David Truman
Stanley was born February
21, 1848, near Terra Haute,
Indiana. Stanley moved to
Edgar County, Illinois with
his parents when he was a
small boy and, in 1856, the
family relocated to Lindley,
Missouri.
Stanley began teaching school
in 1866 at a small school
in Lindley, Missouri. In 1868,
he enrolled in Kirksville
Normal School in Kirksville,
Missouri, and graduated from
the institution in 1870. That
same year, he married Mary
Bristow, became an ordained
minister in the Christian
Church, and accepted a teaching
position at Princeton High
School in Princeton, Missouri.
Stanley was selected as the
high school’s principal
in 1871, and, in 1872 when
the high school became Princeton
College, he was hired as its
first president.
Stanley’s tenure at
Princeton College was short
and, in 1872, he made the
trek to Corvallis, Oregon
to be editor of the Christian
Messenger. The Christian Messenger
was a publication of the Christian
Church in Oregon, and had
previously been edited and
published by TF
Campbell, then president
of the Christian College in
Monmouth. By May of 1877,
Stanley was on the mathematics
faculty of the Christian College
in Monmouth.
Stanley taught at the Christian
College until 1880, when he
resigned to become a railroad
engineer. He worked on several
projects including locating
a route for the railroad through
the Cascade Mountains and
building a line from Corvallis
to Newport. Stanley returned
to Corvallis in 1882 after
finishing his railroad projects,
and purchased the printing
plant of the Christian Messenger.
Stanley resumed editing and
distributing the publication,
a vocation he would pursue
throughout his life.
Stanley was appointed as
president of the Christian
College in May of 1882, replacing
the retiring TF
Campbell. Stanley inherited
an institution with dropping
enrolling and rising debt,
and the new president immediately
sought to increase enrollment.
Stanley, the first president
to graduate from a normal
school, initiated and lobbied
the state government to designate
the campus in Monmouth as
a normal school. In October
of 1882, the Oregon governor
signed the legislation renaming
Christian College as the Oregon
State Normal School (OSNS).
Stanley also oversaw construction,
financed with private donation
as the school still received
no state funds, of the Bell
Tower and South Wing of Campbell
Hall. The Bell Tower and South
Wing, finished in 1889, were
destroyed by the Columbus
Day Storm of 1962 and was
replaced by the Humanities
and Social Sciences Building
in 1965.
President Stanley retired
from OSNS in 1889, but remained
very active in his “retirement.”
He immediately returned to
publishing and editing his
newspaper in Corvallis, renaming
if the Pacific Christian and,
later, The Harbinger. Stanley
consolidated The Harbinger
with a similar Christian Church
newspaper in 1893, and moved
to California to publish the
paper. Stanley sold the newspaper
in 1895. He next purchased
a book publishing company
in New York, New York, only
to sell it a year later to
return to school. Stanley
attended Drake University
in Des Moines, Iowa, and received
his law degree in 1897. Afterwards,
he earned a medical degree
from Barnes University in
St. Louis, Missouri, and worker
for several years in the medical
field. David Truman Stanley
died in July, 1917.
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