Thomas Van Scoy was born in White County, Indiana, to William Van Scoy and his wife Mary (née Channel) on February 13, 1848.[2] Thomas was the youngest of fourteen children in the family.[3] Their father was a farmer from what became West Virginia, while their mother was from Ohio.[2] In 1855, the family moved to Iowa where they continued to farm.[2] Van Scoy's parents and the three youngest children in the family returned to the Indiana farm in 1860 after difficult times in Iowa.[2] In Indiana, Van Scoy received his education in the local schools before joining the militia in 1865 during the American Civil War.[2] He served one year in Company I of the Indiana Volunteers, posted as a guard in the Shenandoah Valley.[2]
After leaving the infantry in 1866, he enrolled at a school in Brookston, Indiana, for a few months and then at the Battle Ground Collegiate Institute.[2] Van Scoy spent two years at the institute and while in school was also a school teacher.[2] He then enrolled at Brookston Academy where he spent one year before entering Northwestern University in neighboring Illinois where he was a member of Phi Gamma Delta.[2][4] Following two-years of study, he left to take the position of principal at Brookston, but resigned there three years later to return to college.[3] In 1875, he graduated from Northwestern (later inducted into the Phi Beta Kappa honor society)[5] and began working as a minister in Rensselaer, Indiana, for the Methodist Episcopal Church.[2] On September 22, 1875, he married Jennie E. Thomas.[3] After three years he left to continue his education at the Garrett Biblical Institute in Evanston, Illinois, where he graduated in 1879.[2][6]
Oregon
In 1879, he was hired by Willamette University in Salem, Oregon, to be chairman of the Greek department and to teach ancient languages.[2][3][6] Part of the reason for the move was to attempt to improve the health of his wife, but this was unsuccessful and she died in 1883.[2] After he was hired at Willamette, Charles E. Lambert resigned as president of the institution and Van Scoy was hired as the sixth president of Willamette University in 1880.[2][7] At Willamette he purchased the former home of the first graduate of the school for use as a school for women in 1880.[8] He purchased the home with his own money and remodeled the home, with the building later moved to the campus and renamed as Lausanne Hall.[8]
In 1884, Van Scoy was granted a doctor of divinity degree by the University of the Pacific.[2] Van Scoy remarried in 1885 to Jessie Eastham, and they had one son named Paul, while he previously had a daughter named Lena with his first wife.[2] In February 1887, he purchased the desks that were formerly at the Oregon State Capital across the street from the school.[9] Van Scoy resigned from Willamette in June 1891 to become dean at the new Methodist school in Portland, Portland University.[2] He also served as president of that school,[10] and due to financial difficulties moved the school to East Portland, though some classes were held in Downtown Portland.[11] The school later closed in 1900 and the campus overlooking the Willamette River and Swan Island was sold.[11] The campus included West Hall, and was sold to the Catholic Church, eventually becoming the University of Portland.[11] Van Scoy was the first minister at the Montavilla Methodist Church in Southeast Portland, dedicating a new building on October 19, 1893.[12]
Later years
In 1898, Van Scoy left Oregon for Montana in order to be the new president of Montana Wesleyan University (eventually became part of Rocky Mountain College)[13] near Helena.[2] As president he moved the school to the city in 1900.[2] Though he never held political office, he was a supporter of the Republican Party.[3] Thomas Van Scoy died on February 11, 1901, in Helena at the age of 52 and was buried in that city.[6]
References
^Past Presidents. Willamette University. Retrieved on March 30, 2009.
^ abcKing, George D. (1901). “Memoirs: Thomas Van Scoy”, Montana Conference of the Methodist Episcopal Church Official Journal, Methodist Episcopal Church. p. 40.
