Case Western Reserve University Archives

The Removal of Western Reserve College from Hudson to Cleveland


Universities don’t often pack up and move to another city, but in 1882, Western Reserve College moved from Hudson to Cleveland.  Several influential factors over a period of years preceded this decision.  As early as 1875, some members of the College trustees believed that in order to ensure its long-term survival, Western Reserve College should distinguish itself from other rural colleges by moving to a city and becoming an urban university.  Cleveland served as a logical choice as an urban location for Western Reserve College, since most of its recent donations came from Cleveland citizens, many of its students and alumni lived there, and the medical department had been the leading educational institution of Cleveland for over thirty years.


Funding from Cleveland industrialist Amasa Stone facilitated the decision to move.  On 9/20/1880, after four years of preliminary action, the Western Reserve College trustees voted to remove the college from Hudson to Cleveland, although the removal itself did not occur until two years later.  Since upon the removal of Western Reserve College to Cleveland, the undergraduate college would now be in the same city as its Medical Department, the trustees saw fit to change the name of the institution to Western Reserve University.  On 9/20/1880, the same day that the decision to move to Cleveland was reached, the trustees directed in a separate resolution that the legal name of the institution be changed to Western Reserve University, and that the undergraduate college be designated as Adelbert College.  Amasa Stone had requested that the college adopt the given name of his only son, who had passed away fifteen years earlier.


When seeking a suitable location in Cleveland, the Western Reserve College trustees expressed the opinion that it was desirable for the new site of the university to be adjacent to the Case School of Applied Science, which was soon to be constructed.  Representatives from each institution chose a location on the south side of Euclid Avenue opposite Wade Park, in the eastern part of the city, in what is today known as University Circle.  The selected site was purchased, with funds from over fifty-six contributors, for joint occupancy by the two institutions.  It was agreed that the relationship between them would be friendly and cooperative, but independent of each other.  The Case School of Applied Science was established in Cleveland in 1880, and the buildings on the new Western Reserve University campus were dedicated on 10/26/1882, during the university’s first academic year in Cleveland.  The old Western Reserve College campus in Hudson was reopened as Western Reserve Academy, a preparatory school, in 1882.

One of the few Western Reserve College faculty members who moved to Cleveland with the College was chemist Edward Morley, who had joined the faculty in 1869.  Since he also taught at the Medical Department located in Cleveland, Morley frequently traveled between Hudson and Cleveland.  In letters to his parents, he recounted the discussions, decisions, and activities that accomplished the move.  Some sections of these letters are transcribed below.


Decision to move from Hudson to Cleveland and some of the reactions to that decision:

March 28, 1880
“Nothing further has been said about the removal of the college, except that Mr. Cutler has been to Cleveland to talk with some of our trustees about the probable organization of the Case School.”

May 9, 1880
“Last Wednesday was the time for Mr. Cutler’s report on the question how much it would take to move the college to Cleveland, and put it on a good footing there. He had a paper which gave satisfaction to those who are ready to see it moved; and it was put in the hands of the man, as yet unknown to us, who is asking how much will be required to do so. On Monday, tomorrow, Mr. Cutler is to read the same paper to the trustees of the Case School, the reading being at the request of those trustees, and intended to give them some notion of what a college is; some suppose it is a fine building.”

June 20, 1880
“The Common Council of Cleveland passed a resolution a few days since to appoint a committee to confer with the trustees of this college and to see how much land we should want for the college in case we move to Cleveland. Last Friday the committee met the trustees of this college and of the new Case School of Applied Science. Mr. Cutler attended. Nothing definite was done or proposed, the meeting being chiefly useful in getting the matter before the public. One thing which I think it accomplished is this: there was on the part of some of those who favor the removal to Cleveland, the idea that the college should be put about five miles from the center of Cleveland. Against this notion Mr. Cutler had labored; the feeling developed at this meeting will settle the question in favor of a central location; which is what we judge the best.”


