A Glimpse of Early Student Life at 'The University'
A parent reflects on the rigorous intellectual environment and the warm, 'family-like' boarding experience at a regional boarding school in Washington Territory.
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.
The school term will begin about the 1st of October with a union staff of able teachers. The University is taking its place in the front rank of the institutions of learning in the Northwest. I knowingly speak of the management of the school and boarding departments from personal experience, extending through a period of several months. I boarded there with my children and sent them to school. The President, Prof. Powell, and his amiable, energetic wife make the place feel pleasant, comfortable, and homelike. The tables in the dining hall are always tastefully loaded with wholesome food, with its choice fruits, fresh milk, cream, eggs, chickens, turkeys, and as they have their own cows and fowls. Most of the teachers reside in the same building with the pupils, sit at the same table with them, and exert great attention to their manners and morale. Here, at the tables, the teachers and pupils converse in the different languages which they are studying; one of the sciences, history, etc., a practical and improving method of instruction. I feel confident if a scholar does not learn here, he will not anywhere. It seemed to me more like a lost, happy family than a boarding house. The mutual feeling existing with each other, the kindness bestowed on me (for I was sick when I was there) can never be forgotten. The institution is parental in its government, firm but kind. The University building, together with the two boarding halls, the President’s house, occupy a commanding eminence in the central part of the city, in the midst of a beautiful campus of ten acres of land, adorned with native evergreens. The location is as healthful as it is beautiful. Clear, cold water, coming in pipes from the hills beyond, supplies all the buildings.
“It seemed to me more like a lost, happy family than a boarding house.”
This 1885 account of student housing—promising affordable boarding with local food and 'parental' oversight—strikes a sharp contrast to the modern era of student housing crises and soaring tuition costs. It offers a glimpse into a time when the University was literally the center of town, literally and figuratively anchoring the development of the city.
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