3 Decline and Revival: The Forties

The outbreak of hostilities in Europe in September of 1939 did not have an immediate impact upon the University of Wisconsin and the Extension Centers. During that month, however, President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed the Selective Service Act which required every male between the ages of twenty-one and thirty-six to register for the draft. By 1943 these ages would be expanded to eighteen through thirty-eight. Some men, especially the younger ones, decided to enlist immediately so that they might elect to serve in the branch of the military they preferred. By the time the six nationwide registrations were completed, some thirty-one million men had been enrolled. Almost ten million were eventually inducted into the service from this pool.^[1]

Wisconsin contributed its fair share of personnel to the war effort. Over one million men registered for the Selective Service in the state and about one-third of them were called to duty. In addition, approximately 9,000 Wisconsin women served, primarily as nurses and office staff. The increased need for labor on the state’s farms and in factories further reduced the pool of potential University enrollees. In 1941, as tensions between the United States and Japan heightened, many men left their studies in mid-semester either to volunteer or to respond to the draft.^[2]

In September 1939 the General Extension Division responded to the need for military preparedness. George A. Parkinson, Assistant Director of the Evening School in Milwaukee and also the Lieutenant Commander of the local Naval Reserve unit, initiated a Civilian Pilot Training program. Its objective was to train rapidly as many pilots as possible for military duty. The Civil Aeronautics Authority worked with Extension to get this program underway and gave it a real boost in mid-1940 by convincing the war Emergency Board to build an Air Annex to house the burgeoning classes and to provide a lab for engine repair and other aircraft maintenance.^[3]

The Engineering, Science and Management War Training (ESMWT) classes, which began in March 1941, aimed at increasing war material production for the United States military and for the Lend-Lease program, which shipped weapons to the Allies. By the end of the war, the ESMWT program had enrolled about 10,000 students from over 600 businesses and industries in 37 Wisconsin cities. The greatest number, of course, enrolled in the heavily industrialized Lakeshore District which included Milwaukee, Racine, and Kenosha.^[4]

The largest and most successful Extension wartime program, by far, was the United States Armed Forces Institute (USAFI). USAFI, which operated under contract with the Department of Defense, provided both college credit and non-credit correspondence courses to military personnel throughout the world. The federal government paid all the fees, so the enrollments constantly climbed. The program quickly became the largest source of revenue for Extension and a surplus once again began to appear in the Division’s accounts.^[5]

Through USAFI, many young men and women from families without a tradition of university education had an opportunity to try college. A significant number were successful and planned to complete a degree after the war.

In the midst of every-increasing uncertainty about enrollment, the University Extension Division went about its business as best it could. Chester Allen, still at his post as Director of Field Organization, and the field representatives opened sixteen Centers in the fall of 1940, which included a new one at Watertown. Two Centers (Manitowoc and Sheboygan) also offered sophomore courses for the first time. In addition to advanced courses in English, history and foreign languages, the sophomores could take economics and political science. Although the total enrollment sagged a little compared to the previous year, Dean Holt believed that his visits with prospective students and parents in several communities in the spring had prevented an even greater decline.^[6]

In an attempt to bolster enrollment in the fall of 1941, Extension initiated college credit courses by correspondence in a few high schools. This high school program had been periodically discussed for several years but had always floundered when the final details could not be worked out. This time, Dean Holt successfully brought together the UW School of Education and the State Department of Public Instruction to make the arrangements. Extension advertised the program as a method by which small, rural high schools could offer introductory college courses to their graduates. The participating high schools provided a room where the correspondence students met regularly to complete lessons under the supervision of the principal. The cost was $5.00 per credit, the same rate charged at the Freshman Centers. Many of these students earned their tuition via National Youth Administration jobs, which paid $15.00 per month.^[7]

In an attempt to increase its income, Extension worked out a cooperative arrangement with the state normal schools. In the past the normal schools had attempted without notable success to organize off-campus education courses for prospective teachers. Finally, during the summer of 1940 the Board of Regents of the Normal Schools accepted Extension’s long-standing offer to use its personnel and experience to set up these classes. Because of the late start, just 190 students were enrolled in the fall of 1940; however, one year later, 575 teachers and prospective teachers flocked to the classes. Each course was sponsored by a particular normal school, whose instructors usually taught the classes. In January 1942, because these classes had proven so popular, the Normal School Board of Regents unanimously approved a resolution that allowed the students to apply up to sixteen credits from the off-campus courses toward graduation and to transfer the credits among the eight normal schools. These credits, however, could not be transferred into the University of Wisconsin, which resolutely maintained that the normal school classes were not truly college-level courses.

