This Week In KU History

July 1, 1925: The Kansas Board of Regents accepts a $75,000 gift from Elizabeth M. Watkins for the construction of the first KU residence hall for self-supporting women undergraduates. Read the full story.

July 1, 1952: Pharmacology professor Dr. W. Clarke Wescoe becomes dean of the University of Kansas School of Medicine and director of the KU Medical Center, ushering in a period of “momentous change and daring innovation” at 39th and Rainbow Boulevard. Read the full story.

July 5, 1857: Architect John G. Haskell, the prolific designer of scores of Kansas buildings, including five KU structures – two of which still remain – first arrives in Lawrence. Read the full story.

July 7, 1894: KU’s Lewis Lindsay Dyche leaves New York as official naturalist on the ill-starred Cook expedition to the North Pole. Read the full story.

July 8, 1932: KU football and wrestling star Pete Mehringer qualifies for the Olympics. Read the full story.

July 16, 1970: Former KU student Rick “Tiger” Dowdell, 19, is shot and killed by police in downtown Lawrence, sparking a series of protests, vandalism, and confrontations that culminates in the death of 18-year-old KU freshman Harry Nicholas “Nick” Rice on Oread Boulevard five days later. Read the full story.

July 19, 1866: KU Board of Regents elects first three members of the school’s faculty, Elial J. Rice to the “chair of Belles Lettres and Mental and Moral Philosophy,” David H. Robinson to the “chair of Languages,” and Francis H. Snow to the “chair of Mathematics and General Sciences.” Read the full story.

July 27, 1922: KU alum William Allen White, nationally renowned editor and publisher of the Emporia Gazette, pens his Pulitzer Prize-winning editorial in defense of free speech titled “To An Anxious Friend.” Read the full story.

July 28, 1939: The Summer Session Kansan announces that renovations are nearly complete on “The Outlook,” the new official KU chancellor’s residence – a willed gift from the recently deceased University benefactress Elizabeth Watkins. Read the full story.

July 31, 1939: The University announces that the “Men of 1011,” founders of the first semi-organized house for KU students, will move from their Indiana Street home into the original chancellor’s residence at 1345 Louisiana. Read the full story.

Compiled by H.J. Fortunato
University of Kansas

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Copyright 2005 © University of Kansas Memorial Corporation