125 Years Ago: Starting Classes at State Normal

On October 5, 1892 – 125 years ago this week – the doors of the State Normal and Industrial School (now UNCG) opened its doors for an initial class of 198 women from across North Carolina. The institution was originally chartered by the State of North Carolina in February 1891, with a mission of training female teachers and instructing them in “drawing, telegraphy, type-writing, stenography, and such other industrial arts as may be suitable to their sex and conducive to their support and usefulness.” Leading the charge in the establishment and development of the school was Charles Duncan McIver, a staunch advocate for public schools, teacher education, and higher education for women. After the state legislature approved funding, McIver was named the first president of the State Normal.

View of the State Normal campus from Spring Garden Street, 1894

Four North Carolina communities put forth offers to be the home for the new school: Durham, Graham, Thomasville, and Greensboro. Ultimately, Greensboro won due to its relatively central location and the convergence of railroad lines from six directions (see this post for more information on the selection of Greensboro as the school's site). McIver and other school boosters quickly set about identifying a location in Greensboro where the new institution could be built. Ultimately, in November 1891, the site that was selected was one referred to as the "Pullen Site," located about a half mile west of Greensboro Female College on Spring Garden Street. This site was also within view, but not directly on, the railroad line. Two Raleigh real estate speculators and philanthropists, Richard Stanhope Pullen and Robert T. Gray, donated the ten acres that would house the school.

After a year spent planning the new school and constructing its facilities, classes began at the State Normal on October 5, 1892 (the date we now celebrate as Founders Day).Courses of study were divided into three departments: normal (teaching), business, and domestic science. The normal, listed as the leading department, included pedagogy classes as well as coursework in English, history, math, science, foreign language, art, music, and physical culture. This department also served as the academic home for McIver. In addition to serving as President of the school, he taught courses in pedagogy, education, and civics – courses that maybe went on a bit longer than anticipated. A memoir written by a staff member noted that “both in class and in chapel, he kept the students after the appointed hour so frequently that faculty members tried to avoid having their own classes scheduled in the following periods.”

President Charles Duncan McIver and the State Normal faculty, 1893

The standard course load for these new students included 22 to 27 class meetings per week, divided among six or eight individual courses. Study time was curtailed by the dormitory lights-out rule from 10 pm to 6 am, designed to ensure that students got adequate sleep. Every freshman regardless of major took the same eight courses in algebra, English, general and English history, Latin, physical geography and botany, drawing, vocal music, and physical culture (although domestic science students substituted sewing for drawing).

Founding the State Normal proved to be a milestone in education – and particularly women’s education – in North Carolina and throughout the United States. McIver and the early educators and students at the State Normal set the groundwork for UNCG as it stands today. One hundred twenty-five years after the first classes took place, the legacy remains.

Ezekiel "Zeke" Robinson

Robinson with the college's horse and buggy

When the doors opened at the State Normal and Industrial School (now UNCG) on October 5, 1892, school president Charles Duncan McIver had 15 well-qualified faculty members and nearly 200 young female students. While cooks, janitors, handymen, and others worked behind the scenes to keep the school running, McIver felt that he needed a single individual to manage the facilities and the support staff on the growing campus. He called upon Ezekiel “Zeke” Robinson, a young African American man who had worked as a servant for McIver during his time teaching at Peace Institute in Raleigh. Robinson arrived mere weeks after the campus’s opening, and took up the duties of “General Factotum.”

In this role, Robinson managed the school’s large support staff – as many as forty-two individuals in the 1894-95 academic year. Nearly all of these workers were African Americans, and many (including Robinson) lived in a small segregated neighborhood several blocks west of campus. There, Robinson and his wife raised their four children – three boys. One son, named Charles Duncan McIver, died at a young age. The other two sons, Ed and Milton, moved to New York City where one became a prominent orchestra leader. Robinson’s only daughter Annie, named after McIver’s daughter, graduated from Bennett College in 1932 and became an educator in Greensboro.