Despite the strong enrollment in these classes, Chester Allen remained unconvinced that they really helped the Extension Division. He noted that the net financial gain was very slight because, as usual, salaries and overhead ate up most of the income. In addition, Allen contended that the fifteen percent decline in the Centers’ enrollment in the fall of 1941 could be directly attributed to these courses, rather than to the alarms of impending war. Allen conjectured that the Extension field representatives had devoted a great deal of time to filling the normal schools’ classes and had significantly reduced recruitment of students for the Centers.^[8]

During the 1941 legislative session a final attempt was made to convince the state to provide a direct subsidy for each Center student to replace the aid withdrawn by the vocational schools in 1939. Assemblyman Henry J. Berquist, a Progressive from Rhinelander, sponsored the measure. Despite Berquist’s keen interest in the measure (both the Rhinelander and Antigo Centers were in his district), the bill died in committee. Partisan politics apparently doomed Berquist’s measure. The Republicans and Progressives remained locked in a bitter struggle to control state government, with the Democrats a distant third. Because the Republicans controlled the Assembly and its Education Committee by a comfortable margin, they could easily defeat a Progressive’s proposal.^[9] The Republicans also noted that Berquist’s measure would mean an increase in the state budget.

Somewhat ironically, however, this same session approved a bill which substantially increased Extension’s USAFI income. Assembly Bill 194A authorized a “sum sufficient amount” from the state treasury for free correspondence courses for any Wisconsinite in the military. Furthermore, the state pledged to refund the fees paid by any soldier to Extension retroactive to October 14, 1940, the day the Selective Service Act had taken effect. This measure sailed unanimously through the Assembly and drew just three nays in the Senate.^[10]

By 1940 the Milwaukee Extension Center’s college credit program had become almost a separate operation, with the Extension Division office in Madison handling just the financial accounts and some administrative work. The academic departments in Madison handled all other matters, wielding especially strong control over the selection and supervision of the Milwaukee faculty and carefully monitoring course content. Milwaukee’s freshman-sophomore enrollment slipped a good deal during the war, from 738 in 1939 to a low of just 274 in the fall of 1943. This was to be expected because the war was in full swing and men traditionally outnumbered women six to one in the college classes.^[11]

Despite the close ties between the Madison campus and the Milwaukee Center, a squabble between the two units occasionally erupted. On Sunday, August 30, 1942, as A. W. Peterson, the University Comptroller, read his Milwaukee Journal he came across an advertisement promoting “The University of Wisconsin in Milwaukee.” The next day an irate Peterson fired off a note to President Dykstra, along with the ad, calling Dykstra’s attention to the fact that the Extension Division had again used the “offensive” name.^[12] Dykstra subsequently asked Dean Holt for an explanation and requested that he take up the issue with the Milwaukee Center. In November the Milwaukee faculty formally petitioned that the Center be permitted to use “The University of Wisconsin in Milwaukee” in its literature and advertising. This was vital, the faculty contended, to make clear to the public that the college classes were bona-fide university courses, not non-credit correspondence courses and short courses generally associated with the Extension Division. They also pointed out that the Milwaukee press customarily referred to the institution as UWM (The University of Wisconsin in Milwaukee) and that a different title would have difficulty winning acceptance.^[13] There is no evidence that this tiff was formally resolved by either the Regents or the President’s office. But it clearly revealed that the Madison campus jealousies toward the off-campus college credit courses remained strong. In any event, the reference to the University of Wisconsin continued to be used in the Milwaukee Center’s publicity and advertisements.

Extension’s outstate college centers marked their nadir in the fall of 1943 when only five Centers operated with just 163 students.