June 27, 1880
“A Cleveland gentleman is ready to give the college four hundred thousand dollars to increase the endowment, and one hundred thousand dollars for a building as soon as a building lot shall be secured at Cleveland. It is not to be made known here till after Commencement.”

September 14, 1880
“The meeting to move the college adjourned, as was the plan, on account of the absence of two trustees, who were at a good distance. They will meet next week Tuesday, and there is now no doubt that there will [be] a majority of three fourths for removal. It is likely that there will be but two against removal, and perhaps only one. There is a good deal of bitterness about it in town, but it does not seem to make much difference to us. Mr. Cutler has to take it; this is partly because the paper which he read to the trustees concerning the removal spoke a little hastily of Hudson, and gives offence. He meant to revise it before publication but gave it to the reporter without revision. The effect is that some who never lacked friendship for Mr. Cutler think the remarks he makes about Hudson are not just. But we shall go to Cleveland all the same.”

September 20, 1880
“The trustees have met today, and have voted fourteen to two and one absent, to remove the college to Cleveland. Amasa Stone give four hundred thousand dollars to add to our endowment, and one hundred thousand for building. We have to secure a site in Cleveland in six months or less. A preparatory school is to be kept up here at least five years. Mr. Cutler has not got back yet, so that I do not know all the details. But after all the somewhat acerb feelings of people in Hudson, it is good to win by so good a majority. And all the men were decided in their opinion; every man had his mind made up, except one of the men who voted not; he was not decided against it. He would have voted the other way, probably, if it had been necessary to carry the measure. So we have to plan a building, and get it built.”


Efforts to finance the move from Hudson to Cleveland:

November 14, 1880
“The matter of moving the college stands still chiefly for lack of a man of affairs to attend to it. Mr. Cutler has absolutely let whole weeks pass without doing anything whatever. It is no wonder that a report has been started that there is a hitch somewhere. There is no hitch, but things which might have been done quickly are done so slowly that it looks just as if there were a hitch, which is about as bad for the present interests of the college. From what Mr. Cutler said to me last week, I judge he has only just now got to the point which he ought to have reached three years ago. The delay in settling things with Mr. Stone will make it impossible to get to Cleveland next autumn. This is a great pity; we shall be likely to have no senior class at all next year, as the members of the junior class think that they would stay out a year, or go elsewhere rather than graduate in Hudson after a year from the vote of removal. There is some talk in the papers of getting an injunction against moving the college, but it is hard to see who is going to move the matter to the extent of giving security for the costs if the case goes against the application.”

November 30, 1880
“Things about the college are not quite so bad as I judge you thought. The thing is moving on slowly; Mr. Stone has asked to see our plans for a building as soon as we can conveniently make them, and I have been at work at them for a day or two. I made one last Friday which Mr. Cutler took up to show Mr. Stone, and the report is that he was pleased well with it. There is now some chance that we may get there next autumn.”

December 6, 1880
“I am just about through with the plans for the college building. Mr. Stone is rather troublesome to deal with, I judge, and the thing goes slowly. But it now looks as if delay was about ended, and as if the getting money for a lot would not be as difficult as we had feared. That work is to be begun at once, I believe.”

January 21, 1881
“The removal is in good shape now. The last agreements are made, and the committee went to work yesterday to raise the money. This will not take long; as they are greatly interested in the matter at Cleveland. One man, who is worth a few millions, a Mr. Wade, saw on the table of a Mr. Everett, who was one of our committee, a note to Mr. Cutler, saying that he was greatly interested in the removal, but was so very busy, that he thought he must withdraw from the committee, and Mr. Wade said to him, No, no, stay on the committee, and if you get in a tight place, I will help you out. So Mr. Everett staid, and told the story. The committee have made a list of the men who are to be asked to give towards the site, and divided the work among themselves.”

