This is the second in a series of stories honoring the University as it prepares to celebrate its sesquicentennial during the 2007-08 academic year.

 When Guy E. Maxwell entered the president’s office of the Winona State Normal School for the first time, he likely knew he was following in the footsteps of giants. For its first half century, the Normal School was led by men who had built national reputations in education. John Ogden and William Phelps, Winona State’s first two principals, carried the idea of model schools from institutions in the east, giving Winona State students what was then the unique experience of hands-on learning in a classroom setting. Ogden and Phelps spread the normal school movement west, and both went on to hold prominent positions in the American Association for the Advancement of Education, and later, in various organizations that would unite into the National Education Association (NEA).
 Phelps brought Winona State back from the brink of failure after it closed during the Civil War. In 1879, with the institution on firmer footing, Irwin Shepard was named Winona State’s first president. Like Ogden and Phelps, Shepard had big ideas about normal school education, and his tenure yielded new classrooms and laboratories at Winona State, as well as the first kindergarten west of the Mississippi. He deepened the Normal’s relationship with the NEA, establishing the association’s office just off campus on Wabasha Street. In 1898, Shepard resigned his presidency to serve as national secretary for the NEA, a position he held until 1913.
 A serious-minded physician turned educator took over for Shepard. Jesse F. Millspaugh, with degrees from the University of Michigan and the University of Pennsylvania, had reorganized a turbulent Salt Lake City school system. He demanded a new measure of rigor from Winona’s curriculum and stiffer academic requirements for aspiring teachers, and also strengthened the importance of the model school. Admired for his progress at Winona State, Millspaugh left to remake the struggling Los Angeles Normal School, which would go on to become the University of California, Los Angeles, or, UCLA.
 When it came time to select a new president, Charles Morey, a former Winona State principal who was now president of the State Normal Board, and the departing Millspaugh put their heads together and harnessed their still considerable influence. Surprisingly, they recommended a man who was a safe choice with little experience on the national level:  Guy E. Maxwell.
 Well-liked, mild-mannered, but considered by some to be unimaginative, Maxwell was inducted as Winona State’s third president in August, 1904. Maxwell guided the institution for the next 35 years. He may indeed have been non-threatening to Morey and Millspaugh’s power, but Maxwell was the steady hand that gave the Winona Normal School the room it needed to grow into a stable, viable teachers college during a period of world upheaval and economic depression.
 BORN in 1870 on a farm in west-central Illinois, Maxwell and his family moved to Appleton, Minnesota when he was a child. He left high school early to attend Hamline University’s college preparatory academy and eventually graduated from the University in 1893. Although admired for his academic record, Maxwell was better known as a standout on the football and baseball teams. After working as a public school administrator for several years and earning his master’s degree at Columbia University, Maxwell came to Winona in 1900 as principal of the model school and coach of the football team. Just four years later, he was selected as president of the Normal School.
 Maxwell likely found himself in an interesting situation. By the end of Millspaugh’s term, Winona State enjoyed a tradition of forward-thinking leaders with innovative ideas on model school training. In reality, the school’s academic reputation didn’t quite align with the prestige enjoyed by its past presidents. Most viewed the Normal as little more than a high school, a place for daughters to learn a useful trade, and for sons to pick up a little knowledge before they took over the family business. Enrollments fluctuated wildly, courses were mostly remedial, and less than half of the small faculty possessed any kind of college degree. And the campus wasn’t much of a campus at all, a single building housed in a cramped library, while students scrounged room and board anywhere they could find it around the town.
 Whether by design, or because he allowed the school to be swept along by the times, Maxwell changed all this. His first report to the Normal School Board would set the tone for the rest of his term. In unremarkable prose, Maxwell requested an appropriation of $55,000 for a new addition to be connected to College Hall, the institution’s single campus building. Two years later, the cornerstone was laid to provide more space for the model school, and to add on a new gymnasium and library. Maxwell got what he wanted, setting the stage for expansion of his normal school.
