Lorado Taft Field Campus

The Lorado Taft Field Campus has served as Northern Illinois University’s Outdoor Education Center since 1954. This facility enabled teachers, youth leaders and students to learn in the outdoors. Located next to Lowden Memorial State Park, near Oregon, Illinois, this campus has been an excellent resource for the study of natural ecosystems and the impact people have on them. It was named for Lorado Taft, one of the founders of the Eagle’s Nest Association, and a well-known sculptor. The history of the campus can be traced back to the 1893 Columbian Exposition held in Chicago. It brought together a group of artists who enjoyed each others company, and thereafter wished to spend summers together. Their first summer home was at Bass Lake, Indiana, but several years later an outbreak of malaria caused the group to search for a new location. In 1898 Chicago Attorney Wallace Heckman agreed to lease fifteen acres of his summer estate near Oregon, Ganymede Farm, to the group for one dollar a year as long as one of the original members of the group lived. Calling themselves the Eagle’s Nest Association after a prominent cedar tree that once held an eagle’s nest, their summer camp became known as the Eagle’s Nest Art Colony. The Eagle’s Nest Association included Lorado Taft; Charles Francis Browne, landscape painter; Ralph Elmer Clarkson, portrait painter; James Spencer Dickerson, newspaper editor; Clarence Dickinson, organist and composer; Horace Spencer Fiske, poet, editor and lecturer; Henry Brown Fuller, novelist; Hamlin Garland, essayist and novelist; Oliver Dennett Grover, landscape painter; Irving K. and Allen B. Pond, architects; and Nellie Walker, sculptor. Browne and Garland were married to sisters of Taft. The first permanent structure was Poley House, built by the Pond brothers, which served at the dining and recreation center. It was followed by Taft’s home, and nine other buildings. Families and friends often visited the camp. The annual Labor Day processions to the Heckman House to pay the one dollar rent brought out the humor in the group, as they dressed in costume and made the event a real celebration. Lorado Taft’s massive concrete statue of an Indian was dedicated on July 1, 1911. It came to be known as the “Blackhawk” statue and still stands overlooking the Rock River. Lorado Taft, the guiding spirit of the camp, died in 1936. Following the death of the last surviving member, Ralph Clarkson, in 1942 the land reverted back to the Heckman estate. The property was purchased by the state of Illinois for a park. In DeKalb on May 13, 1949. Dr. Leslie A. Holmes in his inaugural address as President of Northern Illinois State Teachers College advocated the establishment of a field study camp. Two years later, on August 7, 1951 Governor Adlai Stevenson signed a bill which transferred sixty-six acres of Lowden Memorial State Park to Northern, which named the campus after the founder of the Eagle’s Nest Association, Lorado Taft. Paul Harrison, Assistant Professor of Industrial Arts at N.I.S.T.C. was asked to supervise the restoration of the buildings, which occupied the property. In the spring of 1954 three buildings were ready for use, Browne, Poley and Taft. On June 1, Harrison was appointed Director of the field campus, and in July the first class of senior elementary education majors came to Taft for three weeks of training. The first class of students, sixth graders from Northern’s McMurry Lab School, spent a week at Taft later that Fall. In the Spring of 1963 a Masters degree in Outdoor Education was approved by the Teachers College Board. Mr. Harrison retired as director at the end of August 1965, and the newly completed dining hall was named in his honor. Dr. Donald R. Hammerman, program director since 1954, became the new Taft Field Campus director on September 1. Just a few weeks later, on October 8, 1965, seventy-five additional acres of land were purchased, expanding the campus to 141 acres. Heckman Dormitory was completed in April 1971, and upgrading of facilities has continued over the years. During a high wind in 1972 the aged Eagle’s Nest Tree fell, and was placed in the garden setting near the heart of the campus. The Instructional Materials Center, replaced the original library, and held the collection of materials related to outdoor and environmental education until it was closed in the summer of 2000. Hammerman stepped down as director of the Taft Field Campus in 1979, but continued his work there until the summer of 1991 when he retired after 37 years. Malcolm Swan followed as acting director, and on January 1, 1980 Dr. Clifford Knapp was appointed director. He was followed by John Saunders in 1982, Michael Pitzen in 1983, and Robert Helmkamp in 1988. Dale Hoppe has been director since 1990. On June 30, 2000, the College of Education ended its relationship with the Lorado Taft Field Campus. As a result of this change the Taft Campus now operates under the authority of the Provost’s Office. Outdoor Teacher Education faculty were reassigned to DeKalb, and Northern’s elementary education students no longer come to Taft Campus for a residential practicum. However, Lorado Taft Field Campus continues to offer environmental education programs to over 6,000 area schoolchildren and their teachers each year, as well as conference opportunities to nearly 4,000 people of all ages from NIU’s service area and beyond. Hoppe continues to serve as Director of the Lorado Taft Field Campus.

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