1899 - 1907 Rufus H. Halsey

The Wisconsin Normal School Board of Regents selected Rufus Halsey to succeed George Sumner Albee as President in 1898. He served from 1899 to 1907, and his concern for student and faculty welfare promoted campus-wide changes that had lasting effect. In contrast to Albee’s stern and puritanical demeanor, Halsey’s presidency was characterized by a more familial approach. Still, Halsey continued the Oshkosh Normal School tradition of high-quality education and professional training.

Born in Bloomington Grove, New York in March 1856, Halsey spent his childhood years in Brooklyn. He attended Williams College in 1873, and after his graduation in 1877 became a teacher. Moving to Oshkosh in 1883, he first served as the city’s high school principal. In 1892, Halsey became the superintendent of Oshkosh’s Board of Education and served four years in that office until returning to New York to become  the superintendent of Binghamton’s Board of Education. It was there that Halsey received the invitation to serve as the second president of the Oshkosh Normal School, his reputation well known in the community.

Putting his own ideas to work, Halsey established faculty committees that would assist both the administration and the student body. New committees like Course of Study, Graduation, Student Contests and New Business oversaw many dimensions of campus procedures. He also introduced the concept of student advisement at Oshkosh. Every faculty member would advise a group of twenty students each term, some making visits to students’ homes. These personal relationships between the faculty and students promoted cooperation and student growth, as the faculty advisor offered not only academic guidance, but social and moral as well.

His cooperative expectations were extended to the students. The social life on campus blossomed, as the number of athletic, academic and social organizations, for both men and women, heightened during Halsey’s presidency. In 1907 the senior men’s basketball team challenged the Normal School faculty to a game. Halsey, an active participant in campus life, played center for the faculty team which lost by one basket. Students were allowed now to organize formerly forbidden dances on campus.  After much deliberation, Halsey had decided that the supervision that on-campus venues allowed would make the dances less harmful. On October 6, 1906, after a game against Stevens Point, the Normal School held its first official dance.

Halsey supported the Normal School in its mission to produce professional educators, but he valued a liberal arts education as well. As a graduate of a liberal arts college, he encouraged flexibility in the programs of study, allowing students to pursue areas of personal academic interest. Greater academic specialization enhanced the instruction of secondary education which was often left to the University of Wisconsin to provide graduates for. Halsey also helped create classes in business and the industrial arts, two fields that expanded into the high school’s academics.

Halsey’s presidency unexpectedly ended on July 25, 1907, while he was on vacation in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula. After a day of target shooting, one of Halsey’s two sons was cleaning a revolver when it accidently fired and shot Halsey in the face.  Far from medical help in the remote area, Halsey succumbed to his injuries.  The death of President Halsey shocked and saddened the campus and community.

President Rufus Halsey is memorialized on campus as the namesake of the Halsey Science Center, dedicated in 1964.

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