Wartburg College

History

Wartburg College was founded in 1852 in Saginaw, Michigan, by Georg M. Grossman, a native of Neuendettelsau, Bavaria. Grossmann was sent by Pastor Wilhelm Löhe to establish a pastor training school for German immigrants. The location of the college moved many times between Illinois and Iowa until permanently settling in Waverly in 1935. Also in 1935, St. Paul Luther College of the Phalen Park neighborhood of Saint Paul, Minnesota merged into Wartburg College.

The college is named after Wartburg Castle in Eisenach, Germany, where Martin Luther was protected during the stormy days of the Reformation. Student and alumni groups often travel to the castle, and the Wartburg Choir has performed in the castle several times. Waverly and Eisenach are sister towns, and they often swap foreign exchange students. The college is proud of its German heritage, and celebrates an annual student-declared one-day holiday Outfly, a deliberately mistaken translation of the German noun Ausflug. Another German element of campus life is the granite inscription on the Chapel: "Ein feste Burg ist unser Gott", which English-speaking Lutherans sing as A Mighty Fortress is Our God.

Campus buildings are named after places and people in Wartburg's history, including Grossmann, Luther, Saginaw, Galena, etc. The college is nearing the end of a long-term effort to unify the architectural appearance of the campus, with new music, library, stadium, cafeteria, and science buildings over the past 15 years. An array of skywalks and building corridors now allows students to walk from one end of campus to the other without having to go outside.

In 2008 the new Wartburg-Waverly Sports and Wellness Center, an indoor athletic complex co-sponsored by the city of Waverly, opened. The new center includes a performance arena, an indoor track, and natatorium. It replaces Knights Gymnasium, the longtime home of Wartburg basketball and volleyball, as well as the Physical Education Center which formerly adjoined the old gym.

The longstanding rivalry between Luther College in Decorah, Iowa and Wartburg College has produced colorful moments over several years. The origins of the rivalry are vague. Stories of pranks date back to the 1940s. The rivalry has, for the most part, been characterized by fun and good sportsmanship. The rivalry rose to new heights in October 1996, when two clever Wartburg cross-country runners rented a light plane, flew to Decorah, and dropped leaflets on the Luther campus. The incident was reported in every major newspaper in Iowa, got national mention on the Fox network and made Rolling Stone magazine's list of the most memorable college pranks of the 1996-1997 year. The creativity in the rivalry continued when student staff members of the college radio station, KWAR, secretly entered a float in the Luther College Homecoming Parade. The staff members decorated the float as an environmental club - the Organization of Nature Enthusiasts - from Luther College. In front of judges stand, the float quickly changed colors from blue and white to orange and black. The float continued all the way through town and onto Luther's campus, with numerous Wartburg students joining the procession from the crowd as the parade passed them.

Presidency of Jack Ohle

Jack Ohle held the presidency of Wartburg College from 1998 to 2008, during which time a number of expensive construction projects were undertaken on campus, including the Wartburg-Waverly Sports Center. As a result of the spending, however, The Chronicle of Higher Education reports that Ohle left Wartburg in a state of financial unrest. This academic newspaper noted that the financing "has raised red flags with its accreditor, alarmed some faculty members, and left Wartburg with a credit rating just one notch above 'junk.'"

Presidency of Darrel Colson

In 2015, Fitch Ratings "assigned a 'BB' rating to revenue refunding bonds issued by the Iowa Higher Education Loan Authority on behalf of Wartburg College," downgrading the college's financial rating. According to an article published in the College's campus newspaper, The Trumpet, Wartburg's credit rating is considered "speculative.” According to Richard Seggerman, Wartburg's vice president for finance and administration, "[t]he debt comes from capital projects" including "the buildings and the equipment related to them...the science center, the student center and The [Waverly-Wartburg Sports Center]," all projects originating during Jack Ohle's tenure as President of the College.

In October 2015, Wartburg made headlines for the Dean of Faculty's recommendation to reduce the college's faculty because of declining enrollment and the lack of “institutional need.” In an article appearing in Inside Higher Ed, it was reported that declining enrollment and a large budget gap contributed to the recommendation. According to the article, "[t]he professors [whose positions were recommended to be cut] were notified their jobs were at risk by being copied on a memo to their respective chairs." The fact that the recommendations, if implemented, would leave the college without full-time professors in Philosophy, Ethics, American Literature, Theater, and French, led students to protest the cuts and created a concern about the perception that it may no longer be a liberal arts college after such measures.

Location

Wartburg College has moved many times throughout its history:

Athletics

Wartburg College teams participate as a member of the National Collegiate Athletic Association's Division III. The Knights are a member of the Iowa Intercollegiate Athletic Conference (IIAC). Men's sports include baseball, basketball, cross country, football, golf, soccer, tennis, track & field and wrestling; while women's sports include basketball, cheerleading, cross country, golf, soccer, softball, tennis, track & field, volleyball, and lacrosse. The women's lacrosse team competes in the Midwest Women's Lacrosse Conference (MWLC). In the spring of 2012, Wartburg’s wrestling and women’s track and field teams led Wartburg to become the only school in NCAA history to win two national team championships on the same day. Wartburg's softball team appeared in one Women's College World Series in 1971.

Notable alumni