When we imagine the typical student who attended “the Normal,” we picture a young woman in a long, white dress, quite literally a “straight-laced” figure in a corset, a goody-goody future school teacher. The institutional narrative, written overwhelmingly by men to persuade other men to send their daughters here, stresses a particular kind of Southern white womanhood. The actual young women who enrolled in the early 20thC often resisted social conventions, however. Most of the time, they merely pushed back gently on the structures. But in a few cases, they committed egregious enough offenses to be intentionally erased from the picture. This is what happened to Lillian Campbell, who

Concerns about undergraduate student ‘belongingness’ are everywhere in higher education these days, but they certainly aren’t new. College staff and faculty have always worried about students’ adjustment to campus life. This one, when it was the State Normal and Industrial School for Women, required every girl who enrolled to join two organizations to combat feelings of isolation and homesickness: the YMCA and the Athletic Association. The administration closely monitored the young women who came here and developed other interventions as well. One young woman, Velna Pearl Barker, documented her struggle with “the blues” in her 1924-1926 college scrapbook, which her daughter and granddaughter carefully preserved. Velna’s story not only helps us understand an understudied aspect of Southern women’s collegiate life then, but now. 

I recently gave a short talk to JMU alumni at a Women for Madison tea party. The topic was the history of tea parties on this campus, which were commonplace from the 1910s through the 1960s. The event was part of JMU’s annual Bluestone Reunion, which marks the 50th anniversary of each graduating class. This year’s honorees were members of the class of 1974, and several alums vividly remembered the welcome tea reception they attended at the President’s house, Hillcrest, in the fall of 1969. It turns out that that was the last welcome tea held at Madison College.

Tea parties have a long history at this institution–they are well documented through photos in yearbooks, napkins and favors pressed into alumni scrapbooks, and actual artifacts in the form of silver tea pots, serving trays, and china. These survivals, carefully recorded and preserved, tell us that tea parties served an important function and were an defining part of campus culture here.

Page Mitchell was one of the most significant employees at the State Normal and Industrial School for Women, for he managed the kitchen that provided three meals a day to hundreds of white students and faculty. Hired as the school’s cook, he is shown in a 1914 image, at left, in chef’s whites. Like Walker Lee and the handful of other African Americans that worked on this campus in the early 20th century, Mitchell contributed to the school’s success, however, little information about him survives in school sources. In this post, I’ll piece together what I have learned about his work so far.

In April 2020, The Madison Magazine, JMU’s alumni publication, featured Dr. Sheary Darcus Johnson, whom the institution recognizes as its first African American graduate. I provided some important historical context for that cover story and reproduce my sidebar here, followed by an update related to other early Black students. [read more]

NB: I started this post in 2019 but completed/updated it in response to JMU’s July 2020 decision to remove the names of Confederate officers from campus buildings. This post references historic examples of racist and oppressive imagery and language.

In 2019, some Kappa Alpha brothers from Ole Miss made headlines when they used Emmett Till’s memorial marker for target practice and reignited old debates about fraternities and other student orgs that invoke the Lost Cause. The Kappa Alpha Order, a fraternity established in 1865 at Washington College in Virginia, claims Confederate General Robert E. Lee as its “spiritual founder,” and is widely recognized by historians for its veneration of the Old South and its particular brand of white, Southern masculinity. Lee became their icon because he served as president of that college from 1865 to his death in 1870, when campus authorities renamed it Washington and Lee. KA chapters expanded over time, and by the 1950s and 1960s, were widely known for hosting elaborate “plantation” parties, flying Confederate flags, and actively opposing efforts to desegregate higher education. (Turner, Coski) JMU’s KA chapter dates to the 1994-95 academic year, when opposition to affirmative action admissions was nationally prominent, and this campus, like many others, struggled over its diversity initiatives (Breeze, 1990-2000). This post connects modern JMU student organizations’ Lost Cause activities to earlier forms, like the Lee Literary Society, and reflects on their impact on white and Black student belongingness and campus culture. [read more]