Join us to learn about the construction of the original buildings on the campus of the University of Missouri. We often hear about the landowners who donated money and land to found the University of Missouri, but we don’t often hear about who actually constructed the buildings on the university campus. Our guest speaker, Zachary Dowdle, will take us behind the scenes with his research into the role of enslaved people in the construction of the oldest buildings on the campus of the University of Missouri. Our 6 pm meeting on Tuesday November 19 is free and open to the public in the Friends Room of the Columbia Public Library. 

Academic Hall, circa 1860

Courtesy University Archives, University of Missouri

Dowdle is a specialist in the history of politics and slavery in Missouri. Dowdle is an Assistant Professor of History at William Woods University in Fulton. He earned his Ph.D. in history at the University of Missouri in 2019. His dissertation, “Reluctant Emancipator: James Sidney Rollins and the Politics of Slavery and Freedom in the Border South, 1838-1882,” examines the intersection of party politics, slavery, and economic development in nineteenth-century Missouri and the Border South with a focus on the career of Rollins. Rollins was a slave owner but he was also a pro-Unionist who provided a crucial vote in Congress that approved the Thirteenth Amendment.

Academic Hall, circa 1880

Courtesy University Archives, University of Missouri

All CoMo Preservation’s monthly meetings feature a guest speaker on historic preservation and/or historic properties in Columbia, Missouri, and are open to the public and held in the Friends Room at the Columbia Public Library.