that bucked that same government.
The history of Black achievements at MSU existed alongside structural racism. In 1989, Black students at MSU staged a “study-in”, occupying the Hannah Administration building for ten days, demanding that the administration take steps to increase Black faculty and adopt effective policies to retain Black students. Further demands were to increase what was called “minority aides” which sought to make MSU a mor hospitable learning environment for students of color. Today, the “minority aides” were renamed “Intercultural Aides”. Furthermore, a more recent addition for on campus is the Multicultural Center, located near Shaw Hall. This new center has its roots in the brave students who marched and demonstrated all those decades ago.
