Through the generosity of Bill and Judy Nash Rogers of Conway, the Archives Room at Southern Arkansas University, Magnolia, became the home of important documents relevant to the school’s distinguished history.
Bill’s grandfather, J.E. Rogers, served on the Board of Trustees of the school from 1909 to 1921 when the University was the Third District Agricultural School. The documents were among papers that the family preserved through the years.
Earl Rogers, Bill’s father, and his aunt, Daisy Rogers Booth, gave Southern State College the original board minutes of TDAS, covering the years 1909-21, which they found in their father’s papers.
Bill discovered additional documents from his grandfather’s papers that he brought in June to the SAU Archives Room located in Magale Library. The documents included a program for the 1920 commencement exercises at TDAS, several financial statements, letters of recommendation for departing teachers, and a letter preserving the only known surviving letterhead used by the school before the First World War, bearing the name State Agricultural School, Magnolia.
He also provided copies of his father Earl’s 1934 high school diploma from Magnolia A & M College, as well as a photo of the seventh and eighth grades at the institution in 1928-29. A & M had pre-collegiate classes until 1938.
Bill Rogers attended Southern State College in its pre-engineering program for two years before earning a degree in mechanical engineering from the University of Arkansas. His wife, Judy, earned a music degree with an emphasis in piano from SSC in 1971. He was an engineer with Arkansas Power and Light/Entergy Corporation before recently retiring. She has taught music in schools in Pulaski and Faulkner counties for 30 years and has served as president of the Arkansas Music Educators Association.
