College of Wooster
private liberal arts college in Wooster, Ohio
The College of Wooster is a private liberal arts college in Wooster, Ohio, United States. Founded in 1866 by the Presbyterian Church as the University of Wooster, it has been officially non-sectarian since 1969. From its creation, the college has been a co-educational institution. It enrolls about 1,900 students and is a member of the Five Colleges of Ohio, Great Lakes Colleges Association, and Association of Presbyterian Colleges and Universities.
History
Founded as the University of Wooster in 1866 by the Presbyterian Synod of Ohio, the institution opened its doors in 1870 with a faculty of five and a student body of thirty men and four women. Ephraim Quinby, a Wooster citizen, donated the first 20 acres (8.1 ha), a large oak grove situated on a hilltop overlooking the town. After being founded with the intent to make Wooster open to everyone, the university's first Ph.D. was granted to a woman, Annie B. Irish, in 1882. The first black student, Clarence Allen, began his studies later in the same decade.
The university gradually began to define itself as a liberal arts institution. In 1915, after a bitter dispute between the faculty and the trustees, the institution was renamed The College of Wooster reflecting a dedication to the education of undergraduate students in the liberal arts.
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Vocabulary and entity names are the principal evidence signals here, because they determine the precision of every later search. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 3, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q1109093. VIAF identifies the subject as 140039081. The Library of Congress control number is n50038797. Authority coordinates are 40.812, -81.936. 4 of 5 selected statements include explicit references; 1 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1866, 1969, 1870 and 1882.
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This entry incorporates text from “College of Wooster” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.