Robinson (front center) with other members
of the maintenance team

In addition to supervision of other support staff, Robinson performed numerous tasks that were critical to the function of the school. He rang the school bell, assisted with campus landscaping, lit fires to keep offices and rooms warm, waited table at state dinners, and delivered the campus mail. He also served as a porter to the college presidents, seeing that they kept appointments and helping with their coats and umbrellas. In his role as the campus chauffeur, he drove the college presidents to meet visiting dignitaries such as Theodore Roosevelt, William Jennings Bryan, and Anna Howard Shaw. In the earliest days of the campus, he manned the college horse-and-buggy, providing students with their primary means of transportation into the city.

Robinson just prior to retirement, 1944

 During his time at the school, he saw the transition from horses to automobiles, from oil lamps to electricity, from fireplaces to central heating, and from wells and pumps to running water. He served three college presidents (McIver, Julius Foust, and W.C. Jackson). He saw the acreage of campus increase tenfold, and saw the student body grow from 200 to over 2,200.

Ill health forced Robinson to retire in 1944 after a 52-year career, although he noted that he planned to “come to work on his good days, and that the college will have to get along as best it can when he can’t make the grade.” At his retirement, faculty and alumnae presented Robinson with a $300 gift to symbolize their “appreciation of his long and faithful service to the college.” He returned to campus numerous times after his official retirement, typically at the annual Founder's Day celebration in October.

On December 1, 1960, Ezekiel Robinson died at a local nursing home at the age of 93. Robinson was the last surviving member of the faculty and staff from the first year of the State Normal. He was interred at Maplewood Cemetery near the North Carolina A&T campus.

Behind the Scenes of State Normal with Lula Martin McIver, part two

In last week's Spartan Stories blog post, we looked at the early life of Lula Martin McIver, wife of the State Normal and Industrial School's (now UNCG) founding president Charles Duncan McIver. This week we will explore her role as the first lady of State Normal and her continued influence on education in North Carolina.

In 1892, the McIvers moved to Greensboro after Charles was named president of the newly-established State Normal and Industrial School (now UNCG). As the campus's First Lady, Lula took on numerous responsibilities. She took charge of selecting furnishings for the sole dormitory on campus at the time and attending to much of the campus landscaping and beautification projects. She also was responsible for advocating for the hiring of Dr. Miriam Bitting as the campus's first physician, insisting at a woman's college needed a female medical doctor in charge of the health of the students.

McIver family in 1900

Also, on the frequent occasions when Charles was away from campus, Lula stepped in to handle much of the school's business. She would give a quiz for a Civics class or monitor the campus coal supply or advise with the College Physician about a threatened measles epidemic. She frequently served as a host for guests waiting to meet with Charles, and she often served as a mother figure for the students. In a 1944 memorial tribute, the Board of Trustees of the UNC Consolidated System noted that "her mother's heart embraced the increasing number of young students who were leaving home for the first time and made the McIver home a center of gracious hospitality."

Lula also became a staunch advocate for increased state support for education in North Carolina. She was a founding member of the Woman's Betterment Association, which specifically worked for improved facilities for public schools in the state. Lula assisted county leaders throughout the state, and at one time served as a field director. Only four years after the creation of the Woman's Betterment Association, 1,133 new school buildings were constructed in rural areas across North Carolina at a cost of $490,272. The total value of the entirety of public school property across the state almost doubled in that short four-year period.

Charles died in September 1906, but Lula and her four children remained in the McIver house on the State Normal campus. The two oldest McIver children - Annie and Charlie - were among the ten students enrolled at the first practice school on the State Normal campus. Annie went on to graduate from State Normal in 1905. Their youngest daughter, who was also named Lula, was a member of the Class of 1921 at the institution her parents founded. Charles, Jr. graduated from his father's alma mater, the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, in 1909. A fourth child, Verlinda, died at a young age in 1908.

Lula Martin McIver,
pictured in the 1921 Pine Needles yearbook

Lula continued to be an active presence on campus, and remained a strong advocate of a number of social causes, including the YWCA, Sunday Schools, the community Art Association, and educational institutions for both white and African American students in the state. Lula suffered a broken hip in 1930 and was wheelchair bound, limiting her ability to be as active as she had been before. But she still attended the annual Founder's Day ceremony on campus every October.

