Men: grab a shovel, pickax or saw. The campus needs work. Trees need to be chopped down, brush needs to be cleared and puddles need filling. Women: start cooking. When the men are done, they’ll want their midday lunch of baked beans.

Construction on campus takes on a completely different angle when pulled off by students, especially for free. Yet, the early days of the UW were marked by Campus Day, a chance to clear the “wilderness” of the campus and improve student and faculty camaraderie.

Seattle was a true “hick town” when governor Isaac Stevens asked congress for a land grant for a public university. Washington Territory had only 4,000 people, and Seattle’s population count didn’t even register.

However, with the support of the governor, the University took root. Delegates from Port Townsend, Vancouver and Seattle created a plan to put the University in Seattle, a penitentiary in Port Townsend and the capital in Vancouver.

“It was an effort to carve up assets to take the capital away from Olympia,” UW history professor John Findlay said. “At the time, [the University] didn’t seem like the best thing to land. Now it’s a much better deal.”

Although the capital remained in Olympia, and the penitentiary eventually went to Walla Walla (in 1861) territory legislature passed a law to begin a university in Seattle. With donations from Charles G. Terry and judge Edward Lander (hence the Terry-Lander residence halls), Arthur A. Denny gave 10 acres of his property, which is now Rainier Square, for the first building.

In May 1861, the cornerstone for the University’s first building was laid. On Sept. 4, classes were officially held at the UW as the first public university on the West Coast.

The first years were rocky. Seattle was rural, and few students had adequate education to apply to a university. The school closed several times due to low enrollment. When the UW was in session, a lot of the classes were preparatory courses.

“If you look at the pictures,” Findlay said, “you see students ranging from 5 to 21. There were less than a dozen high schools with a four-year study. The territory was not producing graduates.”

Although the UW struggled to stay open, students continued coming. The 1876 school year produced “Miss” Clara McCarthy as the first graduate of the UW.

As the population of the territory grew, so did the high schools, and with the support of the UW, education opportunities in the area grew. At the same time, faculty members were required to have at least a master’s degree and the range of courses began to expand. By the early 1890s, enrollment soared; it was apparent that the UW needed to move.

Findlay also noted that concerns of morality were an underlying factor in the campus relocation.

“In the 19th century cities had a view of being corrupt. They [university officials] did not want students too near to bars, brothels or gambling,” he said.

Early UW president William Edward Bernard wrote, “[Seattle] society is greatly disorganized; drunkenness, licentiousness, profanity, and Sabbath desecration are the stinking characteristics of our people. These are the influences we have to encounter to build up an institution…I need not say it is discouraging and well nigh hopeless.”

Universities at the time viewed themselves as “parents” to the students and often included strict rules about interactions between male and female students as well as policies on proper decorum.

Thomas Kane, University president from 1902 to 1914, said that “the highest object of the University is to produce good citizens, men of character, patriotism, and purpose.”

In 1894, July 4 was celebrated with the laying of the first cornerstone of the University’s administration building (later named Denny Hall), and on Sept. 4,1894, teaching began.

“No finer site for a university can be imagined than the present campus of our alma mater. Bounded on one side by far-reaching Lake Washington, on the other by Lake Union, it lies like a gem in a setting of silvery waters,” the school newspaper staff wrote in The Pacific Wave of May 1896.

“Denny Hall was a statement of permanence and ambition. It’s made of stone, not wood,” said Antoinette Willis, the associate director of development for the UW College of Arts and Sciences.

The University was well established. Courses varied from math and engineering to English and history and included such degrees as mining and domestic sciences. Following the move to the new campus, college life also began to evolve.

Students were living on campus dorms: male students in Lewis Hall and female students in Clark, and Edmund Meany, a UW professor, took it upon himself to instill in the students pride for their school.

Findlay described Meany as one of the instigators of the University’s growth who became involved in all aspects of campus life.

“Meany was a guy who was into all the college traditions,” he said.

Willis agreed. “Meany loved the UW and believed that everyone else should love the UW, too.”

Meany helped establish many campus traditions, including Campus Day in which students would take the day off to work to clear the campus, hauling away brush and logs. At first Campus Day was created because the university couldn’t afford workers to improve the campus, but over time it became more of a celebration of camaraderie between students.

The University was experiencing rapid growth, but there was little funding from the state legislature despite Meany’s continuous advocacy.

As the UW grew, so did the city of Seattle.

“Portland had had a world fair and Seattle wanted one, too,” Findlay said. “It was a way for Seattleites to show that they’d arrived and were no longer a frontier town.”

The Alaska-Yukon-Pacific Exposition was the result of the Seattle businessmen’s planning and was held on the UW campus in the summer of 1909.

In return for providing the land for the exposition, the UW received several campus upgrades including a landscape designed by John Olmstead, several buildings and increased funding. Although the buildings were designed to be temporary, many remained for several years, including the Architecture Hall, which continues to be in use today.

During the 1890s, the UW had several “firsts.” The first student newspaper, The Pacific Wave began in 1893. In 1892, the school’s colors were declared as purple and gold, and the football tradition began in 1892 with a game against the Seattle Athletic Club.

Despite the apparent differences in decade, Tom Griffin, editor of the UW’s alumni magazine, Columns, has found that many of the issues students and faculty members faced are similar today.

“It’s funny, but a lot of the school traditions, activities were going on 100 years ago,” he said, describing an article in the 1909 alumni magazine that complained of a “failing” athletic program.

“It is when at the ‘Pullman Day’ or the ‘Big Day’ after months of training, a varsity man repeatedly drops a punt, misses a tackle, shows rank ignorance of fundamentals, that we slink home the back way,” wrote Merle Thorpe in the article entitled, “What is the matter with Washington Athletics?”

On the other hand, a published rulebook for freshmen shows an entirely different view of student life. The rules stated that freshmen “shall wear a small olive-colored cap with a large pearl button on it” and must “enter the Auditorium by the rear doors.”

It’s the little things like this that Willis wishes students knew about their school.

“I believe students should know the history,” Willis said. “A lot of people have invested a lot time into building this University to serve students.”

The UW’s history is relevant to its excellence.

“History and tradition mean a lot in academe,” Griffin said. “Some of the most venerated academic institutions are the oldest — look at Oxford. The people here were very forward thinkers in many ways and they cherished this university and wanted to see it grow.”

[Reach reporter Erika Cederlind at features@thedaily.washington.edu.]