Colorado State University
Colorado State University is a public land-grant research university in Fort Collins, Colorado, United States. It is the flagship university of the Colorado State University System. It was founded in 1870 as Colorado Agricultural College and assumed its current name in 1957. In 2024, enrollment was approximately 34,000 students, including resident and non-resident instruction students. The university has approximately 1,500 faculty in 8 colleges and 55 academic departments.
Bachelor's degrees are offered in 65 fields of study and master's degrees are offered in 55 fields. Colorado State confers doctoral degrees in 40 fields of study, in addition to a professional degree in veterinary medicine. In fiscal year 2023, CSU spent $498.1 million on research and development. It is classified among "R1: Doctoral Universities – Very high research activity".
CSU's campus includes the Engines and Energy Conversion Laboratory, the University Center for the Arts, which houses the Avenir Museum of Design and Merchandising and the Gregory Allicar Museum of Art, the James L. Voss Veterinary Teaching Hospital, and the Cooperative Institute for Research in the Atmosphere.
The Colorado State Rams compete in the NCAA Division I Mountain West Conference. Swimmer and six-time Olympic gold medalist Amy Van Dyken is one of CSU's most notable athletes. Other CSU alumni are Nobel Prize winners, Pulitzer Prize winners, astronauts, CEOs, Marshall Scholars and two former governors of Colorado. CSU faculty includes Fulbright Program American Scholars, members of National Academy of Sciences, National Academy of Engineering, American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and the Guggenheim fellowship.
History
Early years
CSU was known at its founding as the Colorado Agricultural College. Arising from the Morrill Act of 1862, the act to create the university was signed by the Colorado Territory governor Edward M. McCook in 1870. While a board of 12 trustees was formed to "purchase and manage property, erect buildings, establish basic rules for governing the institutions and employ buildings," the near complete lack of funding by the territorial legislature for this mission severely hampered progress.The first parcel of land for the campus was deeded in 1871 by Robert Dazell. In 1872, the Larimer County Land Improvement Company contributed a second parcel. The first $1000 to erect buildings was finally allocated by the territorial legislature in 1874. The funds were not, however, and trustees were required to find a matching amount, which they eventually obtained from local citizens and businesses.
Among the institutions which donated matching funds was the local Grange, which was heavily involved in the early establishment of the university. As part of this effort, in the spring of 1874, Grange No. 6 held a picnic and planting event at the corner of College Avenue and West Laurel Street, and later plowed and seeded 20 acres of wheat on a nearby field. Within several months, the university's first building, a -by-24-foot red brick building nicknamed the "Claim Shanty" was finished, providing the first tangible presence of the institution in Fort Collins.
After Colorado achieved statehood in 1876, the territorial law establishing the college was required to be reauthorized. In 1877, the state legislature created the eight-member State Board of Agriculture to govern the school. Early in the 21st century, the governing board was renamed the Board of Governors of the Colorado State University System. The legislature also authorized a railroad right-of-way across the campus and a mill levy to raise money for construction of the campus' first main building, Old Main, which was completed in December 1878. Despite wall cracks and other structural problems suffered during its first year, the building was opened in time for the welcoming of the first five students on September 1, 1879, by university president Elijah Evan Edwards. Enrollment grew to 25 by 1880.
During the first term at Colorado Agricultural College in fall 1879, the school functioned more as a college-prep school than a college because of the lack of trained students. Consequently, the first course offerings were arithmetic, English, U.S. history, natural philosophy, horticulture and farm economy. Students also labored on the college farm and attended daily chapel services. The spring term provided the first true college-level instruction. Despite his accomplishments, Edwards resigned in spring 1882 because of conflicts with the State Board of Agriculture, a young faculty member, and with students. The board's next appointee as president was Charles Ingersoll, a graduate and former faculty member at Michigan State Agricultural College, who began his nine years of service at CAC with just two full-time faculty members and 67 students, 24 of whom were women.
