Emporia State University history

Kansas State Normal School began offering bookkeeping classes to schoolteachers as early as 1868.

The settlement developed as a trading centre after the arrival of the railroad (Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe) in 1869.

In 1876, the Kansas Legislature passed the "Miscellaneous appropriations bill of 1876". As a result, Leavenworth Normal and Concordia Normal were closed so the state funding for normal schools could be directed to Emporia.

By 1889, KSN had become the largest school in the state and the largest normal school in the country.

The Emporia Gazette became probably the best-known and respected “small-town” newspaper in the United States under the editorship of William Allen White, who bought it in 1895.

The school was first accredited in 1898, the same year it graduated its first black students.

In 1917, KSN began offering a bachelor's degree in commerce.

The name was changed to Kansas State Teachers College in 1923.

Kansas State Teachers College began offering the Bachelor of Science in Business degree in 1952.

In 1975, the name of the degree was changed to the Master of Business Administration. As a result of program growth, changes in student interest, and the needs of society, the program began offering several majors within the B.S.B. In 1971, KSTC was authorized to award the Master of Science in Business.

In July 1974, the name was changed to Emporia Kansas State College.

In 1983, the Division of Business and Business Education, a component of the School of Applied Arts and Sciences, was reorganized into the ESU School of Business.

The arch between King Hall and Beach Music Hall was built in Spring 2002 by artist Richard Harrison and a team of Emporia State students.