{"id":2,"date":"2012-04-02T18:56:16","date_gmt":"2012-04-02T18:56:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/web.saumag.edu\/1909\/?page_id=2"},"modified":"2016-02-22T14:21:16","modified_gmt":"2016-02-22T20:21:16","slug":"plaza","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/web.saumag.edu\/1909\/","title":{"rendered":"Historic Campus Plaza"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Historic Campus Plaza (Click photo to enlarge)<\/p><\/div>\n

Welcome to SAU’s Historic Campus Plaza!<\/strong><\/p>\n

Listen to an audio introduction to the Historic Campus Plaza narrated by Professor Mark Trout.\u00a0<\/a>\u00a0The sounds, heard above in Professor Trout’s narration, were once very familiar to rural America:\u00a0\u00a0the hoof beats of a mule, wearing shoes much like those you see mapping the original campus building locations on the Historic Campus Plaza.The history of Southern Arkansas University and the three other Arkansas regional universities located in Jonesboro, Monticello, and Russellville began with echoing hoof beats of mules when these institutions were first established as residential agricultural schools.<\/p>\n

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Arkansas Act 100 established four agricultural schools. (Click photo to enlarge) (Click here to view entire document<\/a>)<\/p><\/div>\n

The mule was the foundation of traditional agriculture in the South.\u00a0 When Arkansas\u2019s four agricultural schools were founded in 1909, over five million mules still plowed southern fields, pulled wagons, and carried farm boys riding bareback to town. Southern Arkansas University was then the state\u2019s Third District Agricultural School. The 1912 football team members, who rode mules to catch the train at McNeil to go to games, selected Muleriders as the school\u2019s mascot.<\/p>\n

Arkansas\u2019s four agricultural schools were innovative experiments in educational reform tied to a national movement to modernize rural life. This Country Life Movement was particularly significant in the South where farms had not adopted the newest scientific agricultural practices to improve efficiency and boost incomes.<\/p>\n

\"Photo:<\/a>

President Theodore Roosevelt called for agricultural schools in 1907. Courtesy of the Library of Congress, Washington, D.C. To view larger sizes, click the photos.<\/p><\/div>\n

President Theodore Roosevelt\u2019s Commission on Country Life urged the establishment of specialized agricultural schools, a call taken up by the Farmers\u2019 Educational and Cooperative Union, then the nation\u2019s largest farm organization. Several states, including Arkansas, responded. For a decade, Arkansas\u2019s schools were leaders in secondary agricultural education.After the First World War, Arkansas\u2019s four agricultural schools broadened their mission. The four schools became two-year colleges in 1925, and each later joined the ranks of four-year colleges and universities.For more information about Arkansas\u2019s four agricultural schools or the original buildings of Southern Arkansas University, follow the links on this page.<\/p>\n

For more information about the Arkansas’s 1909 experiment with agricultural schools, see James F. Willis, “The Farmer’s Schools of 1909: The Origins of Arkansas’s Four Regional Universities,”\u00a0Arkansas Historical Quarterly<\/em>\u00a065\u00a0(Autumn 2006): 224-49.<\/p>\n

Click here to watch the dedication ceremony of the Historic Campus Plaza on YouTube<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Welcome to SAU’s Historic Campus Plaza! Listen to an audio introduction to the Historic Campus Plaza narrated by Professor Mark Trout.\u00a0\u00a0The sounds, heard above in Professor Trout’s narration, were once very familiar to rural America:\u00a0\u00a0the hoof beats of a mule, wearing shoes much like those you see mapping the original campus building locations on the… Read More<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"class_list":{"0":"post-2","1":"page","2":"type-page","3":"status-publish","5":"entry"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/web.saumag.edu\/1909\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/2","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/web.saumag.edu\/1909\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/web.saumag.edu\/1909\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/web.saumag.edu\/1909\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/web.saumag.edu\/1909\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/web.saumag.edu\/1909\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/2\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/web.saumag.edu\/1909\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}