President Charles Ingersoll
Agricultural research grew rapidly under Ingersoll. The Hatch Act of 1887 provided federal funds to establish and maintain experiment stations at land-grant colleges. Ainsworth Blount, CAC's first professor of practical agriculture and manager of the College Farm, had become known as a "one man experiment station", and the Hatch Act expanded his original station to five Colorado locations. The curriculum expanded as well, introducing coursework in engineering, animal science, and liberal arts. New faculty members brought expertise in botany, horticulture, entomology, and irrigation engineering. CAC made its first attempts at animal science during 1883–84, when it hired veterinary surgeon George Faville. Faville conducted free weekly clinics for student instruction and treatment of local citizen's diseased or injured animals. Veterinary science at the college languished for many years following Faville's departure in 1886.President Ingersoll believed the school neglected special programs for women. Despite the reluctance of the institution's governing board, CAC began opening the door to liberal arts in 1885, and by Ingersoll's last year at CAC the college had instituted a "Ladies Course" that offered junior and senior women classes in drawing, stenography and typewriting, foreign languages, landscape gardening and psychology. Ingersoll's belief in liberal yet practical education conflicted with the narrower focus of the State Board of Agriculture, and a final clash in April 1891 led to his resignation. In 1884, CAC would celebrate the commencement of its first three graduates.
Professor Louis G. Carpenter
One of the early notable professors was Louis George Carpenter, who was happy to be called "Professor Carp." He was a college professor and later the Dean of Engineering & Physics at Colorado State University formerly known as the Colorado Agricultural College. He was also an engineer, mathematician, and irrigation and consulting engineer.Carpenter began teaching mathematics at Michigan State Agricultural College, and did so from 1883 to 1888.
Carpenter was recruited by President Charles Ingersoll and accepted the chair of the Engineering & Physics Department of the then Colorado Agricultural College. There, he began the first organized and systematic college program for irrigation engineering. Those completing such instruction were awarded a Bachelor of Science degree in Irrigation Engineering. Carpenter was a strong advocate for expanding education opportunities to minorities and women. He helped promote and organize newly accredited degree programs despite opposition from those unwilling to change.
Carpenter declined the Presidency of that college in 1891 and several times during his tenure. Despite difficulty to enact change, he was significant in being able to help transform the farm focused college into a university of higher learning.
In 1889, he became the director of the Colorado Agricultural Experiment Station.
Carpenter was one of the foremost leading experts on irrigation systems. He investigated irrigation systems not only in North America but also in Canada and Europe. This led to his engineering consulting and water law. He became Colorado's State Engineer, a post he held for several years while still teaching.
In 1911, Carpenter left academics and established an engineering consulting firm in Denver. This covered not only included irrigation engineering, but also consulting on hydraulic construction projects and the problems associated with such projects. He did this traveling around Canada, the United States and Western Europe with his brother running the office until his retirement in 1922. He left many papers to the university and was given an honorary doctorate before his death in 1935.
Turn of the 20th century
Alston Ellis encountered limited funding and decided in 1895 to reduce the number of Experiment Stations. Female students grew in number from 44 in 1892 to 112 in 1896, and by fall 1895, the college's new domestic-economy program was in place. Football had a one-year stint at CAC in 1893, but Ellis was not a supporter of extracurricular activities and was especially hostile towards football.Barton Aylesworth became the school's fourth president in 1899, and the combination of his non-confrontational style with the presence of the vocal Colorado Cattle and Horse Growers Association on the governing board allowed ranching and farming interests to take the college's agricultural programs to new heights, greatly influencing the development of the entire school. Initially, the influence of ranching interests brought tremendous progress to CAC's agricultural programs. Enrollment quadrupled, studies in veterinary medicine were re-established, and CAC's Experiment Station benefited from lobbying that finally secured state appropriations. Eventually, conflicts with agricultural interests may have prompted Aylesworth to begin promoting a more balanced curriculum at CAC, which he then fought hard to defend. The conflict also led him to tire and negotiate his resignation.
Aylesworth was a big supporter of extracurricular activities. Football returned to the college in fall 1899, but baseball was the school's most popular sport. In 1903, the women's basketball team won CAC's first unofficial athletic championship, culminating with a victory over the University of Colorado. New clubs, fraternities, and sororities also emerged. By 1905, the school had a fledgling music department, which two years later became the Conservatory of Music.