Midwestern State University Campus Tour

Midwestern State began in 1922 as Wichita Falls Junior College, sharing space with the city high school, and moved to this site on Taft Boulevard in 1937. Its red-brick, tile-roofed buildings with arched facades give the campus a unified Mediterranean look that has been carried through nearly a century of growth. Now part of the Texas Tech University System and billed as the state's public liberal arts university, MSU Texas makes for an easy walk from the original 1937 building to the quad, the student center, and the lake at the campus edge.

Midwestern State wears its history in red brick and clay tile. Since the junior college moved to Taft Boulevard in 1937, building after building has repeated the same arched, Mediterranean look, and this easy walk shows how a small Wichita Falls school grew into the state's public liberal arts university without losing its style.

The Hardin Administration Building, the heart of the 1937 campus, has a bell tower that became the university's emblem. A state historical marker recalls a harder chapter: the years when Willie Faye Battle and other graduates of Booker T. Washington High School were turned away, took the college district to court, and helped open the doors to the first African American students in 1954.

Campus lore adds some fun. Inside the Clark Student Center, students steer carefully around the university seal, since legend says anyone who walks across it won't graduate on time. The supposed cure is a quick dash to touch the Believers, a statue of three Mustangs standing for wisdom, courage and strength that's also a favorite backdrop for graduation photos. At the campus edge, Sikes Lake hosts the homecoming Cardboard Boat Race, where homemade vessels don't always stay afloat.

It's a short, rewarding look at a campus where architecture, civil rights history and student superstition share the same few blocks.