TWU celebrates 118 years

Caitlyn Laky

By KRISTA SIMPSON

118 years later, and the Pioneers are still celebrating their school pride.

Friday, April 5, Texas Woman’s University threw a Pioneer Palooza on the Denton campus for its 118 birthday. The party took place from 5 to 9 p.m., and it generated a large turnout from the community and the student population.

The event featured live music from several artists to keep the crowd entertained. The artists that performed during the Palooza were DJ Boogie, DJ Dupree, Troy Garrick, Kade Trentham and Sawyer. While Palooza-attendees enjoyed the music, there were several activities for them to participate in. Attendees were given the chance to spray paint their mark on a car, have a photoshoot with props available to them or play a game of pick-up volleyball with their friends.

There were also many performances put on by TWU students and members of the community, including a hip-hop dance performance and a “dragon dance” performance. Oakley was at the Palooza as well and walked around greeting anyone who attended.

A highlight of the party, however, were the pounds and pounds of crawfish available for students and community members. The crawfish feast was free for TWU students, and open to the community for a price of $11.25. Served alongside the crawfish was gumbo, New Orleans red beans, dirty rice and hush puppies to make it a true Cajun-style picnic. The meal was all-you-caneat, so event-attendees were allowed to go back for as many servings as they pleased.

While Pioneer Palooza was put on to bring TWU students and community members together for a fun time, it was also created as a celebration of TWU and its many years of history. After all, Pioneer Palooza was a birthday party for TWU.

TWU was born in 1901, which is when it was known as the Girls Industrial College. The university didn’t become Texas Woman’s University until 1957. According to the TWU website, the school’s mission then and now is “to provide a liberal education and to prepare young women for the ‘practical industries of the age’ with a specialized education.”

When TWU first started out, the entirety of the campus was located in the Old Main Building, which still stands on campus. OMB was first constructed in 1903, and it contained classrooms, the cafeteria, professors’ offices and everything else that made up the university. Everything else around OMB was farmland.

TWU has most certainly grown since then, but not just in the number of buildings the university has. The first graduating class graduated in 1904, and it was a class size of one- Beulah Kincaid. Kincaid graduated with a degree in home-making, which TWU no longer offers. However, it’s degree programs have significantly multiplied in size.

Another prominent event to occur in the history of TWU is the acceptance of men into the university. As the school name implies, TWU originally was a college strictly for women. Then, in 1972, TWU opened its doors to men as well.

TWU has undergone a lot of change since its birth in 1901, and it is still continuing to grow. Pioneer Palooza celebrates the existence of TWU and the students that it educates