On December 22, 1944, Lula Martin McIver passed away at age 80. At the Founder's Day service the following October, college president Walter Clinton Jackson noted that "death last December broke Mrs. McIver's long connection with this College, but death cannot remove her benevolent spirit from this campus not can it stop the force which she, working with and through her husband, started for the advancement of educational opportunity for women in North Carolina." That year, students placed wreaths on both the graves of Charles and Lula McIver as part of the Founder's Day ceremony, "conscious of the fact that Dr. McIver himself would feel that this was indeed a just and proper recognition of one who may rightfully be called the co-founder of the College."

Behind the Scenes of State Normal with Lula Martin McIver, part one

In a undated speech titled "The Educated Woman's Contribution to the Service of the State," Lula Martin McIver, widow of the State Normal and Industrial School's (now UNCG) founding president Charles Duncan McIver, passionately argued for the value of education for women in North Carolina. Her speech echoes many of the sentiments expressed at the founding of the school about the importance of educating women as a way of educating the populace as a whole. She stated, "since it is true that the child of today is the citizen of tomorrow, it may safely be claimed that the woman citizen of the state laboring in the home and school combines all four -- she rules all, prays for all, fights for all, and metaphorically and literally feeds all. Since she occupies such an important position in relation to the future citizenship of the state, it is of supreme importance to every state that she be properly trained for her great work."

The fight for women's education is one that Lula McIver started as a young girl, developed further with her husband Charles, and continued until her death. Lula was born Lula Verlinda Martin in Salem, North Carolina, on June 8, 1864, to Dr. Samuel Martin, a dentist, and Verlinda Miller Martin, who had graduated with honors from Edgeworth Seminary in Greensboro. Young Lula grew up surrounded by books and scientific instruments, and dreamed of becoming a physician. But, in the 19th century, the path for women wishing to become medical doctors was almost non-existent. She attended the prestigious Salem Academy, graduating in 1881. Ultimately, however, she chose to pursue a career as a teacher over her dreams of becoming a physician.

She began her career teaching in a one-room private school and later in the Oxford Orphanage. Four years after beginning her teaching career, Lula met a fellow teacher named Charles Duncan McIver. In 1885, the couple married. Lula, however, retained her strong sense of independence and her belief "that a woman was an individual with a right to her own mind, her own property, her own privileges." She refused to wear a wedding ring as she believed it to be a symbol of the oppression of women (according to a 1940 Founder's Day address issued by the College).

Around the time of their marriage, Charles became heavily involved in local Teachers Institutes, which sought to provide professional training for educators throughout North Carolina. At the time, the state had no formal system for training its teachers, and funding for public schools was sparse. Lula was an essential part of the Institutes' success, doing everything from practice teaching demonstrations to scrubbing clean the local courthouses used as training sites.

Most of the Teachers Institutes took place during the summer months when the public schools were not in session. During the academic year, beginning in 1886, the McIvers both taught at Peace Institute in Raleigh. Lula also briefly held the position of "lady principal" at the Charlotte Female Institute (now Queen's University). During this time, Charles also contemplated leaving education for a career as a lawyer (a decision he ultimately abandoned). Lula joined him in studying the law "because her mind needed the constant stimulation of study and learning." Charles often told a story of coming home to find Lula "completely absorbed, lying across the bed with her chin in her hands, in The Legal Rights of Married Women in England." During her time in Charlotte, Lula studied with Dr. Annie Laurie Alexander, the first North Carolina woman physician to practice in the state.

Next week, we'll explore Lula McIver's role as the first lady of the State Normal and Industrial School as well as her continuing contributions to the development of the public education system in North Carolina.

Ringing "Glad Tidings": A History of the University Bell

On October 5, 1892, when the doors of the State Normal and Industrial School officially opened for instruction, the women enrolled were called to classes by the chiming of the University Bell. Originally, the bell stood near the location of the current Alumni House. It was used wake students in the morning, call them to breakfast and other meals, and alert them to the start of the school day. Ezekiel Robinson was typically the person tasked with ringing the bell during the earliest years of the school.