ENROLLMENT 1943-44 

In view of this dismal enrollment, one of the field representatives commented that the Extension Centers may as well be closed down because the students’ fees barely covered the expenses of setting up and supervising them.^[14]

That same October the Extension Division suffered a serious blow when, after months of discussion, its popular and effective Dean Holt was appointed Director of the University’s Department of Public Service. This new public relations service, located in the President’s office, had been created by the Board of Regents to assist President Dykstra, who was often in Washington, D.C., to fulfill his responsibilities as national director of the Selective Service System. In addition, Dykstra had not proven effective in public relations, a field in which Holt had several times demonstrated his mettle while the head of the Extension Division. Although Holt kept his title as Dean of the Extension Division, he obviously devoted most of his attention to his new assignment. His absence exacerbated the wartime personnel shortage in Extension’s administration, where there already were five vacancies. And because Dykstra and the Regents seemed in no hurry to replace Holt, the staff members in Madison became concerned about the future of the entire Division.^[15]

This uneasiness intensified the following month when several key people from the Madison administration, the Extension Division, the Milwaukee Center, and Agricultural Extension met to discuss a merger of the two extension services. One result of such a reorganization would have been to transfer total control of the college credit courses to the Madison academic departments. Chester Allen, who represented the Extension Division, believed that the academic departments would probably close down the outstate centers to secure for themselves at least the salary monies paid to the circuit-riding faculty. Allen and his colleagues in Extension quickly became convinced that President Dykstra, who did not attend this meeting, was the mastermind behind this transparent attempt to strip both General Extension and Agricultural Extension of some of their most important and income-producing responsibilities.^[16]

Fears about Dykstra’s motives intensified when Lorentz Adolfson was appointed Acting Associate Director of the Extension Division in February 1944. Adolfson, an associate professor of political science who had taught at several Centers and who was currently directing USAFI, was not the source of their concern. Rather, the veteran administrators were alarmed by the “acting” designation and by the apparent demotion of the Division’s chief executive from the rank of dean to director. Dykstra told the Regents that for the present he personally would retain the decision-making authority of the director’s office. Dykstra also explained that the “acting” label was necessary because further administrative changes might be made after the study of the Extension Division and Agricultural Extension was completed.^[17] In the end, however, a merger did not occur, primarily because of a lack of enthusiasm for it among the principals. Even the academic departments, finally, did not support a merger, because they feared they might somehow lose rather than gain money and authority.^[18]

President Dykstra’s resignation in October 1944 to become provost of the University of California at Los Angeles also contributed to the demise of the merger discussions. Professor Edwin Broun Fred was appointed as Dykstra’s successor in January 1945. President Fred had thirty years’ experience at the University of Wisconsin as both a faculty member and an administrator. Most significantly for the Extension Division and the Centers, as Dean of the College of Agriculture at the time of his appointment, he brought a thorough knowledge of the University’s outreach programs to his new office. Fred definitely did not favor a merger. He took quick action to end speculation about their futures when, in February 1945, he recommended that Adolfson be named Director of the Extension Division. The Regents unanimously concurred.^[19]

Shortly thereafter, Adolfson delivered an address which focused entirely on the freshman-sophomore program. This speech clearly marked an end to the months of anxiety and indecision regarding the Centers’ future. Adolfson predicted steady growth for the Extension Centers’ college credit program because it provided many advantages. For instance, the Centers had ably carried out the Wisconsin Idea by extending college opportunities across the state at an almost ridiculously low cost. Adolfson also pointed out that both public and private colleges benefitted from the program when successful students continued their education, because without the Freshman-Sophomore Centers many of these young people would never have enrolled.^[20] Adolfson’s confident appraisal of the Centers appeared to be confirmed by the state legislature in September 1945 when it overrode Governor Walter Goodland’s veto of a bill that lowered the Centers’ fees to the level charged in Madison.

