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Show PAGE 4 MARCH 1979 COMMENT 90th Anniversary 1889 . .. Weber’s first home. : . 1889 suds fore In additio or ganizatite “TI beg leave to kindly ask the members of the legislature of our country, as well as the county and city officers, to aid in establishing a college in our city, where our students may further qualify themselves for teaching, so that Weber County may maintain her position in educational advancement with the leading counties of our territory’’—report to trustees of Weber County Schools, July 27, 1877. Louis F. Moench. Primary, cm girls. Lewis W. Shurtliff, president of Weber Stake, said at the opening of Weber Academy, January 7, 1889, ‘‘he would never be satisfied until this became one of the leading institutions in the territory.”’ Picnics a couraged as Huntsville .C debate. 1889 on the@solved tha educationdfa0uld be eq The affirm ad one hoy #e building 1891 tions, reat. presented. | 49208 The Academy met briefly in the Weber Stake Tabernacle but the need for their own building was _ great. President Wilford Woodruff made a - $5,000 appropriation for a building and board members and their wives signed a loan of $10,000 to complete the Academy. They used their own homes as collateral. The building, usually referred to as the Moench Building, was completed and classes started November 23, 1891. A description of the school, believed to have been written by Louis F. Moench, Said “It is a large two-story building with two wings facing east on Jefferson Avenue between 24th and 25th. The wings are erected in Corinthian style, the first floor of the center is Ionic and the second story is Doric while the arches and entrances style of architecture. are Romanesque The gable of the central building is an imitation of the St. Magdalene found the in Rome. inscription . . Below ‘‘Weber is Stake Academy.”’ Still lower between the two windows of the upper story of the central building and facing the balcony is a large niche, in which is to be placed some statue, the nature of which is yet to be determinted.”’ In 1916 the college freshman year was added and then the sophomore year, making the Academy a four-year high school and two-year junior college. In ‘oduce, « Salaries ¢ l y and th tickets re 1923 the high school portion was dropped. During. the early year of the for finan depression President Aaron W. Tracy leeded W kept the doors of the school open by busing students to the college and ac- fo od. |