The University of Missouri is established on…
February 1839 CE
The act had been introduced by congressman James S. Rollins from Boone County and named after its author, Henry Geyer.
Rollins will become known as the "Father of the University of Missouri" in part because of his support in the bill's passage.
The act had been designed after Thomas Jefferson's plan for public education in Virginia.
Most of the act will be revoked by 1841 out of practicality, but still the foundations of public education in Missouri can be traced to the passage of the Geyer Act.
To secure the university, the citizens of Columbia and Boone County pledge $117,921 in cash and land to beat out five other central Missouri counties for the location of the state university.
The land on which the university will be constructed is just south of Columbia's downtown and owned by James S. Rollins.