 The new addition, which was connected to College Hall by a tunnel, represented the beginning of a campaign by Maxwell to establish a permanent campus in Winona. Only two years later, with the dedication of Morey Hall, the Normal School got its first on-campus residence hall, built to house 80 women. The Phelps School (now called Phelps Hall) opened in 1915, providing a state-of-the-art facility for its elementary model school, including room for 200 children, an industrial arts shop, a movie theater and full gymnasium.
 By the end of his 35-year tenure, Maxwell had managed to build a campus adequate for Winona State’s 1,200 or so students. The institution now included four residence halls, a classroom and administrative building, playing fields and the Phelps School. Despite being thought of as “unimaginative” by many, Maxwell found a unique way to add another building that would open just after his death in 1939:  the original Maxwell Library (it was greatly expanded in the 1960s). Combining Depression-era federal public works funds, state appropriations and gifts from 28 donors, he constructed a facility with space for Winona State’s books, stored on self-supporting stacks and protected by the first air conditioning system in the Minnesota State Teachers College system.
 INITIALLY, Guy Maxwell was thought to be little more than an old coach interested in building gymnasiums, a strong football team and a precision marching band to go with it all. His intent to expand the Winona campus was obvious from the start, but the academic progress Winona State made during his time in office is startling. The Normal School broadened its mission and evolved from a 2-year trade school into a 4-year, bachelor’s degree granting institution. As a result, the Normal School underwent a name change, too, becoming Winona State Teachers College.
 After taking charge of a school with a single-building, fewer than 400 students and a faculty described as “inadequate,” Maxwell inspired steady improvements. Enrollment rose gradually, although the increase may have had more to do the growing acceptance of the need for education in Midwest communities. When Maxwell arrived, remedial programs comprised three of the six courses of study at Winona State, because more than a third of the student body had not finished high school. His predecessor as president, Millspaugh, emphasized a 4-year curriculum, but Maxwell finished the job, marking a clear distinction between Winona State’s high school and normal school in 1912.
 Finally, in 1918, the first step was taken toward Winona State’s transformation into a full-fledged college. Beginning with the September term, high school graduation was required for admission to the Normal School. No student could be denied entrance, regardless of academic record, but the institution began gradually meeting higher standards for admission, curricula and graduation set by the State Normal School Board. Maxwell also took steps to raise the quality of the faculty, although this took some time. In the early years of his administration, it was common for professors to hold little more than a state teaching license. By 1929, only eight of 47 faculty members had no degree, and 15 had earned advanced degrees in their fields.
 The United States entered World War I in 1917, but the conflict seemed to have a limited effect on Winona State. The number of men dropped by about half in 1918, but it had little impact on enrollment since women made up an overwhelming majority of the student body. Faculty numbers remained stable, unlike the Civil War period when a number of teachers left to fight and caused the Normal School to close for almost two years.
 ACCORDING TO Robert DuFresne in Winona State University, A History of One Hundred Twenty-Five Years, the war distilled a mix of societal changes and forced the Normal School to change its outlook and its reason for being. Along with other normal schools in the state, Winona State quickly widened its curriculum, improved its faculty ranks and demanded more of its students. In short, the Winona State Normal School grew up.
 On March 19, 1921, the Normal changed its name to Winona State Teachers College. Elevation to college status brought no additional resources to the institution, but Maxwell immediately set about building the faculty, planning for campus construction and increasing enrollment. He particularly focused on recruiting more male students. From the time that the school was founded men consistently made up less than ten percent of the student body. Some argued that the lack of male teachers in the public schools was a social problem that Winona State needed to address. Others suspected that Maxwell was merely trying to build a dominating football team.
 Whatever his motives, Maxwell and his staff convinced more men to come to Winona. Women continued to make up the majority (as they now do in 2006), but by 1935 about a third of the undergraduates on campus were men. West Lodge, a rebuilt home on the edge of campus, was obtained in the 1920s to accommodate 20 male students, the first opportunity for men to live on campus.
 As more students began to live on campus, follow a uniform academic calendar and study a standard curriculum, they began to develop traditions. During the 1920s, homecoming, with athletic events, marching bands and the alma mater, written by Charlotte Chorpenning, were favorites of the students. A winter carnival, spring prom and dozens of student club activities were organized around campus. As undergraduates became more

