Calling all student groups AND history lovers! The Albert S. Cook Library is extremely excited to announce a new initiative to promote student group success while preserving Towson University’s unique and extensive history. Housed in Cook Library’s Special Collections Department, the University Archives is currently reaching out to student groups in an effort to gather
“The First Annual Faculty Follies will be presented on Tuesday evening”, announced the November 1941 issue of the Towerlight. Faculty members were to present a two-part program, the first of which was a kind of music hall performance with “all the members of the faculty who can be crowded on the stage”. “The second act,” the
One question we often get in the archives is “When did Towson start letting men attend?” and the answer is “Always.” Many people think that in our early days, we were a women-only institution, but that’s isn’t true. In 1866, when we had 48 students, 8 of them were male. The reality is that teaching
It’s not unusual for many generations of the same family to be graduates of Towson. We meet students every semester who tell us that their great-grandparents, grandparents, and parents are alums. Often we’ll search for those alums in our yearbooks, newspapers, and commencement programs, and are rewarded with a result. What I find striking about
For about 50 years, Towson celebrated a now little-known anniversary, the very first day of classes at the Maryland State Normal School in January of 1866. The celebration, called Founders’ Day, is first in evidence in the school calendar for 1919/1920 when the Maryland State Normal School principal was Henry Skinner West. By that time,
As we celebrate the anniversaries of both the founding of Towson University in 1866, and its move to this campus in 1915, the Towson University Archives and Special Collections department is taking time to look back over the school’s history and some of the important but lesser-known people who have influenced it. This is one
This history of student government at Towson University has been compiled using documents in the recently processed Student Government Association Records, 1921-2005 at Towson University Special Collections and Archives. If you would like to view the documents in this collection, or if you would like to contribute documents that would enhance our understanding of student
As we celebrate the anniversaries of both the founding of Towson University in 1866, and its move to this campus in 1915, the Towson University Archives and Special Collections department is taking time to look back over the school’s history and some of the important but lesser-known people who have influenced it. In 1922 as
The artistic talent of Louis Rosenthal had its beginnings in the little town of Plugnyan, Lithuania, where he was born on the 20th of February in 1888. Rosenthal was the sixth child of seven children, and from his early childhood years he was known to go out into the forest and experiment with carving his
This is a bridge nearly 40 years in the making . . . When the Administration Building — now known as Enrollment Services — was constructed in 1972, it meant pedestrians coming from the main part of campus had to cross Osler Drive to reach it. Almost immediately concerns about pedestrian safety were raised. In