The College of Emporia, founded by the Presbyterian Synod of Kansas, existed from 1882 to 1974. Its first campus building, Stuart Hall, housed a bell presented by Major Calvin Hood to the college on September 1st, A.D. 1886. After Stuart Hall burned on Dec. 21, 1915, the bell was preserved and later mounted on a stone memorial on the campus by the classes of 1925 and 1928. For 50 years it symbolized the dedication, love, and loyalty of the college’s faculty and students, and it endured as a symbol of a century of faith, service, loyalty, and the fighting spirit of C. of E.