page_title: James M. Hamilton
section_title: Montana State University
hierarchical_section_title: James M. Hamilton / Montana State University
caption_attribution_description: English: Looking north-northeast at Hamilton Hall on the campus of Montana State University in Bozeman, Montana. Hamilton Hall was built in 1910 as a women's dormitory. Omnipresent local architect Fred Willson designed the four-and-a-half story structure in the Mission Revival style. It was named for Emma Hamilton, wife of MSU President James Hamilton, who died in 1909. For years, it was the only on-campus student residence available. It had no room numbers; every room was named for the first woman to live there. Men were barred from any area except the lobby. Any time a man came to call on a young woman, a bell would ring on her floor and she would have to come down to meet him. In summer 1943, Hamilton Hall housed about 100 women training for military nursing duty. The nurses were moved into empty frat houses (all the young men were at war), and Hamilton Hall was used by young men training for the U.S. Army Air Corps. Hamilton Hall was turned into offices in 1967. It was almost demolished in the 1980s, after university officials considered a plan to build an underground museum and office tower on the site. In 2009, Hamilton Hall underwent a $1 million structural stabilization and renovation project. Additional structural problems were discovered, and another $2 million added to the budget. The foundations and interior wood framing for the first and second floors were completely demolished. An additional four feet of soil beneath the building was excavated, and a new concrete foundation installed that met current earthquake standards. A new steel frame was installed on the first and second floors, and the floor structures attached to the exterior brick walls to enhance earthquake survivability. The first and second floors were restored to historic accuracy, removing interior alterations made over the years. Structural reinforcements were also made to the second, third, and fourth floors (all of which were sagging). At some point, the structure's original north stairs were removed and modern stairs constructured. The modern stairs were now removed, and a historically accurate replacement installed. The renovation also cleaned, repaired, repointed, and sealed the exterior masonry; replaced the 1910 single-pane windows and doors with energy efficient ones in a historic style; replaced the electrical, HVAC, and mechanical systems; and made landscaping changes to improve drainage and prevent water infiltration into the foundation. As of 2013, Hamilton Hall houses Gallatin College (a community college within the college) and the Air Force and Army ROTC programs. A ghost allegedly haunts Hamilton Hall's fourth floor.
context_page_description: James McClellan Hamilton was an American historian and economist who was the third president of Montana State University. He served from 1904 to 1919. A group of historians named Hamilton one of Montana State's four most important presidents in 2011.
context_section_description: The Montana State Board of Education appointed Hamilton to be President of what was then known as the Agricultural College of the State of Montana (now Montana State University). The first president, Augustus M. Ryon, had only served for a year before coming into significant conflict with faculty and local businesspeople who disagreed with his intent to build a technology-oriented engineering school. His successor, the Rev. Dr. James R. Reid, was a Presbyterian minister and educator who rapidly expanded enrollment, obtained a campus, and oversaw the construction of the college's first two buildings—the Agricultural Experiment Station (now known as Taylor Hall) and the Main Building (now known as Montana Hall). Reid was determined, however, to stop students from dancing, drinking, gambling, playing cards, and soliciting prostitutes (common distractions in a frontier town like Bozeman), and his constant anti-vice campaign took a significant toll on his health.  He resigned in 1904.
  Hamilton's governance style was unlike the authoritarian Reid.  He was friendly and outgoing, which made him popular among state legislators, local Bozemanites, and students, but he was also a decisive leader who rarely deviated from a course of action (once decided upon). He was also interested in ensuring that Montana State adopted the most modern educational models available, and he traveled widely in Europe in 1912 in order to keep abreast of ongoing changes in European institutions of higher education.
  Determined to make the college into a school of technology, Hamilton rapidly expanded the curriculum in areas such as biology, chemistry, engineering, geology, and physics. He also devised the school motto, "Education for Efficiency", which the college continued to use until the 1990s. Further marking this change in direction, the school was officially renamed the Montana College of Agriculture and Mechanic Arts in 1913 (although that name was in widespread use as early as 1894). The college's first great rapid expansion of physical plant also began under Hamilton. Constructed during this time were Linfield Hall (1908), Hamilton Hall (1910), and Traphagen Hall (1919). Hamilton Hall was named for Mrs. Emma Hamilton, the popular and vivacious president's wife who died on August 12, 1909. The giant whitewashed "M" on the side of the Mount Baldy in the foothills of the Bridger Range was first built in 1916, and in 1917 ROTC came to campus for the first time.
  Hamilton married Florence Ballinger, an instructor in the Department of Home Economics, on August 21, 1918.
  When World War I ended in 1919, Hamilton resigned as president of the college.  He argued that a younger man (he was 58 years old by now) should take over. Hamilton accepted the position of Dean of Men in addition to resuming his teaching duties in the Department of Economics.
caption: Hamilton Hall on the MSU Campus, named for Emma Hamilton, wife of MSU President James Hamilton
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