Prairie View A&M 145th anniversary
On Aug. 14, Prairie View A & M celebrated its 145th anniversary. Though it has gone through a handful of name changes in these many decades, it was the first institution of higher learning in the state of Texas for African Americans. It was established in 1876 during the Reconstruction Era after the Civil War.
The initial name of the college was the “Alta Vista Agricultural and Mechanical College of Texas for Colored Youth.”
The name came from its location on the Alta Vista Plantation of 1,388 acres that was owned by Mrs. Helen Marr Kirby, the widow of Colonel Jared Ellison Kirby. Mrs. Kirby had operated a fashionable girls’ school in the large plantation home that sat on a hill surrounded by the vast prairie.
A three-man commission spent $15,787.67 in purchasing the land and buildings and making necessary repairs. Eight young African American men, the first of their race to enroll in a state-supported college in Texas, began their studies on March 11, 1878.
The following year, in April 1879, the State Legislature established on the site a separate “Prairie View State Normal School for the training of Colored Teachers.” The site then became co-educational with the girls first housed with the School’s Principal in the plantation house that became called Kirby Hall. The boys were housed in a 30 by 40-foot combination chapel-dormitory called Pickett Hall. With a quick increase to 60 students by that coming 1880 winter, the campus buildings became over-crowded.
Nearly a decade later, in 1887, the State Legislature attached the Alta Vista Agriculture & Mechanical School to the Prairie View Normal School. By 1899, at the turn of the century, the State Legislature changed the name to “Prairie View State Normal & Industrial College.”
Again, in 1945, the State Legislature changed the name to “Prairie View University.”
Two years later, when, in March 1947, the State Legislature established “The Texas State University for Negroes,” namely Texas Southern University, it also changed the name of Prairie View University to “Prairie View Agricultural & Mechanical College of Texas.”
There is one more name change that has now stood for just shy of 50 years when the 63rd Legislature in 1973 changed the name to “Prairie View A & M University.”
What an array of different ‘higher learning institutional’ names on 145 years of graduate diplomas from the same school!
In a recent report, the campus still claims six National Register buildings that date back to the 1920s and 1930s. However, all earlier 19th and early 20th century buildings have been demolished including the plantation home, an early hospital, a Rosenwald School, and the Old Main building.
The oldest building said to be on campus today is the Veterinary Clinic built in 1924. It is a nondescript brick building with a hipped roof and the significant place where the legendary Waller County veterinarian and Prairie View professor emeritus Dr. Alfred N. Poindexter practiced and taught from 1945 to 2004.
Today, the Texas Highway Magazine, recognizes it as a “small town to visit” with a history museum “in the works” and the campus featuring an expansive John Fairey Gardens with 3,000 plants from not only Texas, but Asia and Mexico. Along the sports line, it boasts one of the largest cricket complexes in the United States…the Prairie View Cricket Center.
(Written by Betty Dunn, Two Rivers Heritage Foundation See www.tworiversheritagefoundation.org for more info and membership).