About the NWC Alumni Society

The NWC Alumni Society Beginnings

The first meeting of the Northwestern College Alumni Society took place in Watertown, Wisconsin, on June 25, 1879. In the spring of the year, two Milwaukee alumni, Dr. John Bading (class of 1872) and Professor Eugene Notz (class of 1873), sent out invitations to all Northwestern graduates to gather for the purpose of forming a Northwestern University Alumni Association. Not a single one of the older alumni besides Bading and Notz attended. But ten more recent graduates did, meaning that 12 of the 28 men who had thus far graduated from Northwestern were there, not including the nine who had just graduated on June 19.

The charter members of the society were: A. Baebenroth, Bading, O. Felland, J. Gensike, W. Harms, O. Hoyer, C. Huth, K. Koch, J.P. Koehler, L. Lampert, Notz, and Chr. Sauer. These twelve men gathered in the college aula to renew their ties with the alma mater and with each other by creating the Alumni Society. The aula (assembly room) occupied the lower floor of the two-story eastern wing of the old dormitory, built in 1875. Roll-up dividers transformed it into two large classrooms. When the dividers were rolled up, it was a sizable hall that was used for commencement exercises, chapel, and meetings of all kinds, including those of most of the alumni meetings until 1895. In that year it gave way to the more spacious aula on the third floor of the new Recitation Hall.

At the first meeting, Prof. Notz was asked to discuss the aims and advantages of the kind of association he had in mind. This he did in a speech that John Ph. Koehler still remembered vividly enough to synopsize years later. He was especially impressed with Notz's idea that the proposed society ought not to be motivated in the first instance by scientific, philanthropic, or theological considerations, but by a spirit of social camaraderie and a feeling of reverence for the institution where alumni had spent formative years and ripened into adulthood. Dr. Bading then added some practical suggestions concerning the formation of a constitution and the activities of an alumni society. A constitution committee was formed, and the document they drafted listed the following aims: 1) to foster the arts and sciences; 2) to support our Alma Mater in every possible way; and 3) to further and maintain the bonds of Christian friendship in a truly Lutheran spirit.

After the election of officers, unknown to posterity, the members of the constitutional assembly adjourned to the dining room in the old main building, where under the chairmanship of Northwestern University President August F. Ernst, they partook of "einen solennen Mahle" (a solemn meal).

Adapted from Elmer E. Kiessling's Centennial Memoir (1979).

NWC Alumni Society Constitution & Bylaws