Funding for this program has been provided in part by the Tiger Athletic Foundation.

The LSU's Alumni Association and the LSU Foundation, which are a part of the forever LSU campaign.

Additional funding has been provided by the Foundation for Excellence in Louisiana Public Broadcasting.

Going to LSU just opened up the world for me.

It doesn't matter how old you get, you have to come back because it's where your heart is.

That foundation at LSU provided me everything I needed for what I became.

In the early 19th century, the United States was still a very young agrarian nation in the South.

Society was divided between an elite upper class of wealthy planters, on the one hand, and on the other, a much larger group of ordinary farming families working hard to coax a living from the soil.

I think there was an assumption which remained true in Louisiana as late, really as late as the turn of the 20th century, and maybe even later than that.

That really only a small group of people at the top of society really needed education.

That changes in Louisiana, partially because people realize that the world has changed, and you got to have an education.

Within a few years of when Louisiana became a state in 1812, the federal government had granted 144mi² of land whose sale would endow seminaries or universities.

But education remained a relatively low priority, and the state did not break ground for a school until 1856.

Near Pineville, north of Alexandria.

What would one day become a diversified flagship university began instead as a small military academy.

Its first students, cadets.

The curriculum was modeled after that of the Virginia military Institute, a rigid but innovative protocol of learning designed to prepare the sons of plantation owners to become gentlemen and eventually good planters themselves.

The school's Board of Supervisors advertised for five faculty spots and received 81 applicants.

Among those chosen was David French Boyd, the future president of the school.

Boyd had been a student of the University of Virginia and later a successful teacher at Bossier Parishes prosperous Rocky Mount Area School.

The first superintendent of the new military Academy, however, was William Tecumseh Sherman, the general who a few years later marched over the ashes of Atlanta in the Civil War.

When Sherman arrived in the fall of 1859, one of the tasks that he was assigned was going downriver to New Orleans to actually get furniture, get books and other equipment that was needed to actually get the university running.

With a handful of students.

The school opened January 2nd, 1860 and was called the State Seminary of Learning.

The boys ranged in age from 14 to 21.

Most lacked education and apparently discipline.

The cadets were unhappy with the school's food, so chickens began disappearing from neighboring farms.

However, under General Sherman's firm hand, military rigor began to take hold.

Soon, the cadets mustered a new blue uniforms, and the school was renamed the Louisiana State Seminary of Learning and Military Academy.

Sherman's cadets quickly came to respect and admire him.

But the school's early successes were soon overshadowed by external events that move the nation to the brink of civil war.

At the start of 1861, former U.S. Army Captain William Tecumseh Sherman was forced to choose between staying with his beloved school and rebellious Louisiana, or returning north to defend the Union.

He bid emotional farewells to each of his cadets, but he warned his southern friends of the coming conflict you are bound to fail in time.

His friend and colleague David Boyd joined the Confederate Army, leading troops in the ninth Louisiana Infantry, a regiment that was part of the famed Louisiana Tigers.

Soon, cadets old enough to serve enlisted, many became officers even in their teens, with enrollment dropping and Union forces closing in.

The seminary finally shut down in 1863, so they basically closed the doors, locked them, hope for the best, and left.

The war had left Louisiana in ruins.

Countless young soldiers had lost their lives.

Town and countryside homes and schools all had been affected.

Used by the Union Army as a hospital, the seminary was left with leaky roofs, rotted floors, demolished furniture and missing equipment.

Now, without a board of Supervisors, the task of reopening fell entirely to David Boyd, with 66 preparatory students and 32 freshmen.

The school struggled to stay open for years after the war.

David Boyd invited his friend General Sherman to address the cadets.

It was a bold move, since many Louisianans still harbored strong anti-union sentiments.

Even the local newspaper urged civility among its readers.

While they may not forget the bloody scenes of the war.

We hoped they would be willing to let the dead bury the dead and treat him with respect and kindness.

Louisiana Democrat, February 1869.

The event proved to be a public relations victory for the school.

Sherman warmly greeted the townsfolk and was warmly received in return when he visited the beloved campus he had not seen in eight years.

At the 1869 commencement ceremony, eight cadets received their diplomas, the first degrees conferred at the Pineville campus, and the last, a fire later that year, destroyed the seminary building.

Just two weeks later, the seminary reopened in Baton Rouge, occupying the north wing of the state's institution for the deaf and the blind.

Students were crowded as many as six to a dormitory room.

Still, David Boyd labored to turn the disaster into an opportunity.

Regarding the move to Baton Rouge as a fresh start, his old friend Sherman recommended a new title for the institution.

Sherman wrote to Boyd and said, well, now, in effect, you graduated your first class.

Let's not call this thing a seminary.

Seminary is where girls go to school.

this is it should be called the university.

He suggested various names, and the legislature essentially went along in 1870 and changed the name to Louisiana State University following the Civil War.

The years of reconstruction were tumultuous time for Louisiana and its new university.

The financial crisis of that period reduced enrollment to single digit numbers, and left only two professors, David Boyd and his younger brother Thomas, a recent graduate of the school.

Fortunately for LSU, the elder Boyd's talents extended beyond the classroom when the Louisiana State Agriculture and Mechanical College in New Orleans obtained Louisiana's land grant funding.

Boyd orchestrated a merger of the two institutions.

This was the beginning of LSU's international prominence, with its new emphasis on agriculture and industry.

The university's advanced work in sugar production soon attracted Latin American students to the school, now known officially as Louisiana State University and Agricultural and Mechanical College.

My family's been here in Parchman Farm and sugar cane and other crops for generations.

And LSU, I think, was connected from a very early stages.

I think without it, we would truly, we would not have Louisiana sugar industry without the efforts of LSU research and extension.

After the merger of the two institutions, David Boyd soon turned his attention to finding a permanent home for LSU.

He considered the abandoned Army post near downtown Baton Rouge a perfect site for the school.

Now, LSU's campus encompassed more than 200 acres of land and about 20 buildings, including the landmark Pentagon Barracks.

David Boyd had achieved remarkable things for LSU in a few short years, and attempted with limited means, to keep it up to date with national trends.

But in his bold leadership, he frequently clashed with the Board of Supervisors.

After one too many confrontations.

He was fired as president of the university in 1890.

Black Louisianans were given new educational opportunities through a new federal law.

The second moral Act land grant states would have to provide a second, separate college for blacks if they wanted to maintain the custom of racial segregation and receive funds from the new act.

What resulted from from these acts was a dour system of higher education, where starting university was established for blacks only.

And Louisiana State University, was and then continue to be for whites only.

In 1896, the board of Supervisors again turned to the Boyds for leadership.

This time hiring 42 year old Thomas Boyd to pilot the university through the troubled financial waters of the time.

He was a much gentler sort of man in public, apparently, and became very well loved by many students and many other stakeholders in the university.

And again, a man who had some vision, some understanding of national trends in education tried to bring some of that to the LSU, operation.

He was granted great latitude in his management of the university, and the school prospered under his leadership.

