Wilkerson Donation Provided first tarleton residence Hall

President’s House Named for Transformative Leader, Dr. William O. Trogdon

In the heart of the Tarleton campus is the elegant Trogdon House. The home, originally called the Dean’s House, was built in 1923 for the college’s top administrator. Dr. Trogdon, who resided on campus with his family from 1966 to 1982, was the last school president to live there prior to current President F. Dominic Dottavio and his wife, Dr. Lisette Dottavio, who moved into the home in 2010.

Tarleton underwent a multitude of changes during the 16 years Trogdon served as president, including a third name change, the upgrading of the school’s farm facilities, an evolving campus skyline and new four-year study programs.

A swine lab, a meats lab, a pair of poultry buildings, a horticulture building and an agricultural engineering building all became part of Tarleton’s iconic college farm under Trogdon. Additionally, the school added a pavilion, a horse center and updated and improved its dairy facilities during his tenure.

The Trogdon House

But Trogdon didn’t just work on bettering the ag department.

His other innovations included instituting a graduate program in 1968, erecting Wisdom Gym in 1970, including space for the Home Economics Department and ROTC classrooms, as well as a new basketball home for the Texans. The football team’s home field got an upgrade under Trogdon, too. Memorial Stadium was renovated during a four-year stretch of the 1970s.

Other key additions to campus were the construction of Hunewell Hall in 1968 and the purchase of Crockett Hall in 1969. The just-completed three-story humanities building was the showcase of the campus in 1973, when the school officially became Tarleton State University.

One of the most significant campus additions under Trogdon was the Clyde H. Wells Fine Arts Center in 1980. The perfoming arts center was named for the chairman of the A&M Board of Regents and former Tarleton student, whose father had worked at the college farm.

The building consolidated the college’s fine arts programs, which had previously been scattered across the campus.

Successful businesses recognize that, as their customers increase, they need to add the infrastructure to accommodate their needs.

That has been true at Tarleton, which has faced shortages of student housing space since its first day of classes.

When the first 175 students gathered for classes in Stephenville, the college that was John Tarleton’s vision had no dormitory space. That remained the case for 11 years.

That first academic year, nearly half the students left school and, while there were several issues involved, some left because there were simply no places to live. Thenpresident Dr. W. H. Bruce resigned after just one year, frustrated over his inability to secure funds to build student housing.

Tarleton State University; The Traditions Remain reports that the college had no dorm space whatsoever as classes began. Private citizens opened their homes to students, earning around $8 per month for boarders.

The first student housing erected on the Tarleton campus, built in 1910, was a women’s dorm financed by a land donation from an area widow. In an early 1908 editorial, C. R. Coulter, publisher of the Stephenville Tribune, saw several urgent needs on the Tarleton campus—needs that would have to be addressed if the school were to flourish.

“To make John Tarleton College serve the purpose for which the founder gave his fortune many, many changes are necessary,” Coulter penned, pointing out the must-haves as he saw them. At the end of the piece, he called for building a women’s dormitory. In Coulter’s view, the $8,000 edifice could be paid for with a combination of private funds and board appropriations.

Coulter’s request made its way to a recent Erath County widow, Mary Corn Wilkerson, who became the catalyst for construction of the dorm, donating land in Hamilton and Bosque counties valued at $7,500 to be sold to finance the new structure.

Wilkerson wrote in the May 7, 1908 deed, that her decision to fund the building came, “…in consideration of the deep interest I possess in the education, the intellectual and moral development of the girls and young women of Erath County and in consideration of and for the purpose of assisting in the erection of a girls dormitory in connection with John Tarleton College and in greater consideration of the abiding faith reposed in the ability and integrity of Prof. J. D. Sandefer, president of John Tarleton College.”

The Mary Corn Wilkerson Dormitory, a two-story, red brick building was almost luxurious for the time, featuring steam heat, electric lights, hot and cold running water and indoor lavatories. Over the next 30 years, additions to the original edifice included Chamberlain Hall in 1925, Lewis Hall 10 years later, Moody Hall in 1936 and finally Gough Hall in 1938.

