History of the University

Ball State University was founded as Indiana State Normal School, Eastern Division, in 1918. Its antecedents, all housed in what is now the Ball State Administration Building, were also normal schools, owned and operated under various names. In 1918, the Ball brothers, a prominent Muncie industrial family, bought the property and donated it to the state of Indiana, which, in turn, transferred control of the school to the board of trustees of the Indiana State Normal School in Terre Haute. In 1922, in recognition of the generosity of the Ball brothers, the board added Ball Teachers College to the school’s name. In 1929, the Indiana General Assembly separated the two colleges, naming the Muncie campus Ball State Teachers College.

On February 8, 1965, the general assembly renamed the institution Ball State University in recognition of its phenomenal growth in enrollment and physical facilities; the variety and quality of its educational programs and services; and in anticipation of the much broader role it would be expected to assume in the future.