Soon, the school's growing enrollment included a new student population under Thomas Boyd.

Women were allowed to attend LSU for the first time.

In 1904, Olivia Davis came in as the first student, but she came in as a grad student.

She was a teacher at Baton Rouge High.

She had gotten a master's degree from Sophie Newcomb and came in to study in a specific area.

But by 1906, Boyd had taken the steps open the door to women in 17 women were admitted.

One of whom was his daughter, Annie Boyd.

At that time, women became sponsors of the men's military organizations, but didn't really have their own organizations.

Consequently, about 14 of them started a group called the CC club, which became quite an interesting and intriguing organization because they didn't tell the men what CC stood for.

This is a great joke among these women.

They enjoyed it immensely and finally wrote in a section of the yearbook that year that CC stood for Cadet Catchers.

Baseball had been played at LSU since 1869, but by the turn of the century, the new game of football had become the school's favorite sport.

The game was first introduced to campus by chemistry professor Charles Coates in 1893.

He was familiar with football in the northeast, where it was very popular in colleges, but he came to the south and found it was it was really nonexistent here.

So he started to get, students together to play football, to teach them about the game.

In many respects, the game was very different from the revered pastime that's recognized today.

It was very rough sport.

there wasn't a lot of pads.

There were no helmets.

there were a lot of, serious injuries.

it was a brutal, brutal game.

It was not long before fans were gathering in great numbers to cheer their fighting Tigers.

The term Tigers actually came from a, regiment in the Civil War, made up of a battalion of New Orleans and Donaldsonville soldiers.

And they were called the Louisiana Tigers.

We had no real uniforms.

The players and the families of the players went to a local, store that had Mardi Gras ribbons.

The store was all out of green, and so they got the purple and the gold ribbons and put them on their uniforms.

And thus purple and gold was born at LSU.

The game grew more and more popular through the years, but it was in 1908 that fans came down with the first true case of Tiger Fever.

We had an unbeaten season.

Some people still look back on that as our first national championship.

There's no record of the 1908 team being a national champion, but they are called the champions of the South and it was the first really, truly great team in LSU football history.

LSU, the institution is much more than just LSU, the football team or the basketball team.

The general public doesn't go into the chemistry labs, and they don't go out in the fields and watch people develop sweet potatoes.

So the athletic program becomes the front porch, if you will, or the, the the window into which people look into the house of Louisiana State University.

In 1908, the Colleges of Arts and Sciences, engineering, Education and Agriculture were formed from the early days.

Agriculture had always been an important part of LSU's identity, but farming required space, and as enrollment grew, it quickly became clear that the institution needed a larger campus.

A few miles south of the downtown location was Gardiners Plantation, a beautiful and diverse tract of land that had captured Thomas Boyd's attention.

In 1918, LSU acquired it.

It looked exactly like what it says.

It was a plantation.

It was a farm.

There were corrals, there were small shacks.

There were, moss draped trees and especially magnolias.

And then there were the agricultural fields and then the Indian mounds, which was a very popular thing at the time to come down in this area and picnic on the grounds.

The school's land now totaled over 2000 acres.

The renowned Olmsted Brothers firm prepared LSU's preliminary master plan in 1921.

One of the things that Rick Olmsted talks about was the, the great variety that this site presented and that there were lowlands that, were represents part of the landscape of Louisiana.

And there was a bluff and uplands and different soil types that represent another part of the geography of Louisiana.

And so this particular site, provided for him a kind of a microcosm of the, of the state.

And, it's just a beautiful idea.

Olmstead divided the campus into a series of quadrangle representing different disciplines at the school, such as fine arts or engineering and science.

LSU's familiar Indian mounds figured prominently in this original design.

Olmstead was a landscape architect.

whose vision, was, how to adapt the overall idea and the placement, on the land not to design the buildings.

For that, an architect was needed.

The university hired Theodore Link, a man of national reputation and European training.

One of the beautiful things about Lynx plan is that, there are a number of formal elements that repeat throughout the campus.

The use of columns, the use of arches, the use of groupings of those kinds of things for LSU's buildings.

Theodore Link employed a Northern Italian Renaissance style using red tile roofs and a tan stucco finish.

From this, LSU derives its characteristic Mediterranean look just before he died.

Theodore Link completed his masterpiece, LSU's Memorial Tower.

The tower itself is a memorial to Louisiana's soldiers and sailors lost in the First World War.

It was originally conceived and drawn as a kind of a Sally port, a military gateway that would lead out to a parade ground.

But one of the beautiful things there is that, in making the tower, it makes a reference to the sky.

And, with the circular form of the parade ground, you have two archetypes, from architectural history to the most fundamental architectural moves, so that you have nature in the sky and gathering in fundamental architectural themes at the beginning, at the entryway, they sort of gateway to learning.

I received my degree in architecture from LSU.

LSU is truly one of the most beautiful college campuses in the country.

LSU has the prettiest architecturally correct, beautifully maintained, campus I have ever seen in my life.

Students were thrilled with their huge new campus.

Compared to the crowded downtown location, the new LSU was a pastoral Paradise of grazing cattle, gravel sidewalks and a shady grove of magnolias.

In 1924, construction began on LSU's new stadium.

Later that year, on Thanksgiving Day, the famed Tiger Stadium hosted its first game with 18,000 in attendance.

LSU loss to Tulane, 13 zero.

There's various points in our history where football and the popularity of football took a leap.

And I think the biggest major leap came in 1924 when, LSU moved to this current campus.

Here we had a real constructed stadium, and I think that was, signified the first real growth in LSU football history as the new tradition of LSU football was coming into its own.

The school's founding tradition of military discipline continued to evolve.

In the old war school, as it was fondly called, had instituted the Reserve Officers Training Corps, or ROTC, eight years earlier.

All physically fit freshman and sophomore males were obligated to serve in the ROTC, and most were required to live in barracks where they were subject to inspection in full uniform.

Now, as Thomas Boyd put it, LSU was a university with a military department, not a military school.

Finally, in spite of numerous infrastructure delays, the new campus was formally dedicated April 30th, 1926.

This was the high point of Thomas Boyd's career.

The Boy brothers era finally came to an end in 1927, when Thomas Boyd retired for 48 of the previous 62 years.

Either Thomas Boyd or his older brother David had served as president.

Thomas Boyd had given more than half a century to hire education, including the last 31 years as LSU's president.

Hi everyone.

I'm Charlie Wynn.

I'm here with my good friend Victor.

How to present forever LSU.

There's a special reason we are presenting this LPB and LSU favorite to you right now.

It's the 100th anniversary of Tiger Stadium this year.

When you think of all the memories in that stadium, it's right.

Charlie, there's nothing like college football in Louisiana.

And this documentary is the story of LSU that traces the founding of our flagship university and its football program in a way that only LPB can do it.

So if you value LPB ability to produce a historical archives as important as this, we need to hear from you right now.

When you become a member during this program, it says to LPB you want to see more programs about great Louisiana institutions like this.