Ezekiel Robinson with the campus bell, 1910

Standing near the site of the current Alumni House, the bell also was used in cases of emergencies or special announcements. In 1897 when the State Normal students learned that the school was receiving increased appropriations from the state legislature (twice the amount received the previous year!), "a hundred or more young ladies started for the Normal bell to ring out the glad tidings." Students kept the bell ringing for nearly half an hour.

When the Brick Dormitory caught fire in the middle of the night in 1904, the bell rang to wake sleeping students and get them to safety. Josephine Scott, a student from Alamance County, ran to ring the bell and hasten the evacuation. After ringing the bell a few times, the rope used broke. According to a classmates' recollection, Scott then climbed the wooden frame of the bell tower to ring the bell with her hands until all of the students had safely left the building.

After the destruction of Brick Dormitory and the construction of Spencer, the bell was moved to a site closer to the new residence hall (across College Avenue from where Jackson Library sits today). When electric bells were installed in the campus buildings, the use of the bell on a daily basis was discontinued. But students still used it as a meeting place for groups and celebrations. On student government election nights, the winning group would meet at the bell to begin their festivities. 

Then, on a Saturday night in January 1938, the bell was taken down and tucked away in a storage room on campus. There it sat until members of the Class of 1923 decided it needed a more prominent location and a more prominent role in ongoing campus life and traditions.

The bell hanging in Students Anniversary Plaza, 1968

When the Class of 1923 held their 30th reunion in 1953, the class president implored that something be done to preserve "a certain bell dear to the memory of the alumnae." Small paper bells were distributed at the class luncheon, and alumnae were encouraged to contribute funds to the "bell fund." Shortly after that reunion, the bell was removed from storage and placed in a more prominent location at the college entrance from Spring Garden Street.  One small change was made to the bell, however. The clapper was removed because administrators "felt that placing the bell intact, so close to Curry School [the teaching school on campus], might be too great a temptation to the Curry children."

In 1967, to commemorate the 75th anniversary of the university's opening, the student body of 1967 donated $15,000 to build Students’ Anniversary Plaza at the corner of Spring Garden and College Avenue (the site of founding president Charles Duncan McIver's home). A brick "modernistic arch" was designed by Charles Bell, superintendent of ground at UNCG. The bell was bronzed and mounted under the arch in 1968.

The bell remained in that location until 1987 when it was removed for restoration. It is currently stored in the Alumni House, but the bell is brought out for every commencement. At the end of the ceremony, the bell is rung to honor the new graduates. As it first rang to welcome students to the new State Normal and Industrial School, it now rings to honor our newest alumni.

The Lost Architecture of UNCG, part 1

At the time of its opening in 1892, the State Normal and Industrial School (now UNCG) consisted primarily of four buildings: two dormitories, a "main building," and the president's house. Smaller outbuildings existed, but these four structures served as the heart of campus activity. Today, only the Main Building -- renamed the Foust Building in 1960 in memory of the institution's second president Julius Foust -- remains.

Campus in 1893 (from left to right:
McIver House, Wooden Dormitory, Main Building, Brick Dormitory)

What happened to the other original structures? What other buildings were constructed during the earlier years of the institution but no longer stand? This week and next, we will look at some of the lost architecture of UNCG -- the buildings that were but are no more. Today, we start with the three structures that stood on opening day of State Normal but no longer exist.

Brick Dormitory

Brick Dormitory, designed by Epps & Hackett of Greensboro, was one of the two campus building in the original campus plans created by the architecture firm of Epps and Hackett of Greensboro. It also known as the matron’s hall or the living building. Like the Main (now Foust) Building, Brick Dormitory was built of brick, trimmed with granite, covered with metal shingles, and plastered with Acme cement.

The three-story structure was built in stages. By 1895 it included a kitchen, an infirmary room, and a dining hall that held 150 students. A final wing was added at the rear of the building in 1903 to add more student rooms and larger dining and kitchen facilities. Brick Dormitory also served as a site for socialization amongst the students. In the evenings between study hour and lights-out, they sat on the steps, singing songs and telling jokes. 