This important victory, however, came only after decades of struggle. In the 1930s, when the University had first offered off-campus credit courses, the legislature had concurred with a Regents’ recommendation that these courses be completely self-supporting; the inevitable result had been a higher fee for any course not taught in Madison. In addition, as the legislature had increased the amount that the Extension Division had to contribute to its budget, the rates had steadily climbed. During debate in the 1943 session, testimony by Extension spokesmen revealed that while fees in Madison in both Letter and Science and Engineering were capped at $48.00 per semester, a student enrolled in the Milwaukee Center would pay from $150.00 to $203.00 for Letters and Science courses and from $193.00 to $274.00 for a full-time engineering program.^[21]

During the hard economic circumstances of the 1930s, periodic attempts had been made to equalize the fees between Madison and the rest of the state. The sudden inability of many families to send their sons and daughters to Madison no doubt increased support for such a decision, as did general acceptance of the ideal of economic democracy which many New Deal programs promoted. Many now believed that access to public institutions of higher education should not be limited to the children of the well-to-do. Despite this increased support, the unequal fees had remained.

The 1943 session, which the Republicans dominated, rapidly passed a bill sponsored by the Assembly Committee on Education which stated that when Center courses were substantially the same as those offered at Madison, then “. . . the rates of tuition charged to the students at such extension center or other place of instruction shall be no higher than the rates of tuition charged for such courses at Madison.”^[22] The impetus for this measure came from within the legislature, rather than from the Board of Regents. Indeed, in February 1943, the Regents had declined to consider a communication from the University Board of Visitors which emphasized that an injustice was being done to the students at the Milwaukee Center by charging them substantially higher tuition.^[23]

Despite strong support by his Republican colleagues in the legislature, Governor Goodland had vetoed the bill. In his veto message, he argued that the legislature should not interfere with the Regents’ prerogative to set university fees. Goodland also expressed the fear that the sharp drop in income would compel Extension to curtail other programs to keep the Freshman Centers open, because the Education Committee had not proposed an increase in state aid to replace the lost revenue. The Milwaukee Journal printed the text of the veto message; then four days later it blasted both the Governor’s and Regents’ actions in a long editorial. The editor insisted that the Regents had had sufficient time to equalize the fees and that the legislature acted only when it was clear that the Regents did not intend to exercise their power. Therefore, Goodland’s claim that his veto was necessary to preserve the Regents’ prerogative was specious and the paper urged the legislators to override the Governor’s decision. The real tragedy in all this, the editorial said, was that students who could not afford to attend Madison in the first place were being penalized by “severely” higher fees. The piece concluded with the pithy observation that the Regents were using their fee-setting authority to insure the continued supremacy of the Madison campus.^[24] The legislators, however, made no attempt at an override, evidently because they agreed that the bill should have specified how the income shortfall would be covered.

In February 1945 another attempt at fee equalization began. The Board of Regents, bowing to heavy public and political pressure, now supported the proposal if the legislature agreed to increase the state aids. The Board estimated that it would need an additional $60,000 for the rest of 1945, $90,000 for 1946, and at least $150,000 annually thereafter. But the victory did not come easily. Goodland again vetoed the bill. He claimed that its cost to the taxpayers was excessive and that it was primarily a “Milwaukee bill.” The Milwaukee Journal again ripped the Governor for refusing to sign. The editor reminded his readers that all communities with Centers would benefit from the measure and, furthermore, they deserved to benefit because they were providing the facilities used by the Extension Division. This time the legislators overrode the veto and a new, equal tuition rate was in effect when classes opened in September 1945.^[25]

During that same summer (1945), the university administrators began to discuss how the anticipated post-war leap in enrollment could be accommodated. A large number of the new students would be veterans who would take advantage of the generous terms of the G.I. Bill of Rights. Some of these enrollees, no doubt, would have already earned college credits through USAFI. Another source of aspiring scholars was the ever increasing number of high school graduates. The percentage of secondary school graduates who attended college had been steadily rising in response to changes in the employment market, where the greatest number of new positions existed in occupations that required some type of post-secondary training. A third factor influencing the trend toward larger college enrollments was the massive federal and state aid for college education. Wisconsin had also consistently aided its students by keeping its tuition and fees as low as possible.^[26]