And it is so easy to get involved.

Call us or text give to 888769 5000.

That's text.

Give 888769 5000.

Pledge your support online at LPB dawg, or you can scan the QR code on your screen with your smart device and as little land app for the programs you are championing, LPB has thank you gifts keepsakes available during this program that show your LPB and LSU team spirit.

We got it all here, and that's a bet.

The $25 a month level of a sustaining member.

You'll receive the forever LSU combo, which includes a Dino Fish, a tiger, purple and gold glasses that is a set of for 100 years in Death Valley hardcover book and an LSU mug.

Or at just $13 a month, you can receive the Mina, a Tiger purple and gold glasses, which is a set of four.

But the gifts are not ending there.

They're not done.

You can even step down at just $10 a month, which of course is very much appreciated.

And at $10 a month, you'll receive the 100 Years and Death Valley hardcover book.

And even at $7 a month, you'll receive the LSU mug that you and I both have right here in front of us.

And in addition to those wonderful gifts, you'll receive visions LP's monthly program guide and our popular member benefit, LPB passport Victor.

There is also a very special credit card offer we're going to hear about more right now.

Support the programs you love on LPB, and show your team spirit to receive these very special works of art, curated especially for you and available during this program.

For a credit card pledge of $750 or more, you will receive a collection of three LSU themed fine art prints by acclaimed 20th century Louisiana photographer.

Fine for wine ends.

The collection includes LSU Agricultural Coliseum, the LSU Memorial Tower, and Tiger Stadium in the 1930s, for a pledge of $1,500 or more on a credit card, receive an original painting by Lake Charles, Louisiana artist Eddie Moorman, titled LSU Stadium.

Moorman uses palette knives to create works with improvizational brushstrokes that are his trademark.

Eddie Moorman has also been featured on LP's Art rocks!

Don't miss this opportunity for these great credit card offers, and thank you for supporting LPB.

And Victor once again want to let everyone know that is for a pledge of $750 or more on a credit card, and you'll receive the collection of three LSU themed fine art prints from acclaimed 20th century Louisiana photographer Fonthill Lions this fall.

Photographer of portraits and the photography done are just incredible at seeing some of the old the original Tiger Stadium like we're learning about in the program we're watching right now.

Some of the things about the campus, those are some classics, and they make for beautiful pieces, whether in your home or whether in your office.

They're they're beautiful.

Yeah.

once again, this is our pledge break, so we need to hear from you right now.

And, we're here to share the history of LSU with forever LSU.

But such a special time being the 100th anniversary of Tiger Stadium.

And as a longtime sportscaster, Victor Tiger Stadium has to have some special memories.

Almost too many to talk about right now.

But a few of you know what's great about the culture in South Louisiana and LSU specifically, is when you get to the stadium, you think of the generations that have come through that stadium, families that have held season tickets for years, if not decades on passing along to the families.

So then the next generation can bring their kids and then their kids bring their kids.

And adults are now going back with grandchildren to share the experiences that have gone through.

As you mentioned, I've had great memories in Tiger Stadium, but mine have always been different because I've been in the, as I say, the business.

Right.

So when you're a sportscaster for over three decades, you go in seeing it a different way because you're in the press box and you're working.

But I've been in the press box when it shook, I, I've been in there when the crowd has gone next level, and now I've had the opportunity to to bring my four girls and on times I'm not working as much to get down there and really see them enjoy the environment.

And that's what it's all about, to see them enjoy the experience from the bands, the cheerleaders, the Tiger girls, Mike the Tiger coming in the mascot walking around the fireworks before the teams come on in.

If there's so much there for everybody, it really is a memorable experience.

Where LPB is known as Louisiana Story teller and Louisiana's history teller, and a lot of times it's missed out that, sports is also storytelling.

Sports is also rich history and traditions and cultures.

And, this is something especially with LPB now having Victor joining LPB as a sports correspondent that tells you just how important telling the story of Louisiana is on a variety of topics and levels.

There are so many sportsman's Paradise for a reason.

Most people hear that and you might think, oh, it's all the outdoors, it's the fishing.

It's the hunting which we have in Louisiana in abundance.

And it is fantastic.

But you think of the sport stories that have come from all corners of the state.

Obviously, right now, focusing on the 100th anniversary of Tiger Stadium and the football that is played inside of that stadium, and certainly memories to go around for so many people in the state of Louisiana.

But there's so many good sports stories, and sports is supposed to be a relief.

Sports will be fun when you're playing at the highest level.

Yes, it's a business.

And yes, you're trying to to make a career out of it.

But you think of the kids starting small, just playing a game.

How many times do you even deal with pro athletes and people try to ask them questions that inevitably somebody will get back to?

We're getting paid to play a game is a game.

Yeah, those games and those sports and the activities for the residents of Louisiana really resonate with a lot.

Once again, the mission of Louisiana Public Broadcasting is to be Louisiana's storyteller.

We are here because of the good folks watching and making contributions and being a member of the LPB team in the form of a of a, donation and, financial support.

It's critically important, and it's critically important as we move forward into the the next season of what you want to see as far as Louisiana programing is concerned.

And you play a big role.

You know, we think of a thanking our corporate sponsor minions, and you talk about what they do and think of all the beautiful things they they make and that they offer.

Yet look at what we have.

LSU Tiger Glass is a set of four.

As we told you earlier, with your level of donation, you can get a set of four glass or beautiful glasses, but you have a mini golf AJ celebrating the purple and gold and LSU and what it means to so many.

Once again, you have some wonderful thank you gifts to take part of, and they include these wonderful of set of four glasses by the way, as well as 100 Years in Death Valley, the hard book, hardcover book and the LSU mug.

And that's all for just, $25 a month.

And at the $13 a month level, you receive the four glasses of mean of it, and you're not done.

Just say, if you want to go down to the $10 a month, you're still receive like 100 years and Death Valley hardcover book.

As we're celebrating 100 years of Death Valley and Tiger Stadium, and at $7 a month, you'll receive the beautiful LSU mug that little empty right now before the end of life.

Whether it's coffee, hot chocolate or otherwise, you'll get that.

And that's just $7 a month.

Victor, I want to let folks know.

and I think you're familiar already.

We have a team outside of Louisiana.

Includes Texas, Arkansas and Mississippi.

Yeah, there's no rivalry here.

Good programing is good programing.

And we want to make sure you out there also get a chance to, participate and also continue the important role that you have been playing so far for LP.

And of course, your support and then the financial contributions make the programing here on LP as we look to go bigger and better.

Yeah, starting to vote more and more on the sports.

You know, I had the pleasure of of hosting the for the last, the last 5 or 6 years now, the Louisiana Sports Hall of Fame.

And this year I did it the purple carpet with carrying the ball from right here at LPB.

And we had a chance to talk to so many great athletes that have ties to Louisiana that had their night to celebrate their careers.

For some, like some on Augusta's, it started a couple high school right here in Baton Rouge, went on to be one of the most decorated female basketball players ever.

