Our focus this week is the decade 1913-1922, during which Elizabeth Stetson, Countess of Santa Eulalia, joined the Board of Trustees of John B. Stetson University, becoming the first female board member in 1913. In 1915, the Eloise Chimes, commissioned from the McShane Bell Foundry Co. of Baltimore, were installed in the cupola of Elizabeth Hall, beginning a long tradition of the ringing of the 11 bells on campus which lasted until 2005. This decade also witnessed the Great War, later referred to as World War I, with many students and faculty participating in the war effort. Even John B. Stetson, Jr., the oldest son of our university benefactor John B. and a University Trustee himself, was a pilot in the war. The university continued to grow in size despite the war, and judging by the yearbooks of that era, students enjoyed themselves with music, athletics, fraternities and sororities, theater, and various clubs, in addition to their studies.

Photographs and commentary courtesy of Stetson University, DeLand, Florida.