The planning continued throughout the 1945-1946 academic year, when the total UW enrollment leaped from 7,779 in the fall to 12,429 in the spring semester. In March 1946 in a speech in Racine, President Fred explained that “[The influx of veterans] is a problem that can only be solved by establishing more university centers throughout the state.”^[27] A major component of the plan, then, was to keep as many freshmen as possible away from Madison by greatly expanding the number of Centers. In the early summer of 1946, Fred directed Adolfson to provide courses for at least 4,000 new freshmen, divided evenly between Milwaukee and the outstate communities.^[28]

Consequently, the Extension Division staff worked furiously during that summer to set up additional centers. Because many more communities expressed an interest in hosting a freshman program than would be needed, a procedure was quickly developed to determine which invitations should be accepted. Whenever possible, an Extension representative visited a potential host community to meet with its leaders to assess whether a Center could enroll enough students and to evaluate the proposed facilities. Thirty-four centers had been established by the time classes began in the fall of 1946. Five of these were located in Milwaukee, where the downtown Extension Center operated satellites in South Milwaukee, Shorewood, Wauwatosa, and West Allis. The rest were scattered across the state, from Marinette in the northeast to Rice Lake in the northwest and from Janesville in the south to Rhinelander in the north. Naturally, the majority of the out-state Centers were clustered in the southeastern corner because almost half of the state’s citizens lived there. The sparsely settled northwest quarter was served by a lightly enrolled circuit of Ladysmith, Rice Lake, and Spooner.^[29]

The burgeoning enrollment created many problems. To staff all of the classrooms, the University recruited faculty from all over the United States and encouraged Wisconsin housewives who had college degrees to teach for a few semesters. Despite the urgency to find instructors, only teachers with solid academic credentials received President Fred’s approval. Fred upheld his high standards by insisting that each departmental leader “. . . show me that the teacher at any one of these extension centers is fully qualified to teach and that if you had the funds, you’d be glad to have the individual on your staff.”^[30] Unless the chairman was willing to sign a statement to this effect, Fred refused to approve the appointment.

Because veterans swelled enrollments in all types of post-secondary schools, Extension found itself pushed out of some of the vocational school rooms it had traditionally used. When this happened, makeshift arrangements were hastily made. In Green Bay, for example, a temporary elementary school that had been used by munitions workers’ children at the Badger Ordinance Works near Baraboo was moved and pressed into service. Because of its flimsily-constructed walls, it quickly became known as “Cardboard Tech.” In Milwaukee, surplus barracks were moved near the main building and used as temporary classrooms. Center students in Merrill again ended up meeting in the City Hall, even in the council chamber. Textbooks were in short supply, too, even though the foresighted Extension Director of Teaching, Wilbur Hanley, had placed orders as early as the previous March. The nation’s publishing houses just could not meet the tremendous demand, even by operating around the clock.^[31]

One of the many problems caused by the tremendous leap in enrollments was a severe shortage of student housing and classrooms in Madison. This shortage, which obviously would not ease in just one year, inspired some Milwaukee Center sophomores to petition for a relaxation of the 60 credit rule, which required them to take their junior and senior years at Madison. The Regents had imposed the 60 credit rule in 1895 on correspondence courses taken for college credit and it had been extended in 1906 to any college course taken “in absentia.” Like the tuition inequity issue, this was not a new concern and during the 1943-44 academic year a Madison Subcommittee on Transfer of Credits had made an extensive study which underscored how seriously the rule disadvantaged students transferring from the Milwaukee Center. For instance, Milwaukee students often needed just one more course to fill out their program; but if that course would put them over 60 credits, they were advised to take “any course” at Marquette because the limit was not stringently applied to Marquette’s courses. In other instances, transfer students had been compelled to retake a course in Madison with the same instructor who had taught the class in Milwaukee!^[32]