Others, it could be players that came into the state like Drew Brees.

Not from here.

We know his impact on Louisiana, what he did with the Saints.

We've had jockeys from the horse racing field.

We've had wrestlers, we've had boxers.

So many athletes with the great touch.

And those are all programs here because they touch citizens in Louisiana one way or the other.

And that's where the programing comes from.

Over.

Victor.

The Louisiana Sports Hall of Fame is such an incredible location in the Acadiana.

It's a fantastic annual induction ceremony that you care and have hosted brilliantly.

And it's it tells the story and and it's long overdue.

And I'm so glad that you are part of it.

Along with care and the rest of the LPB team.

Let's go back to forever LSU.

But do not forget, we need to hear from you now.

We will.

LSU achieved full accreditation the same year Louisiana's most colorful politician took high office.

He was elected governor in 1928 after he survived his impeachment, and in the spring of 1929, he began to take a very active interest in LSU.

I think because he realized that, the university offered opportunities for, political theater.

And in LSU, Huey Long had found an ideal stage on which to perform.

It didn't take long for the Kingfish to show that no one could stand in the way of what he wanted.

Here, he wanted 125 member band, and that was considered outrageous.

The band was very small.

He asked Dean Frye, how will I how could I go about getting a 125 member band?

And and fry answered him, you'd have to get a new president and a new board, thinking that that would be the thing that stopped you.

And of course, the the result was a new president, a new board.

and he got his his big band.

Long was a frequent guest at the Roosevelt Hotel in New Orleans, where he had long admired the band and especially its leader, Castro Caruso.

It was 2:00 in the morning, and some men came up there and told my grandfather.

He said, you're wanted in Baton Rouge by your lot.

And he told them, he said, you no longer working at the Roosevelt.

He said, you're my new band.

Director Ellis.

LSU.

He said, and I want the biggest man that there is.

And he said, I can do it.

And that was the beginning of their friendship, their close friendship.

Oh, I think about it.

I think it's fine.

As much a showman as a politician.

Huey long was fond of marching with his band.

Sometimes, as the drum major knew.

He said, well, we're going to march through downtown Nashville.

Show off your voice.

And so, Lou Williams was a drum major, and he wore a white flannel pants and a white flannel vest with gold braid on the front of it.

So Lou was getting off white flannel pants.

Freshman year, he decided it was time to go.

So you give me the baton, I'll be the drum major.

So he led us to down to four blocks, and Lou had to run four blocks to catch up with you.

Had a good as bad, Huey long took a great interest in LSU football.

Often to the displeasure of some coaches.

Biff Jones was a football coach at LSU back in the Huey Long days, and his team was behind at the half.

Huey long strode over to the dressing room and said, I'm going to talk to the team and Biff said, nobody talks to this team but me.

Well, Huey Long stormed off.

The president was sitting there.

When Huey got there, he said, I want that coach fired.

The president said, I can't firing.

He already quit.

Besides football, Long's favorite pastime was politics.

And like it or not, LSU soon found itself deeply involved in that game as well.

In 1930, our budget was about $600,000, and he increased it to 3 million.

In one fell swoop, five fold increase, in the university budget.

Long's Share our Wealth program promised to the poor even more than President Roosevelt's New Deal, elevating the kingfish nationally.

By one estimate, more than half the student body by the time he died.

We're all in some kind of a state job or state scholarship, most of which were given out for political considerations.

Long became a political threat, and Roosevelt responded by cutting off all federal funding in Louisiana.

It was not restored until after Huey Long's death in 1935.

LSU's new campus continued to flower.

E.A.

McIlhenny, famous for his family's Tabasco empire, had played a prominent role in shaping the landscape of the campus.

He had designed a formal arrangement of plants that gave LSU the appearance of an orderly garden.

Now the campus was in the hands of its new master planter, Steele Burton.

Reflective of the old campus, burden further cultivated the tradition of beautiful trees at LSU.

He thought the live oak was the most beautiful tree there was the most beautiful thing.

There was really Burton came along, and it was one of the few people that had an interest in the landscape.

So this individual hired him to help do the landscaping in.

Ever since up through the 70s, Burton was I was the primary person doing it, and he didn't really answer to anybody.

Most of the time he he sometimes would contribute his own, money and effort.

As our alma mater says, broad magnolias and stately oaks.

You just everybody remembers that, about this campus.

And even if you're not an alumnus of the school, you you remember the way it looks when you've been here.

Because it's so fascinating, the spatial quality that it has.

You come here for a day and something changes in you that you cannot let go of LSU.

You you love it here and you can't wait to get back.

It doesn't matter how old you get, you have to come back because it's where your heart is.

While Steele Burden planted Oaks on campus, LSU athletics expanded its stadium and added lights.

There was a tremendous surge in attendance.

What we saw once we started playing night games and as you know, that tradition has continued until today.

Soon afterward, another football tradition was begun.

We paid $750 as a school to, the little Rock zoo.

to bring a tiger to LSU.

They built a cage for them next to Tiger Stadium.

It became quite an attraction.

They didn't know what to name him.

but there was a trainer with the LSU football team at the time named Mike chambers.

He was a rather large man, and he became popular from the fact that when a player got injured on the field, he would just carry him off the field on his own.

That was determined that that's what we would name the tiger after Mike chambers.

And so today we have, Mike the Tiger.

Despite the Great Depression and a politically saturated environment at LSU, flourished during the 1930s, rising to national prominence in fields like engineering, the arts, and especially literature.

At a surprise Sunday meeting in 1935, university president James Monroe Smith asked young professor Robert Penn Warren about the possibility of publishing a literary quarterly.

Warren said, of course it was possible, and he very quickly let President Smith know what it would take.

financial support, staff support.

It would take no interference with editorial decision, President Smith said.

If you will get together with Dean Pipkin, and Plant Brooks, bring me a proposal tomorrow, I'll sign it.

And the Southern Review was launched in less than 24 hours.

The Southern Review changed the way that literature was read and taught, bringing established writers like Eudora Welty and W.H.

Auden to broader audiences.

But the outburst of creativity at LSU was not confined to the Department of English.

Particularly noteworthy were the efforts of young art students and the talented painter who instructed them, Conrad, a breezy Breslow exciting new work was also accomplished in newly established doctoral programs, the LSU press and the Department of Speech and Music.

Did you know something else in the music education program at LSU?

Not just the voice lessons and the coaching and things like that, but music history, theory, things like that were still really fresh on my mind.

Having any kind of career in music, you have to be able to understand music at a level that is educational.

I'm really proud to to come from there.

It was a really wonderful school.

LSU had this enormous growth in the 1930s, whereas most colleges and universities in this country were hard times, they were actually having to let professors go.

But there was Huey Long and the infusion of money and a dream of making LSU a great university.

Following Huey Long's assassination, Richard Lasch became governor in 1936.

His relationship with President Franklin Roosevelt was much more amiable, and once again, federal funds flowed into Louisiana with LSU as a major beneficiary.

