SPRINGFIELD, Mo. (ABP) — The Missouri Baptist Convention renamed Hannibal-LaGrange College Oct. 26 to Hannibal-LaGrange University after alumni campaigned to retain the "LaGrange" part of the moniker.
Messengers to the convention's annual meeting, gathering in Springfield, voted 593-360 to amend a motion presented on behalf of the school's trustees. The trustees had proposed changing the name of the four-year, liberal arts college with about 1,150 students to the University of Hannibal. The amendment re-inserted the historic "LaGrange" reference into the name of the school, currently based in Mark Twain's hometown of Hannibal, Mo.
After the ballot the school's president and trustee chairman stepped forward to tell messengers they also would accept the amendment. A second public vote passed nearly unanimously, according to a report in the Quincy (Ill.) Herald-Whig.
Woodrow Burt
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"We are pleased to move forward as HLGU," Woodrow Burt, a 31-year administrator at Hannibal-LaGrange who has served as the school's president since 1995, said in a statement following the second vote.
College trustees voted three times in favor of the University of Hannibal name to ensure the two-thirds majority of the entire board required to change the school's charter. While preferred by the administration and trustee board, the proposed name was unpopular with many alumni.
A Facebook group titled "Hannibal LaGrange College Name Change" supporting the use of "university" while opposed to dropping the "LaGrange" portion of the name grew to 339 members. "Please don't let our establishment lose it roots by naming it University of Hannibal," group administrator Melissa Hawker, a 1990 graduate, implored. "Please make the name Hannibal LaGrange University."
Founded in 1858 in the Mississippi River town of LaGrange, Mo., the La Grange Male and Female College flourished until the Civil War, but afterward struggled to recover from debt. In 1928 the institution merged with Hannibal College and moved 30 miles downriver to Hannibal, where it became known as Hannibal-LaGrange College.
Past presidents of the school include Larry Lewis, who headed the college from 1981 until his election as president of the Southern Baptist Convention Home Mission Board (now known as the North American Mission Board) in 1987.
Hannibal-LaGrange is one of four colleges historically affiliated with the Missouri Baptist Convention and one of two — the other is Southwest Baptist University in Bolivar, Mo. — whose trustees continue to be appointed by the convention. Two others — Missouri Baptist University in suburban St. Louis and William Jewell College in Liberty, Mo. — have distanced themselves from the statewide body since conservatives cemented control over the convention 10 years ago.
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Bob Allen is senior writer for Associated Baptist Press. ABP Managing Editor Robert Marus contributed to this story.