The University of Memphis

The school has carried six names since 1912, but the larger change came in 1959, when it admitted its first Black students, eight of them. By 1970 about two thousand Black students were enrolled, and by the 1990s the university was a national leader in minority graduation rates. Before that came the long push for university status, which arrived in 1957 after several failed attempts, pressed by J. M. Smith and C. C. Humphreys. Its first campus was three red brick buildings on eighty acres just outside the city.

What the plaque says

The University of Memphis This public institution of higher learning has grown with the city of Memphis since opening in 1912. Its development went through the following stages: West Tennessee State Normal School (1912-25); West Tennessee State Teachers College (1925-1941); Memphis State College (1941-1957); Memphis State University (1957-1994)and The University of Memphis since July 1, 1994.

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Elmwood Cemetery — 5.0 mi
  Memphis's oldest active cemetery, a rural garden cemetery of about 1,500 trees opened in 1852, with Black civic leaders, yellow fever victims and the city's whole history in its lots.
• Stax Museum of American Soul Music — 5.1 mi
  A rebuilt Stax studio on the site of the old Capitol Theatre, with a replica of the sloped-floor Studio A, Isaac Hayes's Cadillac and the story of an integrated soul label.
• Sun Studio — 5.6 mi
  The small Union Avenue room where Sam Phillips recorded Rocket 88, Howlin' Wolf, Elvis Presley and the Million Dollar Quartet, now a National Historic Landmark.
• Beale Street — 6.3 mi
  The street that became the center of Black Memphis after the Civil War, home to Church's Park, W. C. Handy, Ida B. Wells and the blues, now a National Historic Landmark district.

More markers nearby

• St. Mary's Episcopal School — 1.9 mi
• Mt. Moriah Baptist Church — 2.0 mi
• Orange Mound — 2.3 mi
• Mt. Pisgah C.M.E. Church — 2.4 mi