However, in 1939, a financial scandal broke that landed Governor Lasch and LSU's president James Monroe Smith in prison.

Despite his scandalous reputation, the university broadly expanded its range of majors under Smith's leadership, and it enhanced programs in the liberal arts, social sciences, and music.

So I think in many ways, even though he was, in the end, corrupt and a crook and an embarrassment to LSU, James Monroe Smith actually did a good deal to help develop the modern university that we know today.

Under the new governor, Earl Kay Long, widespread corruption continue to taint state government, but not LSU.

Paul M Abbot, formerly dean of the law school, now acting president of LSU, and Troy Middleton, acting vice president, together, successfully cleaned up corruption and put an end to the rigged bids, padded payrolls and embezzled funds.

Middleton, a former commandant of the cadets at LSU and already a decorated veteran of the First World War, soon joined fellow LSU administrators and students heading off to fight in the second.

With the start of World War II, two LSU students were caught up in the patriotic fervor and rushed to enlist.

Large numbers of LSU's graduates and cadets became officers, including some at the general rank.

Enrollment dropped at an alarming rate as male students enlisted in droves.

Female students at LSU soon outnumbered men for the first time.

The war started when I was a freshman, and when I was a senior, the boys all had to leave.

We were down to mostly girls on the campus.

Nobody went out because they didn't have dates.

I announced to the group that I knew that I was going to be on the Campanile steps at 6:00.

If anybody wanted to come, we'd go do something.

And gradually those freshmen began coming out.

So we ended up having Friday night adventures.

We got out.

I was barely 17, and of course the war was just coming to an end and the veterans would start coming back after the war.

But that summer, at least, there were a lot of us that were, very young and really represented the, the male population on the campus.

So we were quite, in demand, if you will, in the terms of social circles.

ROTC was a very big part of the campus activities.

You had girls sponsors for you, various units.

So they were kind of integrated into the system.

It was just very much a part of the campus.

Following the war, the GI Bill allowed veterans of war to attend any public or private college or university.

LSU scrambled to cope with thousands of former GIS showing up for fall 1946 semester.

Young veterans who had won the war for America soon formed the well-educated body of citizens that charted the country's bright future throughout the rest of the 20th century.

LSU is a unique university because of military traditions and military history.

What we have contributed to the United States for 150 years.

And so we need to continue that tradition.

We rank right up there with the top 2 or 3 universities, state universities in the United States with respect to our military history.

Sure.

As I'm concerned, it's second to none.

In the 50s, the NAACP and others battled to abolish LSU's separate but equal policies of old.

Royce Wilson became the first black student to attend the LSU law School, admitted by court order in 1950.

Even though LSU fought hard to prevent desegregation at the undergraduate level.

New Orleans civil rights attorney appeared to row prevail in his suit against the university.

In 1953, his 17 year old son, A.P.

to Row Junior, became the first African American to enter LSU as a freshman.

It was the beginning of the worst experience that I ever had.

I was, I was I was totally rejected by the adults, by the faculty and by the students.

And the plan was that if we give him the silent treatment and we ignore him and we pretend that he's not here, and anybody that speaks to him, is friendly with him will be ostracized and blackballed, then he will leave because he'll be too miserable to stay.

And, I didn't go there expecting that to happen.

Undergraduate racial segregation at LSU would persist for another decade, but Terrell's experience there remained with him long afterward.

And now I've been back 6 or 7 times and I'm over what happened to me.

But it's still a very big part of my soul.

You know, I mean, it'll never leave me.

I mean, it's an I guess it's shaped me in a way to help me understand things better.

Even as it grappled with desegregation, LSU experienced a period of growth under the guidance of President Troy Middleton.

Old buildings were renovated and new ones built in 1958.

The football team came into the national spotlight under the leadership of Paul Diesel.

Some of the best players that he recruited, were right here in Baton Rouge and, right here in Louisiana.

And that led to the great team of 1958.

So exactly 50 years after our first great team, in 1908, we had our first real national champion consensus national champion team in 1958, led by Paul Diesel.

Besides the national championship.

What people remember about Diesel's tenure as coach was that night in 1959, when Billy Cannon made his famous Halloween run.

I saw the ball and it hit a field, and I saw it take a high bounce and I saw Billy Cannon eyeing it.

And I thought, no, no, no, Billy, no, no, no.

Because all you have to do is catch a ball, have someone hit it, boom in the ball.

The game would be over, but it didn't work that way.

That was a dead burn football game.

I've never seen that cannon.

Red cannon run was magnificent beyond anything I've ever seen before.

No other athlete in the world could have made that run at that late in the game.

As tired as everyone was.

But he had that great stamina.

That he got on race some 89 yards for a touchdown.

That's another tear for a cannon as he comes off the field.

By the late 1950s.

LSU's enrollment surged past 10,000.

Campus social life blossomed with student organizations, homecoming festivities and expanding fraternities and sororities.

I was there in 59.

It was wonderful.

My goodness.

I mean, people don't know about weekends in Baton Rouge.

All of those memories are just great.

And the fact that I met the woman and I spent the rest of my life with.

And I keep coming back to Baton Rouge.

Louisiana State is a big part of my life, and will continue to be a big part of my life.

Hello and welcome back, everyone.

I'm Charlie when I'm with my good friend Victor.

How to share this great documentary about LSU with you, produced by Take a Lowden and Ed Dodd with so many other contributors as well.

Well, the scope of this documentary required many hands on deck and support from past members to make it possible.

We wanted to revisit LSU's 150th anniversary to commemorate the 100th anniversary of Tiger Stadium that we are celebrating this year.

Amazing.

And we are asking you to invest in LPB right now so we can produce and present more programs about Louisiana, because these are the programs you tell us you want to see more of, but we need your help to do that.

So call us or text give to 888769 5000.

You can also pledge your support [email protected], or scan the QR code on your screen with your smart device.

And there's a little more than that for the programs that you love to support.

LPB has.

Thank you.

Gets to help you show your team spirit for LPB and for LSU.

Let's take a look at those right now.

We've had the $25 a month level.

You'll receive the forever LSU combo, which includes them, you know, a Tiger, purple and gold glasses.

It is a set of four and they are beautiful.

Also, the 100 Years in Death Valley hardcover book, as well as an LSU mug, but also at the $13 a month level, you'll receive the amino acid eight Tiger purple and gold glasses.

Once again, that is a set of four beautiful glasses.

At the $10 a month level, you'll receive the 100 Years in Death Valley hardcover book, and at just $7 a month, you will receive one of these LSU mugs from $25 a month to $7 a month.

You can find the one that fits you perfectly for your donations to LPB, and you'll get one of these beautiful thank you gifts.

And we talk about that book, the 100 Years of Death Valley.

Nobody has seen it yet, but you're talking about pictures.

You think of the history, and we're learning some of it in the documentary that we're watching right now.

But when it was first built, you lost to Tulane in the very first game.

13 nothing.