Upon receiving the petition, President Fred sought Director Adolfson’s advice. Adolfson agreed that the 60 credit rule should generally be retained because the Milwaukee facility lacked adequate laboratory space for advanced science courses. However, he recommended that the rule be waived in special cases and that transferring Extension students be given preference in the assignment of University housing. Subsequently, President Fred directed the executive committees of the various colleges to review carefully appeals of the credit limitation and to grant waivers to individuals who could not find housing in Madison and who also could enroll in appropriate junior level courses in Milwaukee.^[33] Both the School of Commerce and the School of Engineering implemented the President’s suggestion for individual appeals during the 1946-47 year. In May of 1946 the School of Commerce proposed a general waiver for a few courses in Milwaukee of “sufficient degree of advancement”; the Regents concurred, with the stipulation that the waiver would expire once the housing crunch had eased. Engineering students, however, were not so fortunate. All they obtained, even after travelling en masse to Madison to confront President Fred and Engineering Dean Morton Withey, was permission to take up to 12 non-lab credits beyond their sophomore year.^[34]

As a consequence of the debate over the 60 credit rule and in view of predictions that college enrollments would continue to rise, the question of merging the Milwaukee Center with the city’s State Teacher’s College to create a new four-year institution arose. In response a committee was established on the Madison campus to study the issue. In early 1948, it recommended that the two schools be merged and operated as a liberal arts college under the control of the University of Wisconsin. The committee also decided that the new institution should offer only undergraduate courses. The entire discussion came to an abrupt end when the Teachers College Regents unanimously opposed this suggestion because they wanted to control the merged institution. For the moment, then, the issue was dropped.^[35]

The great bulge in enrollment created by the returning veterans passed quickly through the freshman centers. Thus even while the Extension Division operated thirty-four centers during the 1946-47 academic year, plans were made to reduce sharply the number for the following fall. Budget considerations also entered into the discussions because the enrollment in some Centers had fallen off drastically between semesters, largely due to drop-outs and academic dismissals. In April 1947 President Fred appointed a Committee on Extension Centers to provide advice on which centers should be continued. The members decided that a center should be kept open only when “. . . the enrollment would warrant a substantially full-time resident staff.”^[36] The Committee expressed the hope that the Centers left open would be large enough, also, to be provided with minimum laboratory and library facilities and with adequate counseling services and social activities. As a general rule, the members believed an enrollment of at least one hundred was necessary. After several meetings, the Committee recommended that just ten out-state Centers remain open, in addition to Milwaukee and its four suburban satellites.^[37]

When he was informed of this decision, Adolfson wrote Fred that he anticipated some sharp criticism from several of the communities whose Centers would not be continued and he noted, in particular, that there would be no Center in the northwestern part of the state. Adolfson suggested that the Committee on Extension Centers reconsider its recommendations in the light of his observations and in view of the University’s commitment to serving the entire state. Subsequently the Committee, by the narrow majority of one, added three centers (New Richmond, Spooner, Rice Lake) in the western part of the state. Just before the June 1947 Regents meeting, at which these recommendations would be ratified, Adolfson made a last minute plea to the president to add Antigo and Janesville. He pointed out that Antigo was the second oldest Center, preceded only by Milwaukee, and that it could be operated rather inexpensively in connection with Wausau and Rhinelander. Indeed adding Antigo to that circuit would allow the curriculum to be expanded a bit. Adolfson favored keeping Janesville open for political reasons. He had learned that some leading Janesville citizens were considering seriously the development of a junior college if their Center was closed. President Fred’s recommendation, which the Board of Regents unanimously approved, included Antigo but not Janesville.^[38]

Thus, in the fall of 1947 the Extension Division operated a total of nineteen Centers–five in Milwaukee and fourteen outside the metropolis. In a report to the President’s office Wilbur Hanley, the Director of Extension Teaching, indicated that some important changes had been made at several Centers. Sophomore courses had been added at eight of the out-state sites–Fond du Lac, Green Bay, Kenosha, Manitowoc, Marinette, Menasha, Sheboygan, and Wausau–in response to petitions from students. Hanley noted that veterans made up half of the Centers’ student body, compared to two-thirds the previous year. Full-time Extension Center Directors had been appointed at Green Bay, Marinette, and Wausau because the field representatives could no longer adequately supervise their operations. These three administrators were the first appointed outside Milwaukee and marked the growing confidence that the out-state Centers would continue to be an integral part of the University’s service to college students.^[39]

