{"id":2,"ordinal":0,"modified":"2026-09-18 18:24:23","content_modified":"2026-09-18 18:24:23","featured":1,"title":"Reckoning with the legacy of Southwestern's racial history","creator":null,"description":"<p>Southwestern was formed and located in Georgetown, Texas, in 1873 by consolidating four Methodist \"Root Colleges\"--Rutersville, McKenzie, Soule, and Wesleyan--into Texas University, which was eventually renamed Southwestern University. Francis Asbury Mood, the first Regent of Southwestern, and the one credited with making the consolidation happen, locating the school in Georgetown, and designing the seal and motto, is central to this story.   In case you are confused about how a school founded in 1873 also claims to have been chartered in 1840, our current claim to be Texas' first university is derived from the first of the Root Colleges, Rutersville College, which was chartered by the Republic of Texas in 1840, and whose charter was transferred to Southwestern at its founding.  Although Southwestern's origin stories use this history to authorize our claim to longevity, this claim ignores the ongoing problematic legacies carried with it, as all four of the Root Colleges and Mood himself are entangled in the histories of settler colonialism, slavery, the Confederacy, and the White Southern elite's resistance to Reconstruction in Texas. The entries in this theme critically engage the ways that the characters and places in this story are actively remembered today in particular places on campus.</p>","postscript_text":"","tour_img":"https://placingmemory.southwestern.edu/files/fullsize/6049ddfb84e941f780a702ad02b3ca65.jpg","items":[{"id":119,"title":"Reading the Plaques on the Mood Obelisk","latitude":30.634362836719077449743053875863552093505859375,"longitude":-97.66694904046477176962071098387241363525390625,"thumbnail":"https://placingmemory.southwestern.edu/files/square_thumbnails/6049ddfb84e941f780a702ad02b3ca65.jpg","fullsize":"https://placingmemory.southwestern.edu/files/fullsize/6049ddfb84e941f780a702ad02b3ca65.jpg","subtitle":"What do you learn--and not learn--when you read the plaques on the F. A. Mood Obelisk in front of Mood-Bridwell?","address":null,"custom":{"subtitle":null,"text":null}},{"id":106,"title":"Who was H. C. Risner?","latitude":30.635059093913110217499706777743995189666748046875,"longitude":-97.665203423073762678541243076324462890625,"thumbnail":"https://placingmemory.southwestern.edu/files/square_thumbnails/839b7476f7460a49ebcc9a2fd7665db5.jpg","fullsize":"https://placingmemory.southwestern.edu/files/fullsize/839b7476f7460a49ebcc9a2fd7665db5.jpg","subtitle":"Uncovering the story of H. C. Risner and the deep roots of racial exclusion embedded in Southwestern's institutional culture","address":null,"custom":{"subtitle":null,"text":null}},{"id":82,"title":"Stepping on the Seal","latitude":30.6355252793253356458080816082656383514404296875,"longitude":-97.66517930764484844985418021678924560546875,"thumbnail":"https://placingmemory.southwestern.edu/files/square_thumbnails/d010636d956ba8d5c9644db31eb52de4.jpg","fullsize":"https://placingmemory.southwestern.edu/files/fullsize/d010636d956ba8d5c9644db31eb52de4.jpg","subtitle":"Southwestern's storied Seal contains a few more stories than most people realize.","address":null,"custom":{"subtitle":null,"text":null}},{"id":51,"title":"McKenzie Drive as memory place","latitude":30.635833916776249452595948241651058197021484375,"longitude":-97.66784529832494854417745955288410186767578125,"thumbnail":"https://placingmemory.southwestern.edu/files/square_thumbnails/fc1f29aff56de5d8222945f3f2430bf0.jpg","fullsize":"https://placingmemory.southwestern.edu/files/fullsize/fc1f29aff56de5d8222945f3f2430bf0.jpg","subtitle":"A campus street named for one of the root colleges with ties to Methodism, the Confederacy, and slavery.","address":null,"custom":{"subtitle":null,"text":null}},{"id":55,"title":"Wesleyan Drive as memory place","latitude":30.63626778890600377280861721374094486236572265625,"longitude":-97.66664364877937032360932789742946624755859375,"thumbnail":"https://placingmemory.southwestern.edu/files/square_thumbnails/6c5915620a6ecb44aeb3a7c6a4c9079a.jpg","fullsize":"https://placingmemory.southwestern.edu/files/fullsize/6c5915620a6ecb44aeb3a7c6a4c9079a.jpg","subtitle":"A street named for one of the root colleges, which itself was named for John Wesley, the founder of Methodism.","address":null,"custom":{"subtitle":null,"text":null}},{"id":54,"title":"Soule Drive as evolving space","latitude":30.634209186834286953171613276936113834381103515625,"longitude":-97.667083525757561801583506166934967041015625,"thumbnail":"https://placingmemory.southwestern.edu/files/square_thumbnails/b88547210184383a6410e3dfef91a6c9.jpg","fullsize":"https://placingmemory.southwestern.edu/files/fullsize/b88547210184383a6410e3dfef91a6c9.jpg","subtitle":"A space for social interaction with a twisted history","address":null,"custom":{"subtitle":null,"text":null}},{"id":53,"title":"Soule Drive as memory place","latitude":30.63421841833147851730245747603476047515869140625,"longitude":-97.66773799122842092401697300374507904052734375,"thumbnail":"https://placingmemory.southwestern.edu/files/square_thumbnails/814ef22a0fda650cc2758afa93918453.jpg","fullsize":"https://placingmemory.southwestern.edu/files/fullsize/814ef22a0fda650cc2758afa93918453.jpg","subtitle":"A street that remembers Soule University, with ties to the first medical college in Texas, Methodism, the Civil War, and the Confederacy","address":null,"custom":{"subtitle":null,"text":null}},{"id":57,"title":"Rutersville Drive as memory place","latitude":30.633904546932580359452913398854434490203857421875,"longitude":-97.6661286655729554695426486432552337646484375,"thumbnail":"https://placingmemory.southwestern.edu/files/square_thumbnails/956eabdc3579fbcb4c2a30760d2aebab.jpg","fullsize":"https://placingmemory.southwestern.edu/files/fullsize/956eabdc3579fbcb4c2a30760d2aebab.jpg","subtitle":"This street is named after Southwestern University’s earliest root institution and the first university chartered in Texas.","address":null,"custom":{"subtitle":null,"text":null}}]}