LHU to celebrate 150th anniversary

LHU will be hosting a year-long celebration as of Feb. 14, 2020 in honor of it’s charter date back in 1870. Now it is up to the students of LHU to make it even better.

Joby Topper, director of library and information services and co-chair of the LHU 150th Anniversary Planning Committee, said. “If students participate, then they can help us shape it [the anniversary celebration] and then it becomes more of an image of what you all want than what some gray-haired guy like me thinks you want.” 

The committee has created a website where students can submit stories, memories, artifacts, and ideas for events to be apart of the celebration. 

Elizabeth Arnold, executive director of strategic communications and the co-chair of the LHU 150th Anniversary Planning Committee, said. “These don’t have to be historical stories, we want to hear the stories that are shaping the university’s history now. Our students are the lifeblood of the university.” To share your stories and ideas go to lockhaven.edu/LHU150/.

The website also includes a list of major upcoming events in the coming celebration as well as a gallery of old photos dating back to shortly after the founding of LHU. Topper and Arnold hopes that the celebration will immerse students in LHU’s rich history beginning with the founding.

“The founding was so difficult it took seven years between the time the charter was approved and the time we actually opened our doors,” Topper said. While LHU got its charter in 1870, the school didn’t open its doors to students until 1877. 

“Going from a normal school to a state teacher’s college to a state college and then to a university, have been really important steps in the history of the institution.”

Arnold said the anniversary celebration is an opportunity for current students to be a part of the university’s history.