And then things started to turn around looking for LSU.

Right.

But when you look at the history, it's not just football.

Yes, LSU has won four national titles and they've won countless SEC championships.

I want to take you back to 2010.

Do you remember that there was a music festival that came to Baton Rouge?

Do you remember what that was called?

Bayou country music, Bayou country, super fast.

Do you remember who was one of the artists that night when it first started that weekend?

That has now blown up to a global sensation?

Swifty, you're going to tell me I better come on now.

You're Swifty too.

Yes.

Taylor Swift play Tiger Stadium.

I believe it was her first stadium.

Performs not a first concert, but a first date before is a Taylor Swift opened up Bayou Country super fast in its very first year right there in Tiger Stadium.

And of course, we talk about other events, not just football.

Yeah, Bayou country, super fast.

Kenny Chesney, one of the many headliners.

Hey, how about a certain guy named Garth Brooks that came back to play Calling Baton Rouge live and that stadium was rocking then?

Like it, like it does every time they play calling Baton Rouge.

It is amazing.

It isn't just a football game at Tiger Stadium.

It is so much more.

And this is what this documentary, as well as the book, that you can get as a thank you gift, you can get it right now and, enjoy it.

Share it with your friends, give it as a gift.

With the holidays approaching as well.

So, so many options to call.

Call an audible.

Do whatever you want.

Have a plan already in store for a game.

Plan for the rest of it.

What matters is that you call, you call LPB.

You get in touch with LPB in any form and make a donation right now.

also, there's a very special credit card option.

Let's hear about that right now.

Support the programs you love on LPB, and show your team spirit to receive these very special works of art, curated especially for you and available during this program for a credit card pledge of $750 or more, you will receive a collection of three LSU themed fine art prints by acclaimed 20th century Louisiana photographer Fawn Ville Winans.

The collection includes LSU Agricultural Coliseum, the LSU Memorial Tower, and Tiger Stadium in the 1930s, for a pledge of $1,500 or more on a credit card, receive an original painting by Lake Charles, Louisiana artist Eddie Moorman, titled LSU Stadium.

Moorman uses palette knives to create works with improvizational brushstrokes that are his trademark.

Eddie Moorman has also been featured on LP Art rocks.

Don't miss this opportunity for these great credit card offers.

Victor.

Once again, this is a very special credit card offer that, for a pledge of $750 or more on your credit card, you'll receive this collection of three wonderfully, photographed, wine, Fonda wine and, pictures that you need.

You can hang them and you turn your own home, basically into a mini art gallery with a nice little sports touch.

Yeah.

And the with the forever LSU program you're watching.

You've seen so many photographs in this special.

The Farmville photos touch on so much.

The history of LSU, the campus coming to life to be what it is right now.

It does a beautiful collection.

Well worth it.

It's easy to forget until you see those photographs.

But, you know, 100 years, starting, kicking off this season.

And we see the new technology and we see this and new lights are going to be coming in to Tiger Stadium and, and flashing after scores and everything.

It's easy to have that snapshot memory for younger folks such as ourselves.

But if our other generations of a parent or grandparent, they can remember the fans will Winton's version of what Tiger Stadium is, right?

Remember seeing that look?

It's not all that long ago.

Remember the upper deck at Tiger Stadium is now what we call the middle of the 200 level was the upper deck.

There was no east side, west side and enclosure with all of the suites.

And yes, they're adding the new lights where you have a light show now have two touchdowns.

It's going to look great during the night games.

The brand new LED boards that are going up on both ends islands, especially the big, big one on the north end zone right behind the student section.

But so many memories in Tiger Stadium, I can go back to remember when, President Reagan came to speak at a commencement inside of Tiger Stadium, back when they didn't have all the graduation ceremonies separated all throughout campus.

And it was one big gathering, and they had a president there speaking in Tiger Stadium.

You've had Bayou Country Superfast, you've had Garth Brooks coming to play.

And of course, the earth shook when Garth Brooks came to play calling Baton Rouge.

But remember the history that Tiger Stadium made when the Earth really did shake in a in a football game?

And that's when 84 went to the back of the end zone and Tommy Hodgson hit them on a fourth down play.

The famous touchdown to beat Auburn seven six.

And that was the night the stadium shook.

We can go on and on, as you know.

And we love to go on and on about LSU, the importance of the, the landmark and, the, the institution that is LSU, the, the rich stories and, and and the great people that have come out of, LSU as well that are highlighted in this documentary.

this is really your time now where we're calling up, the next folks on the bench, and you are those folks we need to hear from you right now to, enjoy what we are presenting so that you not only enjoy yourselves, but share it with others.

And you'll get a nice thank you gift as well.

Let me tell you about some of the wonderful combo gifts.

The, at the $25 a month level, you'll receive the forever LSU combo that includes the minnow, Fancy Tiger, purple and gold glasses, and 100 years in Death Valley hardcover book, as well as an LSU mug at the $13 a month level.

You'll receive the the glasses, the set of four glasses.

But that's not all, though it continues at the $10 a month level, you will receive the 100 Years and Death Valley hardcover book that we've been talking about.

And then at just $7 a month, you'll get this LSU mug that we have here right in front of us.

So from $7 to $25 a month, if that fits into your plan, if you want to go higher, that's fine.

No gift is a bad gift when it comes to the contributions at LP, and we talk about the hardcover book and what you'll see, you know, there will be a lot of pictures.

You know, there'll be games, you know, there'll be the end zone, the famous touchdowns.

What about Joe Burrow?

I promise you, this picture is going to be in there.

Yeah, right there spelled with the EAA UX when he came running out his final game senior night.

And he changed jerseys.

Nobody, nobody was going to do it except for the equipment staff.

And he runs out in the student body in the fancy burrow.

And he does that from behind.

You know, that's one of the famous pictures that'll be in that book as well.

The folks LSU, and LPB, this, this documentary really highlights what LPB is mission is it is the sports.

it's the storyteller, whether it's sports, all sorts of different histories.

But that's what we're really taking a next step.

Victor, is is a big part of this next step for LP's future.

Being a sports correspondent for Louisiana Public Broadcasting.

What I want to welcome you aboard to OPB.

Well is well deserved, as well as the story set.

for a person with your experience can only really dive deep and share with you.

Well, there's so many folks we're looking forward just to interviewing, just to tell the story.

There may not be a lot of video involved.

Sometimes it might just be great conversations.

But you think of how sports has impacted so many families in Louisiana.

It might be fishing, it could be hunting, it could be out on the property, it could be dancing, it could be horse racing.

This past year, when we had a chance to induct the latest class into the Louisiana Sports Hall of Fame and hope you enjoyed the broadcast and the replay that we had here on LPB.

Perry Clark, the former Tulane head coach who came down here and took over a program that had been decimated and two years later had a winning a conference championship with about Frank Monica, the longtime head football coach down at Saint Charles, down in the Laplace area, and racer Bill.

I can still remember interviewing him that night at the induction because he's from sunset.

