One-hundred-fifty years ago today — March 11, 1868 — the Illinois Industrial University (University of Illinois) celebrated its opening of nine days earlier with inaugural ceremonies. President John Milton Gregory, both members of his faculty, 77 students and a bevy of town folk gathered in a large hall on the third floor of University Hall, known by its moniker "The Elephant."
In "Hot Type", a 2002 book authored by The News-Gazette's Tom Kacich, the weather outside was described as being miserable. The town's newspaper, The Union & Gazette, colorfully described the conditions. "It seemed all the elements in nature had combined to make the day disagreeable and the occasion of a failure, for overhead it was dark and lowering, underfoot an almost unfathomable depth of mud, and between and lying loose was rain and water enough to make ducks or the student of hydraulics supremely happy.