These decisions had been made in the midst of a broad debate over the future shape of post-secondary education in Wisconsin. The focal point of the discussion was John Guy Fowlkes’ and Henry Ahrnsbrak’s report, “Junior College Needs in Wisconsin.” This study had been authorized by the Regents in May 1945, when it was clear that the war would end fairly soon and that the University must be prepared to help shape the state’s higher education system. Legislators were keenly interested in the study because of their concern about the ever-increasing share of the state budget claimed by the various post-secondary programs. Fowlkes and Ahrnsbrak carefully reviewed how each segment of the state-supported higher education establishment–vocational schools. State Teachers Colleges, and the University and its Extension services–had evolved. They then confronted the basic question: did Wisconsin need a system of junior colleges, two-year schools which would offer both transferable college credit courses and non-transferable vocational programs? Their answer was a very qualified “yes.” They suggested that junior colleges could be created in seven Extension Center cities by adding a vocational component to the existing college credit program, but they also noted that each campus would have to be constructed from scratch to assure the proper facilities. This recommendation was much discussed but no decisive action was taken to implement it by either the University Regents or the legislature. No doubt the great expense of the undertaking caused the report to be quietly shelved, but Fowlkes’ and Ahrnsbrak’s work would repeatedly surface as the state continued to wrestle with how best to provide for the post-high school educational needs of its citizens.^[40]

In the spring of 1948 the Extension Division leaders again turned to the hard work of determining which Centers should remain open the following academic year. The task was made more difficult because the number of potential students continued to decline. The strong post-war economy, fueled by the need to rebuild Europe and Japan, provided high school graduates with many job opportunities. More entering freshman could now afford to go directly to Madison, too. Because of the Cold War and the looming threat of conflict with the Soviet Union, the draft still inducted many males and some men chose to volunteer, so that they could select a branch of the service. Consequently, the pool of veterans who would begin college studies in the fall of 1948 also continued to shrink.

In mid-April 1948 Adolfson recommended to the President that just ten Centers (Fond du Lac, Green Bay, Kenosha, Manitowoc, Marinette, Menasha, Milwaukee, Racine, Sheboygan, Wausau) should be continued. Subsequently the Regents set up a study committee which visited several of the cities to assess the sentiment toward the Centers. As a result of these surveys and in response to urgent appeals from several communities whose programs were slated to be dropped, the Regents added seven sites to Adolfson’s list. Consequently, Antigo and Rhinelander retained their strictly freshman programs and Marshfield was also added to the Wausau circuit. The Janesville Center was reopened, despite strong objections from the nearby State Teachers College at Whitewater. The study committee, mindful of the promise of the Wisconsin Idea, rescued the small freshman course operations at Rice Lake and Spooner. Ladysmith was added in the hope that this northwest Wisconsin circuit would attract at least one hundred students and pay its own way.^[41]

The ability of the Centers to pay their own way had become very important. When the state lowered the Center students’ fees to the Madison level in 1945, the legislators had also placed all the UW state aid in Madison’s budget. Consequently, the University would be compelled to make up any difference between income and expenses at the Extension Centers. This meant that the Centers’ fiscal affairs received additional scrutiny from main campus officials who wanted to assure that Madison did not subsidize the Centers.

Actually, as Adolfson and Extension’s other spokesmen often pointed out, the state received a bargain in supporting the Centers because the host communities paid for the facilities, utilities, and janitorial services. Normally, the Extension Center shared an existing building with a vocational school or a normal school. In mid-1945, however, the City of Racine had offered to provide a remodeled school for the sole use of the Extension Division and suggested that the University should pay for the utilities and upkeep. Although this seemed a fair proposition, Adolfson cautioned against accepting it because other Center towns would then demand similar treatment. The negotiations with Racine took on added urgency when the Marathon County Board offered the old normal school in Wausau to Extension for its exclusive use. By the time a policy was worked out in March 1948, Green Bay and Brown County had also joined the discussions. The 1948 Regent policy both confirmed the past practices and established important new provisions. When a Center shared a building with a vocational or normal school, the University would continue to provide the instructional and administrative services and the instructional supplies, while the community paid for the utilities and janitor’s salary. But when a city or county provided separate quarters exclusively for Extension, the Regents agreed to supply all the furniture for the classrooms, laboratories, and offices and underwrite the expense of operating the facility. This policy committed the University more firmly to the continuation of the Extension Centers, especially those which now had their own building.^[42]

