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The Evolution of TCU

A Guide to 150 Years of Campus Growth

By Texas Christian University

December 14^th, 2023

HUMBLE BEGINNINGS

TCU’s story began in 1869, when Fort Worth brothers Addison and Randolph Clark dreamed of creating a college where men and women could acquire a classical education and develop character. To distance the endeavor from their hometown’s notorious “Hell’s Half Acre,” the minister-teachers headed for the open prairie of nearby Thorp Spring.

With just 13 students, the Clarks opened the doors of AddRan Male and Female College in 1873. It was one of the first co-educational institutions west of the Mississippi.

In 1889, the Clarks transferred control of the school to the Disciples of Christ Church. It was renamed AddRan Christian University and the Board of Trustees was established, ensuring the university’s future to “promote literary and scientific education.”

Students and faculty in front of the Main Building in Thorp Spring, Texas, in 1880. In addition to the college, the school operated primary and preparatory programs similar to today’s elementary, middle and high schools.

RACE & RECONCILIATION

In August 2020, TCU launched the Race & Reconciliation Initiative (RRI), a historically focused, academically based research project to investigate the university’s ties to racism, slavery and the Confederacy.

As outlined in RRI’s First Year Survey Report, “it appears that TCU’s founding was a reaction to the decimation wrought by the Civil War, but had little direct connection to either enslavement or the Confederacy. Enslaved Black labor, for instance, did not contribute substantially to the creation of wealth for the university. Although the Clark brothers’ father, Joseph Addison Clark, benefited from slave labor, the two brothers possessed limited financial resources.”

MORE FINDINGS

THE TURN OF THE CENTURY

In 1895, the school moved to Waco, Texas, and officially became Texas Christian University in 1902. TCU enjoyed a fifteen-year stay in Waco until a mysterious fire on March 22, 1910, destroyed the campus.

Nearly 400 TCU students were left without a place to live and learn. The destruction prompted the Board of Trustees to make a decision: rebuild or move.

A faculty photo from the early 1890s.

A military celebration at the Waco campus.

Several hundred students attended classes at AddRan Christian University each year in the 1890s.

The 1899 football team.

An 1890s class on the Waco campus.

The four-story Main Building on TCU’s Waco campus included classrooms, laboratories, the library, the chapel, dorm rooms and faculty apartments.

The aftermath of the 1910 fire on Waco’s campus.

ARRIVING IN FORT WORTH

After the fire, trustees T. E. Tomlinson, C. W. Gibson and T. E. Shirley sought a new site for the university.

While Waco wanted to keep TCU, several other cities were interested, including Fort Worth, Dallas, Sweetwater, McKinney and Gainesville. Fort Worth’s city leaders sealed the deal by providing 50 acres for a campus, $200,000 (about $5.5 million today) and connections to city utilities and streetcar service. For its part, TCU promised the city that it would stay for at least 10 years.

Until TCU’s new campus was built, the school operated from several two-story brick buildings in downtown Fort Worth. The buildings housed the classrooms, chapel, offices, print shop, dining room and living space for several hundred students.

When TCU first moved to Fort Worth, the university’s temporary location was downtown at the intersection of Weatherford Street and Commerce Street.

PUTTING DOWN ROOTS

The Main Administration building (now Reed Hall) and dormitories Clark Hall, Goode Hall and Jarvis Hall were some of the first buildings to open on TCU’s new campus in 1911. Student life began to flourish as more than 400 students enrolled in classes, participated in extracurricular activities and made University Drive their home.

TCU students, faculty, staff and Fort Worth locals celebrated the new campus with a cornerstone-laying ceremony in the spring of 1911.

Jarvis Hall in 1911.

The 1922 men’s glee club.

A biology lab circa 1910.

TCU’s original gymnasium building.

A 1924 map of campus.

Students in a 1912 dialectics class.

THE BUILDING BOOM

In the early 1940s, TCU formed a building program committee to oversee campus expansion planning as enrollment climbed above 2,000.

Ed Landreth, an oil businessman and member of the TCU Board of Trustees, led the committee’s campaign to raise $5.5 million to construct or renovate 16 buildings on campus.

The TCU building program committee raised $5.5 million for campus expansion in the 1940s.

Impacts of War

R.H. Foster Hall, a women’s dormitory, was the first new building completed in 1942. Subsequent construction was halted as a result of the the United States entering World War II at the end of 1941.

Following the war, the government created the G.I. Bill, which resulted in a sharp uptick in enrollment and additional need for residence halls and classrooms. Construction plans were revised to build or renovate five additional buildings for the 3,700 students at TCU. Ultimately, campus expanded significantly in the 1940s and 50s with the construction or renovation of 21 buildings.

The Tom Brown Hall men’s dormitory opened in 1947, followed by E.M. Waits Hall for women in 1948. The Ed Landreth Hall and Auditorium for fine arts performance also opened in 1948.

In the 1950s, the university renovated Jarvis Hall, expanded the football stadium to a 37,000 seating capacity and Mary Couts Burnett Library, and built the Brown-Lupton Student Center, additional dormitories and new classroom spaces.

Ed Landreth Hall and Auditorium opened in 1948 on the corner of University Drive and Cantey Street.

Mary Couts Burnett Library was renovated in the 1950s to provide more study space for students.

The Brown-Lupton Student Center pictured in 1955.

An aerial view of campus in the 1940s.

TCU’s enrollment doubled to 6,000 by the end of the 1960s. The student population growth was supported by a westward expansion into what was once Worth Hills Municipal Golf Course. The area included a new dining hall and fraternity and sorority houses for the 16 Greek organizations that established chapters on campus in 1955.