The dormitory was destroyed by fire on January 20, 1904, with all of the residents escaping unharmed. The total loss due to the fire was evaluated at $64,458. It was located to the east of Main Building, approximately near the site of the current McIver and Taylor buildings.

Wooden Dormitory/Midway/Guilford Dormitory

Built in 1892, this 22-room dormitory was known at the outset as Wooden Dormitory. It was then nicknamed “Midway” after the Chicago Exposition of 1893 and later called Guilford Dormitory. This frame building was not included in the original building agreement between the school and the city of Greensboro, so the school's board of directors were forced to mortgage the property (along with the President's house) for $9,000.

As was the case with Brick Dormitory, students who lived in Wooden Dormitory were directly supervised by "lady assistants" who served almost as house mothers. The students in Wooden Dormitory, however, faced an extra challenge compared to those in Brick Dormitory. Rigid standards of dress dictated that no lady would be seen on the street without hat and gloves. Therefore, students had to be properly attired before they could walk from their room Wooden Dormitory to the dining hall in Brick Dormitory.

The College’s first “practice school” was housed in the right wing of the dormitory until the Curry Building (College Avenue) opened in 1902. The dormitory was razed in 1935 to make room for the current Alumni House.

President's House/McIver House

This two-story, ten-room house was built in 1892 on the southwest corner of College Avenue and Spring Garden Street for President Charles Duncan McIver and his family (around the site of the current Vacc Bell Tower). Although President McIver passed away in 1906, Mrs. McIver lived there until her death in December 1944. It was torn down in 1952 but has since been commemorated on two occasions.

The Class of 1923, on the occasion of its 30th reunion, commissioned a small brick foundation from which the original 1892 School bell, or “University Bell,” would hang. In 1967, on the occasion of the University’s 75th anniversary, the student body voted to build a more elaborate brick setting on the site named Student Anniversary Plaza. Student Anniversary Plaza was renovated in 2005 to incorporate the Vacc Bell Tower.

Edwin Alderman and the founding of the State Normal and Industrial School

Edwin Alderman, ca. 1892

While Dr. Charles Duncan McIver is credited with being the founder of the State Normal and Industrial School (now The University of North Carolina at Greensboro), the contribution and influence that his good friend, Edwin Alderman had on its creation cannot be overlooked. Born in May 1861, Alderman attended the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill where his friendship with fellow students like McIver, James Y. Joyner, and M.C.S. Noble encouraged his belief in educational reform in North Carolina. Graduating in 1882, he became the superintendent of schools in Goldsboro, NC.  In 1886, McIver approached Alderman with the idea of establishing a teachers’ college which would serve both male and female students in the state. This concept was unique at the time as there were no public colleges or universities for white women and the private denominational colleges were often too expensive for many to attend.

Despite enthusiastic support from the North Carolina Teachers’ Assembly, the state legislature failed to pass funding for the establishment of such a school in 1887 and 1889.  However, as a compromise they agreed in 1889 to fund two educators to travel to every county in the state, offering week-long teachers’ institutes.  McIver and Alderman were selected to lead the program. Seizing on the opportunity to connect with people across North Carolina, they began promoting and gaining support for the establishment of a new teaching college. Their successful crusade culminated in February 1891, when the state legislature easily passed a bill to establish a Normal and Industrial School for White Girls.

In June 1891, the nine-man board of directors for the State Normal and Industrial School elected McIver as the president of the new school. While Alderman had also been interested in the job, he did not actively campaign for it against his good friend McIver and instead accepted  professorships of English and History. The importance of his contribution to the school’s founding was also reflected in his yearly salary of $2,000; only $250 less than McIver’s and nearly double that of any other faculty member. Alderman left the college in 1893 to become the first professor of pedagogy at the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill and was elected president of the university in 1896. Alderman continued his commitment to higher education by becoming president of Tulane University in 1900 and eventually was elected the first president at the University of Virginia in 1904 where he would serve until his death April 1931.