And I remember saying, why sunsets don't come to town.

That all moved to Natchitoches for his induction ceremony with just how wonderful that night was.

It's those types of stories and those types of people in Louisiana that have great stories to tell.

It is Lpez B's mission, and you have been watching LPB, for well, LPB has been on the air nearly 50 years, 50 years here.

And, this is an important factor.

We are not going to rest on our laurels.

We're not.

This is only half time, really.

And what's the score?

Zero zero.

That's right.

In the play fair.

There's so much to play for.

There is another 50 years that LPB is going to be front and center.

And it's going to be right there.

We want you in the stands.

We want to cheer in from the sidelines to help us, as only you can do.

If you're enjoying the program that you're watching, make sure you call.

Use the QR code that you're seeing, but enjoy that one more segment of forever.

As we continue telling the great story of that campus here in Baton Rouge, go ahead and enjoy and we'll be right back after that.

We will.

Following a nationwide trend on college campuses, the 60s brought more freedom than ever before for LSU students.

Many strict rules for women were relaxed or completely abolished at this time.

If you played softball on the field, you had to wear a trench coat over your shorts because you could not be seen on campus in shorts.

And then getting there, playing softball, putting your trench coat back on, all sweaty and nasty, and walking back to your dorm a.

We had curfew hours.

We had.

Not only do we have to be in the dorm, we had to be in our room for check in time or we would be campus for the next weekend.

We could build up enough points to where we were held and held in our dorms for a weekend.

So it was huge change for women from going from these fairly oppressive rules to one in which we had many, many more freedoms.

College campuses across the country were awash in student protests, and LSU was no exception.

We had marches on campus, many of which started at free speech, Ali.

The atmosphere changed in terms of what what we were expecting of 18 year olds.

What would happen if you flunked out of school?

particularly for men, because the draft was there.

Being in school was a way to, stay out of going to war.

And so if you didn't manage to stay in school, chances were you were going to be drafted and go to Vietnam.

In 1964, a decade after the first failed attempt to integrate LSU, African-American students were finally admitted as undergrad poets.

But it would take years before they were fully accepted into campus life.

Our goal was to get an education and no cursing.

no turning your head when you see me on campus.

none of that was going to stop us.

We were just very, very focused and very driven.

By 1972, LSU elected its first black student body president, Carrie Peugeot.

He didn't run as a black candidate.

He ran as a candidate like I had run.

You know, the woman running and the student body just was used to scary.

Used to him being involved in everything.

And that, to my knowledge, was why he was elected.

LSU could be given a lot of credit for that.

They looked at the candidate.

LSU started my career in journalism, and then I went on to go to law school, and following law school, I went into the FBI.

LSU provided me everything I needed for each of the career opportunities I went into.

It was the right foundation.

It was the right school.

It.

It left me with a sense of family.

And so now even my son attends LSU and we are starting our own new traditions in our family.

The role of the military at LSU changed forever in 1969, as ROTC became voluntary rather than mandatory for the first time.

There was a lot of dissension within the university.

A lot of students didn't like the idea of having to be in military.

They were certainly pro-america, but they didn't feel like that was the right thing to do to make them do that.

Cecil Taylor as chancellor, gave me a call, and we talked to the head of our Air Force ROTC in the country.

And this was in early 1969.

And, he told me, look, man on said, we want it to be voluntary.

And, they, so and he said the Army is the same way.

ROTC was not the only area to redefine itself in the 60s.

A 1963 self-study posed a pivotal question for the university.

What are you doing?

Except in agriculture, where we already had a strong research tradition.

What are you doing about research?

As a result of the exceptional work of the faculty of the chemistry, physics, mathematics and Geology departments?

LSU obtained a Centers of Excellence grant from the National Science Foundation.

The university soon gained recognition in many of the sciences and even the humanities, most notably historian T Harry Williams, one of the most popular professors in LSU history, was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for his biography of Huey Long.

T Harry Williams is one of my history professors and a fascinating, teacher.

We would go to his classes, and he was an expert on the Civil War, and he'd get up on his desk and put his chair, and he would say, I'm General So-and-so, and we're riding to the battlefield of Gettysburg.

And here's what's happening.

As individuals like Williams brought prestige to LSU, the institution as a whole garnered new stature as well.

Building on the university's success in coastal studies, LSU acquired sea Grant status.

It had been a land grant university, since the 1860s, but, the sea grant designation came during the 1970s.

We became the 13th institution in the United States to be so designated as a sea grant school.

LSU access to a new source of federal funding along with the new research emphasis.

LSU also saw swelling enrollment and enrollment that included a thriving and diverse community of international students.

The university's student population was now 20,000 students on a campus designed for 5000.

The need for new construction became acute during the seven years while I was chancellor.

We added over 1,000,000ft² of academic space, new space.

We also were able to, remodel a number of the buildings on campus that were really in very sad shape.

And we undertook a project to say that every building on campus would be air conditioned.

LSU's next chancellor was James H. Wharton, who continued mural's pursuit of excellence throughout the 80s along with increased graduate education.

He prized research.

Well, if you're going to claim that you're a, major research operation, and that you're attracting the federal funding, for research, it requires that you have the faculty that can compete, for those federal dollars.

And graduate students are so critically important in engineering and in all the sciences.

to that effort.

And so, it was clear that we had to, increase our graduate enrollment.

Wharton, in a controversial move, pushed for LSU's first admission standards for undergraduates.

No longer would every student with a high school diploma who applied to LSU be automatically accepted.

Now, a certain degree of academic excellence was expected.

Enrollment slightly decreased, but did not devastate the university as some had predicted.

What did undermine the university was a sudden drop in oil prices, relying on tax revenues from petroleum.

Louisiana and LSU spiraled into a dire financial crisis.

The legislature imposed budget cuts on LSU year after year, causing the university to raise its tuition and fees, cut programs and nonessential personnel, and defer much needed maintenance.

The real difficulty in that time period was that the state didn't have any cash, and the university had very little cash.

And so getting through this, the 80s that involved, trying to meet payroll when you when you didn't have the reserves to meet the payroll, even amid the budget cuts that had weakened many areas of LSU.

There were still successes in the 80s.

The Carnegie Foundation ranked LSU as a research one institution, its highest category.

The Carnegie Foundation rankings are the most prestigious rankings that, exist, but it was very important to us because it, changed the image of LSU nationally to be a research one.

And, my own personal opinion, we ran the top 50 universities in the country, two world Class facilities committee, the center for Advanced Micro Structures and Devices and Pennington Biomedical Research Center were created during this time.

LSU was also excelling in sports.

Part of the university's tradition for more than a century, LSU baseball finally came into its own when a gentleman by the name of Skip Birdman arrived here in the early 80s.

The program all of a sudden started to catch fire and became what I believe to be the model premier program in the country.

I, told them what we what I envision and of course they your eyes were very, very big and told me there would be more seats and a full house and a new scoreboard.

