“It was an audacious dream based on a dubious premise.”
This is how Barbara Floyd, professor emerita of library administration and retired university archivist, described Jesup W. Scott’s decision to establish what would become The University of Toledo in 1872 in her new book, An Institution for the Promoting of Knowledge: The University of Toledo at 150.
Published by The University of Toledo Press as part of the University’s sesquicentennial celebration, the 328-page hardcover book details the University’s history from its founding to present day, including the administrations of each of the presidents and the contributions of administrators, faculty, alumni and students. The book is available from The University of Toledo Press website. Through Wednesday, Oct. 12, the price is reduced to $29.95.
“Scott believed that the city of Toledo was destined to become the ‘Future Great City of the World,’ ” said Floyd, professor emerita of library administration and retired university archivist. “A great city would need a university, so he and six others signed the articles of incorporation for the Toledo University of Arts and Trades on Oct. 12, 1872.”
Floyd noted that, while Toledo never became the greatest city in the world, Scott’s dream of the University made the city a better place to live and contributed to its growth in untold ways.
Jesup Scott died in 1874 and never lived to see the University open its doors. The institution as he created it lasted only until its closure in 1878 and reopened in 1884 as a city-supported institution.
“Most people have forgotten that the University was a municipal university for 83 years, and did not become a state university until 1967,” Floyd said. “Toledo taxpayers provided millions of dollars in funding for the University over the years and stepped up to support the institution at critical times in its history.”
One of the most important turning points in UToledo’s history was in 1928, when Toledo taxpayers approved a bond levy to raise $2.8 million for the Bancroft Street campus. This allowed for the purchase of the land and the construction of University Hall and Memorial Field House.
Floyd said that if the president at the time, Dr. Henry Doermann, had waited just one year to put the levy before the voters it likely would have failed since, in October 1929, the stock market crashed and signaled the beginning of the Great Depression. “Who knows if the University would have survived,” she said.
Floyd said she also believes that Doermann’s focus on building a beautiful campus in the Collegiate Gothic style was significant. Until then, the University had been housed in various inadequate facilities including a church, a renovated elementary school, an office building and buildings originally constructed for World War I.
“The architecture signified to everyone that this was a university,” she said, “and it was here to stay.”
The book also details other more recent turning points, such as the merger with the Medical University in 2006. It concludes with thoughts from current president, Dr. Gregory Postel, about the University’s future.
Floyd holds a bachelor’s degree and two master’s degrees from UToledo and served as university archivist from 1986 to 2017. She also was director of the Ward M. Canaday Center for Special Collections, where the archives are housed.
“I spent most of my career collecting and preserving the historical records of the University, and to have the chance to use them to write this history made all of that work worthwhile,” she said. “It was a great way to cap off my career at the University.”
All author’s royalties from the sale of the book will be donated by Floyd to the Canaday Center in support of the work of university archives. “It was a pleasure to have had the opportunity to give back to the University that gave me so much in this way,” she added.
Floyd will give a lecture titled “Ten Events that Shaped 150 Years” as part of the University’s Founder’s Day activities. The lecture is scheduled at 3 p.m. Wednesday, Oct. 12, on the fifth floor of Carlson Library as part of the opening of the Canaday Center’s exhibit, “Faith, Vision, and Hard Work: The University of Toledo 1872-2022,” which will be on display through Aug. 1, 2023. Following her lecture, Floyd will sign copies of her book, which will be for sale at that time. Pre-publication orders can be placed at utoledopress.com.