Greensboro Got the Girls ... Now Where Do We Put Them?

In last week's Spartan Story, we looked at the decision to name Greensboro as the site for North Carolina's newly-created State Normal and Industrial School. Greensboro citizens were happy and excited -- while those in other towns also in contention for the institution were not so pleased. Greensboro won the right to host the new school by pledging $30,000 along with a site for the campus's development. But the offer alone didn't mean that the money - or even the land - was in hand.

In July 1891, shortly after being awarded the school, a committee was formed to drum up citizen support for a bond referendum to be voted on in late July. The bonds would allow citizens to support the city's efforts to raise the $30,000 pledged to the state. The committee proved successful in its campaign as 771 citizens voted in favor of the bonds; no votes were cast opposed.

State Normal's first president, Charles Duncan McIver,
pictured here in his office in the Main Building in 1895

That night, a "rousing meeting" was held at the Greensboro Court House. The chief speaker was Charles Duncan McIver, who had been selected by the board of directors to be the first president of the new State Normal and Industrial School. McIver "fervently proclaimed his faith in the future progress of the State through the education of its women. He expressed complete satisfaction with the Board's selection of Greensboro for the school, praising its climate, accessibility and its fine public spirit." Likewise, the Greensboro correspondent to the Raleigh News and Observer reported that "Greensboro was delighted with President McIver, and glad to know that he is soon to be one of us."

The issue of raising $30,000 through bonds proved simpler to resolve than that of finding and selecting a site for the school. A number of sites around town were suggested as possibilities. The Steel and Iron Company offered two sites - one directly on a rail line just over a mile outside of town and one within the city limits on Church Street. Another site offered, known as the "Brick School Site," was located about 100 yards west of Greensboro Female College (now Greensboro College). Another site known as the "Tate Site" was also just west of Greensboro Female College on West Market Street.

Ultimately, in November 1891, the site that was selected was one referred to as the "Pullen Site," located about a half mile west of Greensboro Female College on Spring Garden Street. This site was also within view, but not directly on, the railroad line. Two Raleigh real estate speculators and philanthropists, Richard Stanhope Pullen and Robert T. Gray, donated the ten acres that would house the school. The land sat just inside of the city's corporate limits, adjacent to a farm owned by the Reverend R. R. Moore.

Epps & Hackett's original architectural renderings for the
Main Building and Brick Dormitory at State Normal

With a site selected, the board of directors hired Greensboro architects Orlo Epps and C.M. Hackett to design two large brick buildings for the campus. One building was to house the school's academic functions and the other to house its students. Contractor Thomas Woodroffe was brought on to build the structures. Epps and Hackett chose to design the two buildings in the Romanesque Revival style which had been made popular at the time by architect Henry Hobson Richardson.

Main Building was constructed to house the president's office, 10 classrooms, the library, a small gymnasium, and an auditorium/chapel. Originally referred to as the "matron's hall" or the "living building," the second structure is most often referred to as Brick Dormitory. Located approximately where the current McIver Building stands, Brick Dormitory contained a kitchen, a dining room, and living spaces for the student body.

After more than a year spent planning the new school and constructing its facilities, the State Normal and Industrial School officially opened its doors for an initial class of 198 female students from across North Carolina on October 5, 1892. The Brick Dormitory was destroyed by a fire in January 1904. But the Main Building, which was renamed in 1960 to honor Julius Foust, the second president of the school, remains in use primarily for classroom and academic office space. It was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1980.

Greensboro Gets the Girls!

On February 18, 1891, the General Assembly of North Carolina passed an act that officially established a "normal and industrial school for white girls." This act appropriated $10,000 per year for maintenance of the school, but not for buildings, land, or other facilities. In fact, the act stated that "the institution shall be located ... at some suitable place where the citizens thereof shall furnish the necessary buildings or money sufficient to erect them." Cities were given until June 1st to submit their bids to host the new school.

