A Brief History of East Lansing

Category: M.A.C. Campus

  • The Memorial Grove and Cenotaph

    When the United States entered World War One in 1917, the Michigan Agricultural College answered the call to arms. Along with many colleges and universities across the country, M.A.C. contracted with the U.S. government to provide housing and training facilities for the Student Army Training Corps. Williams Hall and Wells Hall were conscripted to house…

  • Farm Lane

    Farm Lane was established very early in the College’s history, and its name suits its purpose: it was the access road to the College farms south of the river. It was positioned along the centerline of the farm for maximum access to the fields—a line that might have seemed inconveniently distant from College Hall in the days…

  • The Streetcar and the Interurban Railway

    Early transportation to and from the Michigan Agricultural College was arduous at best. “Students and state board members coming to the college in the early days from Detroit and vicinity traveled by rail to Jackson, thence by plank road to Eaton Rapids, and stage to Lansing.” Once in Lansing, the travelers would have to hire…

  • The Bookstore

    The origins of the M.S.U. Bookstore date to November 1896, when a group of faculty and students organized the “Agricultural College Cooperative Book Buying Association,” or C.B.B.A. Its chief organizer was Wilbur Olin Hedrick (M.A.C. ’91), Assistant Professor of History and Political Economy, who was a major proponent of cooperative organizations in agriculture. The primary purpose of the…

  • The “Half-way Stone” or “Split Rock”

    Long before the days of asphalt and automobiles, the three-mile journey between downtown Lansing and the Michigan Agricultural College was arduous and wearisome at best. What today is Michigan Avenue was a dirt track with occasional corduroy—logs laid perpendicular to the direction of travel—to prevent wagon wheels from sinking into the mire. When it was…

  • The Women’s Cooperative Houses (1936–1956)

    Enrollment at Michigan State grew stratospherically during the era 1920–1950. Especially fulsome was the growth in number of female students, as the Division of Home Economics (established 1896 and commonly called the “Women’s Course”) reached maturity. A dedicated Home Economics building in 1924 improved the classroom and laboratory plant, which contributed to increased enrollment: from 537 female…

  • Drinking Fountain, Gift of the Class of 1900

    This odd, rounded mass of stone, shrouded by shrubbery and bearing the inscription “Class of 1900,” is the subject of much curiosity among visitors (and those few students who happen to stroll, rather than rush, by). In our modern era, the intended purpose of this remnant of a hundred-year-old class gift is not readily discerned.…

  • Beal Botanical Gardens (1873)

    William James Beal (1833–1924) was Professor of Botany at M.A.C. from 1870 to 1910. He also served as Professor of Horticulture 1872–1882 and Professor of Forestry 1882–1902, two fields that grew from being sub-disciplines of botany until they warranted their own departments and professors. Even a short list of Beal’s accomplishments is lengthy and distinguished, including being credited…

  • “The Rock” – Gift of the Class of 1873

    One of the university’s more famed (and perhaps notorious) traditions is that of “The Rock,” a large boulder with a prominent flat face that is used as a constantly changing painted billboard for all sorts of messages—birthday greetings, political slogans, and everything in between. However, few students are aware that the rock had its origins…