Wilkerson Donation Provided First Tarleton Residence Hall

After World War II, President E. J. Howell, under a state mandate banning new construction, brought in several former barracks buildings from Eagle Mountain Lake Naval Air Base in Fort Worth for student living space.

Campus housing construction has been constant in the century since joining the A&M System. Of the Tarleton residence halls currently occupied, Bender Hall is the oldest, having stood since 1953. Ferguson Hall was added in 1958, followed by Hunewell in 1961 and the Hunewell Annex in ’68.

A half-dozen housing structures have been added since 2000.

In the past three years, the university has opened four new halls and renovated one under a new philosophy of creating Living and Learning Communities designed to aid in retaining students—just as the first dormitory served that purpose. In 2014, Tarleton opened Heritage Hall, in 2015 Integrity Hall, in 2016 Traditions North and South and an expanded and renovated Honors Hall.

The additions create sufficient housing for all freshmen and sophomores – another factor that contributes to keeping students and helping them graduate.

With nearly 4,000 students now living on campus, it’s a far cry from the dearth of housing experiences by Tarleton’s first students.

The 1917 changing of the Stephenville college’s name to John Tarleton Agricultural College marked a pivotal emphasis on an updated curriculum.

Prior to joining The Texas A&M System, Tarleton had no degree program in agriculture, despite the fact that a majority of students came from farming backgrounds. As A&M’s resources began filtering to Stephenville, programs, personnel, courses of instruction and facilities all merged to form the early backbone of the reinvigorated school.

To help entice the Aggies to take JTAC under their wings, Tarleton’s supporters purchased 500 acres of nearby land for transition to a school farm. The farm, located northeast of Stephenville, grew quickly from a sparse acreage to a facility featuring separate barns for horses and dairy cows, sheds for sheep and pigs. Ultimately the farm was divided into different sections for each of the agriculture departments – agronomy, agricultural engineering, animal industry, veterinary medicine and horticulture.

New Direction Hatched

with A&M Merger

Direction Hatched

with A&M Merger

Oddly enough, the school’s poultry activities, a key portion of Tarleton’s agricultural legacy, were housed on campus, rather than on the college farm.

Students and agriculture department faculty took care of the Tarleton flock, which was located in a series of coops on what was then the southwestern border of campus. Tarleton gained national notoriety as generations of hens here participated in egg-laying contests spanning three decades.

C. Richard King reported in his book, Golden Years of the Purple and White: The John Tarleton College Story, that as of 1927, there were 16 official egg-laying contests in the nation. Tarleton’s was ranked first. The school claimed an international title, as well in later competitions, with several local hens earning accolades for their production.

One, a single comb white leghorn, was tops in a 1936 matchup, meeting an untimely end 13 days before the end of the contest when she choked on a grain of feed corn. She laid the last of 312 eggs five minutes before her death.

The current College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences consists of three departments—wildlife, sustainability and ecosystem sciences; agricultural and consumer sciences; and animal science and veterinary technology.

Today’s program is nationally known for its FFA involvement, providing leadership training for FFA officers and attracting thousands of high school FFA participants for judging events annually. The Career Development Events (CDE) feature more than 20,000 high school agriculture and science students and have been hosted by Tarleton for more than three decades. Tarleton played a part in initiating at least two of the events prior to their adoption into the annual contest.

To keep up with the expanding agriculture curriculum, learning venues have also improved vastly. The original wooden edifice was

replaced in 1951 with the current Joe W. Autry Building in the heart of the Tarleton campus.

Additionally, ag-minded students and faculty are drawn to Tarleton’s Southwest Regional Dairy Center, which opened in 2011 to help develop solutions for sustainability and productivity in the dairy industry.

The cutting-edge Tarleton Agricultural Center is the modern iteration of the college farm that started it all.