Bowling Green Business University

History

Bowling Green Business University originated in 1884 as the Southern Normal School and Business College. In 1892 Henry Hardin Cherry and Thomas Crittenden Cherry took over its operations and renamed it the Bowling Green Business College and Literary Institute; the name changed again to the Southern Normal School and Bowling Green Business College in 1894.

On January 7, 1907, the Southern Normal School became Western Kentucky State Normal School, a state-chartered institution. H. H. Cherry sold the business school to a private partnership of Joseph S. Dickey, J. Lewie Harman, and W. S. Ashby.

Under J. S. Dickey and three subsequent presidents, the Bowling Green Business University earned a national reputation for its training of commercial teachers. It became the first privately owned business school to achieve four-year college status and membership in the Association of Kentucky Colleges and Universities.

On June 1, 1963, the Bowling Green Business University merged with Western Kentucky State College.

Collection

The Towers yearbook is available from 1926 to 1963. Scattered issues of the Southern Exponent are available from 1906-1940. Many issues of the Students Weekly newspaper from 1932-1939 are in the collection, as are some of the student magazines T'N'T (1948-50) and BUWKY (1936-1943). Catalogs for the University run from 1910-1940; for the College of Commerce Division from 1923-63; and summer school catalogs from 1914-1940 (not all issues are available). Some course bulletins are available from 1941-1959.

Additional holdings include recruitment materials; enrollment and graduate lists; materials from fraternities, sororities and the Coreco/Big Four debating clubs; diplomas; class rings; photographs; and the scrapbooks and papers of J. Lewie Harman, president from 1921-45.

Search the collection inventory. An online exhibit is available.