The Making of an Independent Thinker

A Liberal Arts Education at Eureka College

Reagan's vision and voice were discovered at Eureka College as he immersed himself in the liberal arts and sciences. "The mutual development of intellect and character" were and are what Eureka College is all about. The National Park Service recently honored Eureka College with the designation of National Historic District. It did so, in part, because of Eureka's unique architecture, but more so because of EC's heritage of servant leaders who changed the world for the better. This rich heritage of servant leaders was the world into which Ronald Reagan stepped in the fall of 1928. Reagan's mother, Nelle, and his Christian Church (Disciples of Christ) Minister - the Reverend Benjamin Cleaver - had imparted stories of the College - a DOC College which was founded by abolitionists in 1855 and was the first college in Illinois and third in the nation to accept men and women on an equal basis.

The liberal arts and sciences approach which grounded the students in a wide-variety of disciplines, while specializing in one, was meant to create leaders, creators, and inventors who could look to broad disciplines for creative answers in a particular discipline.

This was Reagan - and the Current Eureka College Student

• Capable of thinking outside the box and find and create solutions to problems through critical thinking.

• Able to think holistically and to look at life experiences through a vocational and avocational lens.

• To live a successful and full life and able to blend opposites to great success and fulfillment.

It is no great shock then that Reagan was one among many EC graduates who were determined to leave the world a better place than how they found it - better in the sense that those who needed assistance were given it with personal responsibility in the forefront.

Christian Church (Disciples of Christ) Influence on Reagan & Eureka

It is important to place Reagan into the historical and cultural context of Eureka College - a college steeped in a tradition of servant leadership. Where as in Dixon, Reagan only heard of the importance of the equality of all people and the importance of education as a way to improve oneself, in Eureka he lived in and was immersed in it. The College was found in a very utopian manner - leaders who envisioned a better society and believed they had the keys to achieving that Utopia. The DOC believed strongly in equality of sexes and an accessible non-sectarian education - in the context that one needs both faith and reason without either interfering with the other. The College founders came to untapped land as a group to found their utopia and today many Eurekans trace their roots to the founding families.As a consequence, Eureka, founded by staunch abolitionists, was the first college in Illinois and third in the Nation to accept men and women on an equal basis.

The 1931 EC Yearbook pictures a photogenic Ronald Reagan but more importantly below him on the same page is Willie Sue Smith, an African-American woman from Houston, Texas.

The College also had racially integrated athletic teams and certainly faced much prejudice as they traveled throughout the Midwest. Eureka also had a long history of graduating highly educated women - white and black - in a time when less that 1% of college graduates in the U.S. were women. This is a college where the inaugural faculty consisted of four women and four men. In short, Eureka College was the utopia of which Reagan had long heard. Learn how this affected Reagan's relationships >