Act to Establish a Normal Industrial School
for White Girls, 1891

On June 9th, the appointed board of directors met in Raleigh to consider the various host proposals. Three main competitors for the new institution emerged -- Durham, Graham, and Thomasville. Greensboro had not even submitted an offer, although the News and Observer in Raleigh reported that representatives from Greensboro "intimated an intention to make a proposition." The board members adjourned to investigate the proposals, but the Greensboro citizens continued their work. The Graham (N.C.) Gleaner wrote that "all this time the Greensboro folks were as busy as beavers, running hither and thither getting subscriptions to knock the other applicants out who had entered the race at the beginning and made a square manly fight for the school." Many newspapers intimated that Greensboro was the understood front-runner, assuming they could garner the necessary support and funds, and that the investigations of the other offers was merely a matter of courtesy.

After learning of the offers from Durham, Graham, and Thomasville, the citizens of Greensboro held a mass meeting on June 12th to finalize their proposal. The citizens present voted unanimously to make a bid of $30,000 plus a site -- an offer which surpassed all others under consideration. Following this offer, the school's board of directors unanimously decided to accept Greensboro's offer. The chairman of the board, Major S.M. Finger, the State Superintendent of Public Instruction, stated, "I congratulate Greensboro on the result. I believe this is the proper place for [the school]. The Piedmont is the coming part of the State."

Local newspapers in Greensboro also celebrated the decision. The Greensboro correspondent to the News and Observer titled his article "Greensboro Wins," with the subtitle: "She Gets the Girls Industrial School -- The City of Flowers is Happy." The Richmond Dispatch announced "Greensboro Gets the Girls." And the Greensboro Patriot praised the "spirit of progress and liberality manifested by the citizens and rejoiced that Greensboro's advantageous location, accessibility to railroads, and healthy climate had been recognized by this decision."

Understandably, the other three cities under consideration for the school were not pleased by the decision. The Durham Globe blamed "the men of property" in that city for "lack of enterprise," stating "Greensboro was wide awake and all her citizens were open-handed. There was no waiting for two or three men to do it all; there was no jealousy and no personal pride. It was city pride and city enterprise." Citizens in Graham complained that the board considered the proposals of Graham and Thomasville only as a means "to pry Greensboro" into submitting an offer.

Cover of a promotion booklet produced by the Greensboro
Chamber of Commerce, 1892

Thomasville, however, argued the strongest against the choice of Greensboro to host the new school. J.A. Leach, who presented Thomasville's proposal to the board of directors, wrote an open letter criticizing the board's "hasty action" and failure to give the other towns the chance to outbid Greensboro if they desired. His chief complaint, though, was that the board selected a "fashionable city" where prices were high compared to other areas. The choice of Greensboro, in his opinion, violated the section of the school's establishment act which stated that "the institution shall be located at a place where low rates of board can be secured." He argued that the purpose of the school was to provide education for poorer girls "not in a city that is noted for its style and costly female dress, where the Normal and Industrial girls will have to dress as well as the college, graded school, and city girls do when upon the streets or at the churches where they must go, but in some town where good board is cheap, and plain inexpensive clothing can be worn with propriety."

In spite of objections, Greensboro was indeed set to house the new State Normal and Industrial School. Stay tuned to next week's Spartan Story where we learn more about the Greensboro citizens' work to move forward with the campus's development.

Ezekiel "Zeke" Robinson

Robinson with the college's horse and buggy

When the doors opened at the State Normal and Industrial School (now UNCG) on October 5, 1892, school president Charles Duncan McIver had 15 well-qualified faculty members and nearly 200 young female students. While cooks, janitors, handymen, and others worked behind the scenes to keep the school running, McIver felt that he needed a single individual to manage the facilities and the support staff on the growing campus. He called upon Ezekiel “Zeke” Robinson, a young African American man who had worked as a servant for McIver during his time teaching at Peace Institute in Raleigh. Robinson arrived mere weeks after the campus’s opening, and took up the duties of “General Factotum.”

In this role, Robinson managed the school’s large support staff – as many as forty-two individuals in the 1894-95 academic year. Nearly all of these workers were African Americans, and many (including Robinson) lived in a small segregated neighborhood several blocks west of campus. There, Robinson and his wife raised their four children – three boys. One son, named Charles Duncan McIver, died at a young age. The other two sons, Ed and Milton, moved to New York City where one became a prominent orchestra leader. Robinson’s only daughter Annie, named after McIver’s daughter, graduated from Bennett College in 1932 and became an educator in Greensboro.