January 30, 1881
“The matters preliminary to the work of our committee in raising the money are successfully ended. The papers binding the different parties are made out and found satisfactory. The committee is a strong one, composed of some twenty prominent business men, well-disposed to the college, and to the plans for its future. I think the money may perhaps be raised in a week. The committee begins work on Tuesday next, and I hope they will be able to report substantial progress by Tuesday the eighth of February. At which time there is to be an alumni banquet of our alumni at Cleveland.”

February 3, 1881
“The committee have got two subscriptions of five thousand dollars each towards the lot for the college. Things are all right apparently.”

February 23, 1881
“The removal business gets on all right, as far as I know. Mr. Cutler went up to Cleveland on Monday to see how matters stood then, but I have not seen him since that time. Last Thursday they had thirty thousand dollars secured, and the Case School men had signified that they would see the thing through by giving towards the end of the subscription. The thirty thousand came from some men whose names had to come first on the list; some were trustees, and others were also in such position that the committee thought that they must get these subscriptions before they could even approach others. As soon as they got these names they approached several men at once, and expect a lot of subscriptions almost at the same time as the result of such efforts. I think they will get the money now in a couple of weeks, or so. Mr. Cutler does not now think that the college will be opened at Cleveland till the summer of 1882; which seems to be the most likely time, as far as we can judge. The putting up the buildings will certainly take more time than to permit the removal this year, and if we begin next year here, we may as well finish, as students would not like to have to get rooms ready here, if they were to stay but part of a year.”

March 3, 1881
“There was a meeting of our trustees on Wednesday, at which things were satisfactory. Mr. Cutler was very blue on Tuesday; he had gone to see Mr. Upson on that day, and Mr. Upson does not take quite the right view of the removal business, I am inclined to think. But on Wednesday, Mr. Lee, who is a little inclined to see all the objections to any proposal, seemed not to find any difficulty with any matters proposed.”

March 15, 1881
“They have seventy-six thousand dollars raised out of the eighty-five which are required; and there is a man who is certainly good for six or seven thousand who is reserved for the last. So there is no danger of the whole matter falling through now.”



Extract from Edward Morley’s letter to his parents on 9/12/1882 describing the beginning of the first academic year in Cleveland:

“College opened last Thursday, as advertised. One recitation is held in an armory, which would accommodate about six hundred; one is held in an old church, not now used as such, but used for some meetings; one is held in the lecture room of another church, and two are held in two rooms belonging to the Young Men’s Christian Association. Prayers are held in the armory. All these buildings are near each other, and we do not lose much or any time in making changes from one room to another. Prayers are at nine o’clock, the first recitation at fifteen minutes past nine, the second at twenty minutes past ten, and the third at twenty-five minutes past eleven. All of the exercises of the college therefore are over by half past twelve.

The number of students is good, and we are going to get along well enough till the buildings are done. I see no reason to suppose that we shall get into the buildings this term. All of our students are quartered where they can be comfortable enough, though at a greater cost than if the dormitory were done. The buildings are very satisfactory, so far; of course there are little things in which our wants have not been understood, which have to be corrected, and sometimes the trouble required is out of all proportion to the work required.


I had three flues for carrying off fumes in chemical experiments. It took a couple of days to get them made. I come back, and find that one is spoiled, one has been altered, and will have to be altered back, and the other is stopped up so that it is doubtful whether it can be cleared without cutting through the wall. Also, where they run into the chimney, joists all run into all of them, so that there is some danger, though slight, of their taking fire.

Today, Mr. Smith, who is hard to satisfy because he has not yet learned that there are any trifles in the world, is in trouble, or rather is troubling me, because he thinks his blackboard is two inches too low. As this involves only the loss of half an ounce of lamp-black needlessly used in blackening the mortar of those two inches, I was inclined to think the matter a trifle, especially as the height was agreed to by him at Hudson, and is made just what he agreed to. But I had to agree to go four miles and back to attend to the matter.”

Sources
For more information about the removal of Western Reserve College from Hudson to Cleveland, see the list of published histories on our CWRU Archives Sources page.  In addition to the published histories, information comes from records in the Case Western Reserve University Archives.

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