Geography at Western Oregon State College W a y n e R o d g e r s W h it e Professor, Department of Geography Western Oregon State College Monmouth, OR 97361 and GEOFFREY TRIONFANTE M.A. Candidate, Department of Geography University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, MN 55455 T h e c o u r se o f GEOGRAPHY a t WESTERN Oregon State College hasprovenhighly sensitive to thechanging mission ofthe college, the development of American geographic thought, and the varied styles of the school’s leaders. The Christian Education Frontier Era: 1856-92 Geography in the earliest days of Western was related “to the study of the earth as created by God for the home of man.” The institution began as Monmouth University in 1856, with moral support from the Christian Church of Monmouth, Oregon, and the DisciplesofChristChurch, andwithmaterial supportfromsettlersout of the Illinois prairie and the Upper South in the form of land donated for division into town lots. The town ofMonmouth, founded in 1851, was the endofamigration path from Monmouth, Illinois, Monmouth, New Jersey, andMonmouthshire, England. Ineach oftheseplaces an 217 218 APCG YEARBOOK • VOLUME 53 • 1991 institution of higher education had been established. The first three presidents of Monmouth University all had graduated from their denomination’sBethany CollegeinVirginia(nowWestVirginia) and were ordained ministers of the Christian Church. Geography was taught as part ofmathematics and science and involved the teleological conceptoftheearth as a“perfect sphere.” The study ofthis sphere meant learning spherical geometry, navigation, and surveying. Financial stringency led the college to seek state support. The campus was offered, butdeclinedby onevote in alegislativecommit tee, asa siteforthe stateuniversity. In 1881, withpartial state support, it became identified as a normal school, but the Christian curriculum was continued. By 1888, the Christian courses were no longer listed in the catalog. Finally in 1891 the campus was given to the state, and the Christian education frontier era ended. The Normal School and Teacher’s College: 1892-1981 The early geographers at Western were educated primarily in the Christian teachers’ colleges of the Middle West. W.A. Wann, who came in 1894, was the first faculty hired specifically to teach geogra phy; he also taught science and geology and later became secretary of the faculty. The initial courses, with texts in parentheses, were world geography (Monteith), commercial geography, surveying geography (Wentworth), map making, and physical geography (Appleton). Catalogs showed geography in the science department, listed along with geology, chemistry, and physics. In 1904 students in geography were informed thattheir study “commences with the local landscape, its elevations, depressions, streams, and forests, studying the cause for each. From the local study, they proceed outward to the development of continents, with a review of those causes which are always at work....By thus, commencing at home,...they proceed from the known to the unknown. As far as possible, most of the suggestions made by the ‘Geography Conference of the “Committee of Ten’” are followed.” (This report, sponsored by the National Educational Association and adopted by it in 1894,presented the idea WHITE & TRIONFANTE: Geography at Western Oregon 219 that geography was too concerned with innumerable disconnected facts andneededto adoptamore systematic, scientific approach.) The 1904-05 catalog also added, “much time is given to mathematical geography, the products of the world, and comparative studies of the continents. Also a complete course in map-making.” The text promisedtogeography studentswas Tarr’sNewPhysicalGeography. In the next decade were added new geography instructors who playedprominentroles in the college. KatherineArbuthnot began her 34 years on the campus in 1913. Thomas Gentle was added in 1916, and L. P. Gilmore arrived in 1918. Gentle’s assignment was to head the training school and to teach geography. The training school, located in the heart ofthe campus, housed an accreditedpublic school and was used to train preservice teachers who attended the college. While atWesternhepublished seventeen articles, mostlydealingwith pedagogy and geography education. He was trained in Germany in the Harbartian tradition, presentednumerouspublic lectures, andwas partly responsible for the design and construction ofthe Instructional Technology Center (Education Building) on which is inscribed his motto: “who dares to teach much never cease to learn.” Since the appointment ofGentle, geographers have held numerous administra tive positions atWestern. In 1928...