The Unfinished Dream of a Puyallup University
After the death of Peter C. Stanup, documents were discovered detailing an ambitious plan for an Indian-led university on the Puyallup reservation.
The story, cleaned up
A cleaned-up reading of the newspaper page: spelling and layout repaired, one story lifted off a crowded page. It follows the original closely but it is not a transcription. The original page is below; read it if a detail matters.
Among the papers of the late Peter C. Stanup have been found complete plans for the establishment of the Peter C. Stanup University for the education of Indian youth. One of the documents is a bill that was to be submitted to Congress to confirm land in the Puyallup Indian Reservation, Pierce County, as the 'school farm,' being the land conveyed by the successors and heirs of the Puyallup tribe of Indians to the corporation. Peter desired the university be named the Thomas Lane University in honor of ex-Chief Lane, but Lane and his friends insisted that it be the Stanup University. The articles of incorporation suggest a board of trustees composed of twenty-one members, to hold office for life, with the objective to maintain a university for the education of the youth of the founders and others in the arts and sciences and all branches of learning.
“The objects for which this corporation is formed are to create and maintain a university for the education of the youth of the founders hereof and others in the arts and sciences and all branches of learning.”
This 1891 proposal reflects the long-standing Indigenous efforts to secure self-determined education systems despite the encroachment of federal oversight. While the Stanup University was never realized, the site of the Puyallup reservation remains a center of tribal sovereignty and educational advocacy today.
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