Oregon Tech "Firsts"

• First Campus: 822 acres – began 1947 – Oregon Vocational School (OVS). Former Marine Barracks – 80 buildings – 3 miles from downtown
• First day of class: Tuesday, July 15, 1947.Thirty-three students in: Auto mechanics, commercial cooking, & automotive body & fender
• First Faculty Senate formed: 1965
• First name: Oregon Vocational School (OVS).Changed 12-21-48 by State Board of Education to Oregon Technical Institute (OTI). “Eliminates an unfortunate connotation with penal institutions”. First use of name Oregon Institute of Technology – 1973.
• The early curriculum included the classes of gun-smithing, baking and commercial cooking, clock and watch repair, dry cleaning, silk screening, auto mechanics, refrigeration servicing, and many others. A class was established when ten students requested it
• First basketball team: “The Owls” entered competition Fall, 1947
• First OVS football team practices – early September 1948- Kiwanis Park in the Mills Addition
• First Dean of Students: Robert L. Smith 1947-61
• First “periodical newspaper for the campus titled The Owl” – was first printed in November, 1948
• First annual commencement exercises were held: June 24, 1949. 233 grads.208 were vets; 15 not. Senator. Harry Boivin spoke
• First catalog issued: 9-3-49; 64 pages; 4,000 copies
• First approval of OTI as acceptable school for scholarships by Daly Scholarship Fund of Lakeview - June 10, 1950 – meant first college-level designation for OTI
• First textbook by Oregon Tech Faculty: 1956, authored by Hagen and Jacobi, on X-ray Technology
• Landmark decision by State Board of Education in 1957: “The Klamath Falls School was to have the same relationship to the Board that State Colleges and Universities had to the Board of Higher Education”
• First Associate Degree to be granted in Applied Science approved by State Board of Education, December 10-11, 1957
• First choice and purchase of new campus site, 6-13-60
• First shovelful of dirt: State Senator Harry Boivin 8-19-1961
• First two buildings to be built: Semon & Owens Hall
• Regional accreditation: 12-7-1962
• Landmark: “Formal dedication of the Nation’s newest college campus” by Governor Mark Hatfield, October 26, 1964
• First BT degree approved 10-12-1966, in Engineering Technologies: Civil, Electrical, Mechanical
• First Honor Society: Omega Pi, local - 4-29-1968
• Law changing name to Oregon Institute of Technology first became effective October 5, 1973
• First President after Dr. Purvine: Dr. Kenneth F. Light,1976
• First approval for a baccalaureate degree: 1968
• First summer sessions began in the mid-fifties
• First Faculty Charter: 2-3-1970
• First Student Council began 8-1947
• First Homecoming Queen: 1949, Gale Bachman
• First Bachelor’s Degree: Bachelor of Technology, in Engineering Technology – “BT” - 1966-1979
• First computerization of Campus between 1983 and 1992, promoted by President Blake
• First regional accreditation as “a specialized higher institution” in 1962
• Oregon Tech’s radio station, KTEC, went on the air for the first time 12-19-1950
• New swimming pool completed end of 1983 academic year
• First Master's Degree: in the Fall of 1995, Oregon Tech introduces a Master of Science in Engineering Technology program, with specialization in Computer Engineering Technology.

Resources on Oregon Tech’s history

Oregon Institute of Technology, 1947-1997, The First Fifty Years, vol. 11 of the Journal of the Shaw Historical Library, (1997)

OVS, OTI, Oregon Tech: OREGON TECH’S FIRST 30 YEARS, 1946 – 1976 by Winston D. Purvine

The Owler, OIT’s yearbook from 1950 to 1983. Copies are available for use at through the University Archives and in the Shaw Historical Library.