by PATTI VAN NOTE
J ohn Bowman had a dream, and he worked against odds to make that dream a reality. His dream was to start a public university in Kentucky.
His odds were an uninterested governor and an uninterested legislature. There were also odds against a nonsec-tarian education. Religious groups were engaging in power struggles, and they fought the idea of a state university. They nearly succeeded in killing the institution in its infancy.
And, there was a problem of timing. At the time of the Morrill Land Grant College Act in 1862, Kentucky was suffering invasion from the Union and Confederate armies.
But Bowman was determined he should have his way, and eventually obtained the land grant funds to establish a university.
In 1874, the Agricultural and Mechanical (AM) College as UK's early name came to be  was nearly ruined from a battle with denominational groups. Bowman was forgotten, and le-
gislature bowing to sectarian pressure, severed the A&M College from Kentucky University in 1878. The land grant A&M  College was left with neither land nor | grant  but it refused to die. |
The Morrill Act required military g training for all, so every student became a cadet. They turned out a 5:30 a.m. to reveille, and went to bed at 10 p.m. to taps. Demerits were given for untidy rooms and artillery practice was the most favorable part of their military life.
Yet in 1880, women entered Kentucky State College  as it was nicknamed. Only 43 enrolled, but it was a start. Their major: teaching.
The student body was predominantly male, but the girls made their pressure known. They organized the Philosophian Literary Society, whicji met on Friday nights for debates and candy pulls.
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BACKGROUND: Today, UK is not known as a military school, but on Wednesdays a few ROTC students may be spotted. LEFT: A group of men in the American Association of Engineers during 1923. BEHIND COPY: A 1920 photo of Buell Armory. OPP. PG., TOP: 1923 Home Economic students making the service flag. BOTTOM: The 1923 University of Kentucky military band.