This policy and an enrollment decline in September 1948 at the Oshkosh State Teachers College may have prompted its President, Forrest Polk, to exclaim loudly that the Centers at Fond du Lac and Menasha were drawing students away from Oshkosh. In fact, Polk asserted these Centers were unnecessary because the Teachers College provided the same courses. After several personal conferences, Director Adolfson and President Polk agreed to have a special committee conduct a survey of the students attending the Fond du Lac Center and of graduating seniors in that Center’s drawing area to determine the validity of Polk’s complaints.

The survey definitely did not support Polk’s allegations. The forty-four Center students who responded to the survey indicted that, had the Fond du Lac option not been available, they would have chosen to attend Madison over Oshkosh. The high school seniors who intended to go to college echoed this finding: twenty-four chose the Center, nineteen preferred Madison, and only six selected Oshkosh.^[43] Meanwhile, Polk expanded his allegation of unfair and unnecessary competition to include the freshman-sophomore programs in Manitowoc, Sheboygan, Marinette, and Wausau. This complaint caused Dr. Robert Doremus, Assistant Dean of the College of Letters and Science, to write to Adolfson. Doremus said, “. . ., it seems ridiculous to expect every existing institution such as Oshkosh must be surrounded by a sterile no man’s land just that it can’t possibly lose a student to some other place.” Doremus observed that, following Polk’s line of reasoning, the University of Wisconsin could argue that all the State Teachers Colleges were unnecessary competition because the UW existed first!^[44] Evidently because the survey results so decisively refuted his claims, President Polk refused to sign the committee report and he also forbade his Dean of Instruction, who had been a member of the committee, to sign it. By the fall of 1949 the controversy was practically forgotten, but it was indicative of increasing friction between the University and the State Teachers Colleges in the constant struggle to secure students and state aid.

The survey of the Fond du Lac students also provided the first extensive data about Centers’ clientele and their families. The typical student was a male who had graduated in the second quartile of his class. He was undecided about his ultimate educational goal, but had narrowed the choices to the liberal arts or professional training. He received, on the average, direct financial support from his family of $100.00 to $400.00 per academic year. He worked about fifteen hours per week. Many of the students hoped to save enough by attending an Extension Center to finance most of the Junior year expenses in Madison. Of course, some males received G.I. benefits. The students’ fathers generally held managerial positions or worked in skilled occupations. Mothers normally were not employed outside the home. A significant number indicated that they were the first members of their families to attend college.^[45]

One of the students’ persistent complaints had been that the Centers provided few of the extracurricular activities found at Madison. But this situation began to change in the late forties, thanks to a larger enrollment and the presence of veterans. The veterans proved to be self-starters who pitched in, organized activities, and sought out a faculty sponsor. The veterans who were elected to student government offices persuaded their classmates to assess themselves activity fees to provide modest support for social and athletic events. By the end of the decade, four inter-center activities had been founded: a Student Leadership Conference for present and prospective student government officers; a Music Festival that featured both instrumental and vocal performances; a Forensics Tournament with competition in discussion, original oratory, and interpretive reading; and a basketball league that included the team from the Milwaukee Center.^[46]

At the close of the forties, the Extension Centers seemed well established in Milwaukee and nine out-state communities. Buildings (for Extension’s exclusive use) had been provided in Racine, Wausau, and Green Bay. Indeed, in these cases, a formal agreement had been achieved between the communities and the University, which specified how the expenses would be shared. The achievement of fee parity had significantly boosted morale among the Centers’ administrators and faculty and made attendance at a Center more affordable. Already, demographers were plotting the size of the postwar “baby boom” who would reach college age during the 1960s and whose numbers would surpass the capacity of all the public post-secondary educational institutions in the state. University and State College officials and the state’s politicians took careful note of this prediction and began to plan how to accommodate the next generation of students.