invested in their education, they formed a strong student government to protect their interests and take a role in guiding the college. Winona State was becoming a community.
 MAXWELL faced one of his biggest crises in 1922, just over a year and a half after the institution became a college. College Hall, the only classroom building on campus other than the Phelps model school, burned to the ground in the early morning of Sunday, December 3. Everything was lost, and books in the adjacent library were badly damaged by water.
 Students and faculty were away between terms, so Maxwell and his staff quickly put the college back in working order. They rallied the citizens of Winona, and the following Tuesday classes were underway in buildings and churches around town. The Teachers College Board met the same day, and added the cost of a new building to the budget slated for submission to the legislature in January. On September 3, 1924, less than two years later, students entered the doors of a spacious new classroom building, later dedicated as Somsen Hall.
 Guy Maxwell went on to lead Winona State for another 15 years. During his last decade in office the college struggled through the Depression, a period when the institution was threatened by declining enrollments and funding cuts from the legislature. Faculty and staff salaries were slashed by half, and the college began charging tuition for the first time ($14 per quarter). As DuFresne writes in A History of One Hundred Twenty-Five Years, unlike

 many colleges, Maxwell and Winona State had luck on their side. Minnesota Governor Floyd Olson, a proponent of higher education’s ability to spark the state economy, designated financial aid for students, the first program of its kind in the country. Winona State’s enrollments remained fairly stable, and the college stayed in business.
 WHEN Maxwell died on January 3, 1939, he had led Winona State for almost half of its existence. He saw the institution survive a world war, a great fire, the Depression and numerous dark moments and decisive turns. By all accounts, Maxwell had been the calm, steady influence that Winona State needed to grow from a normal school to a college.

Thanks to Dr. Peter Henderson, Department of History, for his assistance with this story, and to Robert DuFresne’s book, Winona State University, A History of One Hundred Twenty-Five Years.

Theda Gildemeister Made her Mark

 While Guy E. Maxwell's gaze was resolutely fixed on the institution he led, one of his faculty members provided the national outlook practiced by Winona State's former leaders.
 Theda Gildemeister came to the Winona State Normal School in 1898, two years before Maxwell arrived as principal of the model school. She ended up staying for 36 years, chairing the education department, teaching a number of subjects, running most of the institution's major committees and instructing female students in the arts of cooking, sewing, housekeeping and anything else she was asked to do.
 It was on the state and national education scenes that Gildemeister left her mark. In 1916, she prepared a course of study for the Minnesota Department of Education. The Minnesota Course of Study for Elementary School and Manual for Teachers, published in 1916, served as a curriculum guide in Minnesota and many other states for over two decades. Gildemeister's paper “Revision of the Elementary School Curriculum,” also influential, was included in the 75th anniversary edition of the Elementary School Journal.
 Gildemeister, elected president of the Minnesota Education Association in 1921, was active in the National Education Association (NEA), continuing Winona State's legacy of leadership in that organization. Active in securing teachers' rights, Gildemeister worked with the state legislature to draft a teachers' retirement fund bill that was passed in 1931.
 When she wasn't busy teaching, serving on committees, or drafting legislation, Gildemeister edited a series of books, along with illustrator Gustavus C. Widney. Her editing credits include Treasure Island, by Robert Louis Stephenson, and The Gold Bug, by Edgar Allan Poe, both published around the turn of the century by Rand McNally & Company. She was much in demand as a speaker, traveling around the world and across the North America, often speaking on a favorite subject “The Place of Literature in Character Building.”
 Gildemeister was apparently a beloved character on the Winona campus. There are many old stories of her efforts in maintaining “chaste” distances between her male and female students during various school activities and dances.

Last Modified: Friday, September 21, 2007 11:31 by Heather Alt