The Evolution of TCU

CAPITAL GAINS

In 1979, when William Edward Tucker ’56 BDiv was sworn in as chancellor, TCU’s endowment sat at around $52 million. When he retired in 1998, the school’s funds had ballooned to $750 million, more than 10 times the amount it had been 18 years earlier.

TCU’s endowment, a nest egg that the university invests and saves for the sustainability of TCU in perpetuity, grew significantly thanks to Chancellor Tucker’s fiscal conservatism and focused vision. These enduring investments helped support the university’s operating budget, as well as endowed scholarships and faculty positions, shaping a vibrant future for all Horned Frogs.

“He knew TCU could never achieve national attention without a stronger financial base,” Chancellor Victor J. Boschini, Jr., told TCU 360 in 2012.

Still, several buildings were constructed during Chancellor Tucker’s tenure, including the J.M. Moudy Visual Arts and Communication Building, Dee J. Kelly Alumni & Visitors Center and Mary D. and F. Howard Walsh Center for Performing Arts.

The J.M. Moudy Visual Arts and Communication Building opened in 1980 for the College of Fine Arts and Bob Schieffer College of Communication.

The Dee J. Kelly Alumni & Visitors Center serves as a front door to the university.

The Walsh Center for Performing Arts, which opened in 1998, provides classrooms and rehearsal space for TCU’s theatre and music programs.

Chancellor Tucker’s successor, Michael R. Ferrari, similarly set the stage for a better and brighter TCU. Among Chancellor Ferrari’s many legacies is his spirit of inclusiveness; he established the Community Scholars program, which makes TCU more financially accessible for local student leaders.

The university’s financial foundation and strategic direction set the stage for its national ascent.

THE AUGHTS

Victor J. Boschini, Jr. became TCU’s 10th chancellor in 2003. Since his inauguration, the campus has undergone a transformation that rivals any other period in the university’s history. While TCU has grown in both size and splendor, its upward trajectory has been guided by the strategic plan, Vision in Action: Lead On.

The plan made way for four residence halls and a university union surrounding a green space — now known as the Campus Commons — and numerous other construction and renovation projects starting in 2005.

On the west side of campus, the historic Bailey Building was renovated and connected to the new Steve and Betsy Palko Building to create a larger footprint for the College of Education. Clarence and Kerry Scharbauer Hall was built as the new home to the AddRan College of Liberal Arts. The Mary Wright Admission Center opened along Stadium Drive to welcome prospective students to campus. Amon G. Carter Stadium was renovated and fully reopened in 2012 with a seating capacity of 46,000.

Rees-Jones Hall was constructed as TCU’s first interdisciplinary building, while an addition to the Annie Richardson Bass Building provided new learning space for the Harris College of Nursing & Health Sciences on the east side of campus.

In 2011, TCU entered the top 100 of the U.S. News & World Report college rankings — the same year the Horned Frogs defeated Wisconsin in the Rose Bowl as the second smallest Power Five school to ever win a major bowl game. Applications to TCU increased 42 percent, and more than 9,500 students enrolled the following fall.

Additional residence halls, called the King Family Commons, new Greek houses in Worth Hills and more academic facilities around the Intellectual Commons and Creative Commons helped support the growing student body.

Amon G. Carter Stadium was renovated from 2010-12 to seat 46,000 fans.

Scharbauer Hall opened in spring 2010 to house the AddRan College of Liberal Arts and the John V. Roach Honors College, which moved a renovated Sadler Hall in spring 2023.

The Campus Commons has been the heart of student activities since 2007.

Student ambassadors serve as the welcoming committee for prospective students and families who visit the Mary Wright Admission center for campus tours.

Three new residence halls, primarily for upperclassman, opened in Worth Hills by 2015, followed by new houses for many Greek organizations.

TCU Today

Horned Frogs have come a long way from a class of just 13 in 1873.

There are now more than 12,000 students and 2,000 faculty and staff who learn, work and live on our beautiful 302-acre campus with state-of-the-art facilities that enable us to continue our legacy as a powerful academic community.

The Intellectual Commons, near Mary Couts Burnett Library and Rees-Jones Hall, is a popular studying and socialization area for students.

The Spencer and Marlene Hays Business Commons includes state-of-the-art learning spaces for the Neeley School of Business.

TCU is ranked one of the most beautiful college campuses by The Princeton Review.

The Princeton Review ranks TCU as offering the No. 7 best quality of life for students.

The Fine Arts Building, which opened in 2019, includes numerous flexible learning spaces for the College of Fine Arts.

Opened in 2021, the Intercultural Center is an inclusive space for all on the first floor of the Brown-Lupton University Union.

The Creative Commons on the east side of campus connects the TCU Music Center to the Fine Arts Building and J.M. Moudy Visual Arts and Communication Building.

THE NEXT 150 YEARS

Chancellor Victor J. Boschini, Jr. and President Daniel W. Pullin share their vision of continued growth in the winter 2023 issue of TCU Magazine.

See The Student-Centered Approach

Footnotes

Photos courtesy of TCU Library Special Collections, TCU Digital Archives, TCU Magazine, James Anger, Rodger Mallison, Jeffrey McWhorter and Amy Peterson. Information sources include TCU Magazine, TCU Library Special Collections and “Walking TCU” by Colby D. Hall.

FootNotes

Photos courtesy of TCU Library Special Collections, TCU Digital Archives, TCU Magazine, James Anger, Rodger Mallison, Jeffrey McWhorter and Amy Peterson. Information sources include TCU Magazine, TCU Library Special Collections and “Walking TCU” by Colby D. Hall.

© 2026 Texas Christian University

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