Robinson (front center) with other members
of the maintenance team

In addition to supervision of other support staff, Robinson performed numerous tasks that were critical to the function of the school. He rang the school bell, assisted with campus landscaping, lit fires to keep offices and rooms warm, waited table at state dinners, and delivered the campus mail. He also served as a porter to the college presidents, seeing that they kept appointments and helping with their coats and umbrellas. In his role as the campus chauffeur, he drove the college presidents to meet visiting dignitaries such as Theodore Roosevelt, William Jennings Bryan, and Anna Howard Shaw. In the earliest days of the campus, he manned the college horse-and-buggy, providing students with their primary means of transportation into the city. During his time at the school, he saw the transition from horses to automobiles, from oil lamps to electricity, from fireplaces to central heating, and from wells and pumps to running water. He served three college presidents (McIver, Julius Foust, and W.C. Jackson). He saw the acreage of campus increase tenfold, and saw the student body grow from 200 to over 2,200.

Robinson in front of the McIver Building, 1944

Ill health forced Robinson to retire in 1944 after a 52-year career, although he noted that he planned to “come to work on his good days, and that the college will have to get along as best it can when he can’t make the grade.” At his retirement, faculty and alumnae presented Robinson with a $300 gift to symbolize their “appreciation of his long and faithful service to the college.” He returned to campus numerous times after his official retirement, typically at the annual Founder's Day celebration in October.

On December 1, 1960, Ezekiel Robinson died at a local nursing home at the age of 93. Robinson was the last surviving member of the faculty and staff from the first year of the State Normal. He was interred at Maplewood Cemetery near the North Carolina A&T campus.

Starting Classes at State Normal

The institution now known as The University of North Carolina at Greensboro was originally chartered by the State of North Carolina in February 1891. The school was founded to train female teachers and instruct them in “drawing, telegraphy, type-writing, stenography, and such other industrial arts as may be suitable to their sex and conducive to their support and usefulness.” Leading the charge in the establishment and development of the school was Charles Duncan McIver, a staunch advocate for public schools, teacher education, and higher education for women. After the state legislature approved funding, McIver was named the first president of what would be called the State Normal.

View of the State Normal campus from Spring Garden Street, 1894

Four North Carolina communities put forth offers to be the home for the new school: Durham, Graham, Thomasville, and Greensboro. Ultimately, Greensboro won due to its relatively central location and the convergence of railroad lines from six directions. After a year spent planning the new school and constructing its facilities, the State Normal officially opened its doors for an initial class of 198 female students from across North Carolina on October 5, 1892.

Classes offered at the State Normal were divided into three departments: normal (teaching), business, and domestic science. The normal, listed as the leading department, included pedagogy classes as well as coursework in English, history, math, science, foreign language, art, music, and physical culture. This department also served as the academic home for McIver. In addition to serving as President of the school, he taught courses in pedagogy, education, and civics – courses that maybe went on a bit longer than anticipated. A memoir written by a staff member noted that “both in class and in chapel, he kept the students after the appointed hour so frequently that faculty members tried to avoid having their own classes scheduled in the following periods.”

President Charles Duncan McIver and the State Normal faculty, 1893

The standard course load for these new students included 22 to 27 class meetings per week, divided among six or eight individual courses. Study time was curtailed by the dormitory lights-out rule from 10 pm to 6 am, designed to ensure that students got adequate sleep. Every freshman regardless of major took the same eight courses in algebra, English, general and English history, Latin, physical geography and botany, drawing, vocal music, and physical culture, except that domestic science students substituted sewing for drawing.

Founding the State Normal proved to be a milestone in education – and particularly women’s education – in North Carolina and throughout the United States. McIver and the early educators and students at the State Normal set the groundwork for UNCG as it stands today. One hundred twenty years after the first classes took place, the legacy remains.