DUANE
Get the App
Duane's take
Here's how the official marker tells it, and I'm passing it along to you straight. Now, you might not expect to find a Swedish Methodist college sitting in the heart of Texas, but that is exactly what happened right here. Texas Wesleyan College opened its doors in 1912, founded by Swedish Methodists, with a man named Reverend O.
E. Olander providing the leadership and guidance that got the whole thing off the ground. Think about that for a moment.
A community with enough conviction and enough vision to build a college from scratch, and they did it. Numerous academic courses on offer, sponsored athletic teams competing out on the field, a school newspaper keeping everybody informed and occasionally stirring things up, and music and literary clubs giving students a place to put their minds and their voices to work. This was not some bare-bones operation.
This was a full, living, breathing institution. For decades it stood right here on these twenty-one acres. Then came 1940.
The college closed. The site, all twenty-one acres of it along with the buildings, was sold to the University of Texas. But here is where the story takes a turn that might surprise you.
The funds from that sale did not simply vanish into some ledger and disappear. They were transferred. To Texas Woman's College in Fort Worth, which was later renamed Texas Wesleyan College, and to the Texas Wesleyan Foundation.
And that foundation went on to provide hundreds of scholarships to Texas students of Swedish heritage. So the college closed, yes. But what it stood for kept going, in the form of opportunity handed down to hundreds of young people who came after.
That is not a bad legacy for twenty-one acres and a dream.
What the marker says
Founded by Swedish Methodists, with leadership and guidance from the Rev. O. E. Olander, Texas Wesleyan College opened in 1912. Numerous academic courses were offered in the school sponsored athletic teams, a newspaper, and music, and literary clubs. It was closed in 1940, in the 21-acre site and buildings were sold to the University of Texas. The funds were transferred to Texas Woman’s College in Fort Worth (later renamed Texas Wesleyan College) and the Texas Wesleyan foundation, which provided hundreds of scholarships to Texas students of Swedish heritage. (1989)