And I said to them, you know, soon there'll be these gold seats, and then there'll be 100, then there'll be several hundred, and soon there'll be a thousand, and there'll be a few thousand.

And I was very excited until I heard a kid say, all right, coaches on drugs like us.

You see, they were mired in mediocrity.

And, we are better than that.

And, we just didn't know that at the time.

Many were equally surprised to learn how good LSU basketball could be even without Pistol Pete Maravich, LSU's great star of the 1960s.

In his 25 years leading the men's team.

Dale Brown presided over more victories than any other coach, guiding the Tigers to a final Four appearances in 1981 and 1986.

Among his memorable players was Shaquille O'Neal, who, along with greats Bob Pettit and Maravich, are the only LSU players named to the NBA's distinguished 50th Anniversary Team under the guidance of Sue Gunter.

Women's basketball took off.

She transitioned the sport.

See?

That's what she did.

To a more fan friendly, uptempo basketball game that the fans would enjoy.

And she, got the bigger, faster, stronger, ladies.

And, of course she won.

Pretty soon, these 400 season tickets in there were 3600 season tickets.

There were a thousand people.

All of a sudden there were 10,000.

They were in the top five.

And it was exciting to watch it grow.

The university as a whole enjoyed exciting growth.

Oil revenues began to rebound.

And years of careful planning began to bear fruit.

This planning yielded what became the national flagship agenda LSU strategy, for achieving its goals of increasing research and improving the quality of education at all levels.

I got my PhD from LSU and I think that prepared me for my future life.

My primary activity in the HIV field is to try to develop a vaccine, and LSU provided independence, which was probably one of the most important factors of me being able to be creative.

And, I can't think of a better experience than that.

Beyond the individual students it has served, LSU has also created vital connections to the larger community, especially in times of crisis.

In the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, for example, the Pete Maravich Assembly Center and the Karl Maddox Fieldhouse opened their doors to victims, becoming the largest acute care field hospital in U.S. history.

As LSU celebrates its 150th anniversary, the university has the unique opportunity to look back to its humble beginnings as a small military school for boys in the piney woods of central Louisiana, and track the progress made on this journey.

The challenges to that commitment remain as daunting in some ways as any of those faced by David and Thomas Boyd.

Financial need still shadows the institution, and education is still a relatively low priority for many Louisianans, just as in their day.

It's a wonderful history, rich and filled with people that have come to love the institution, but it's also a platform.

It seems to me, and a challenge for the future.

As we look back, I think it's very important that we look ahead and say, those who created this place have given us a challenge to continue to recreate it, to be the great university that they had made it in their time, that we must make it ours.

I feel like I am part of history, just making strides on campus and doing everything that I can to be, a productive part of campus and actually make a difference.

Nice to know that so many people around the world know about this school, and that they all think of it as a home, or they all think of it as something that transformed them, that something that made them who they are.

To this day, it's almost like a culture.

I mean, our athletics, our academic.

I mean, the number of people that have graduated from this school.

The number of friends that have sat in the stadium on Saturday nights.

It's just something that's a part of Louisiana, and it's going to be here forever.

Funding for this program has been provided in part by the Tiger Athletic Foundation.

The LSU Alumni Association and the LSU Foundation, which are a part of the forever LSU campaign.

Additional funding has been provided by the Foundation for Excellence in Louisiana Public Broadcasting.

For more information about this program, visit us [email protected].

Hi and welcome back one last time during forever LSU.

I'm Charlie Wit.

I'm here with Victor.

How to celebrate Louisiana's flagship university and share its story with you.

How about the unbelievable history of LSU and the campus now?

We hope you've enjoyed this amazing look at history.

You can tell us you value films like this by becoming a member, so we can continue to share Louisiana's stories with the world.

Call us or text gift to 888769 5000.

Pledge your support [email protected] or scan the QR code on your screen with your smart device.

LPB always has the best thank you gifts, and Victor and I will tell you about the gifts available during this program so you can make your final selections.

They include Ake, LSU forever combo at the $25 a month level that will include, a minnow, a tiger, purple and gold glasses set, a for 100 years in Death Valley hardcover book and and LSU mug.

And at the $13 level, you will receive a mini of a Tiger purple and gold glass sets the set of four.

But that's not all.

Now, if you want to step down just a little bit, from there, you can go down to the $10 level and the $10 a month you will receive the 100 Years and Death Valley hardcover book.

And it just $7 a month.

You can receive this beautiful LSU mug right there.

So from $7 up to $25, the beautiful menu of AJ glassware with the purple gold celebrating the Tigers of LSU.

And what a great program to come out of and have all of this related to LSU.

When you think about the history that we've learned about in this program, starting at Pineville, making its way down to Baton Rouge, finding its real estate, and then, of course, celebrating the history of Tiger Stadium as well.

This is something Victor and I talk about all the time.

You can also be a hero during the holidays.

Okay.

So you can take receive your gift.

You can re gift.

You say hashtag we gift that you.

I know you probably have a Tiger fan either in your family or you know, someone that would love to wake up with a cup of coffee and that mug.

There you go.

Absolutely.

There's also a special, credit card offer that, let's hear about right now.

Support the programs you love on LPB, and show your team spirit to receive these very special works of art, curated especially for you and available during this program for a credit card pledge of $750 or more, you will receive a collection of three LSU themed fine art prints by acclaimed 20th century Louisiana photographer Fine Ville Winans.

The collection includes LSU Agricultural Coliseum, the LSU Memorial Tower, and Tiger Stadium in the 1930s, for a pledge of $1,500 or more on a credit card, receive an original painting by Lake Charles, Louisiana artist Eddie Moorman titled LSU Stadium.

Moorman uses palette knives to create works with improvizational brushstrokes that are his trademark.

Eddie Moorman has also been featured on LP B's Art rocks.

Don't miss this opportunity for these great credit card offers.

Victor.

It's worth repeating because it's this important and you have a chance of getting something special.

It's a pledge of $750 or more on a credit card pledge, and you'll receive that collection of the three LSU themed fine art prints from acclaimed 20th century photographer Fondo Winans, it is spectacular stuff.

It is Louisiana.

It is history.

It is history.

It's everything you could ever want.

Yeah, beautiful photographs, beautiful portraits.

And it really does share the history and tell so much of the history of LSU like you've been watching in this program forever, LSU and again, we want to thank our corporate sponsor.

Many of you don't forget at the $25 level and the $13 level, we'll go over it again in just a couple minutes.

But that beautiful set of four glasses with the purple and gold for LSU Tigers, thank you to many of you watching forever.

LSU and LPB has a mission that the umbrella is broad it it's the state's storyteller.

The stories are shared not only throughout Louisiana, but around the country and all over the world.

And LPB also has the Louisiana Legends and the folks that are Louisiana legends that you're seeing right now in that show Paul Diesel, Mary Fry Eaton, Lard Cook, Bill Conti, and pulmonary and Skip Bourbon, a couple of guys.

You know what?

Absolutely.

And when you watch the history is so interesting to go back and watch the program.

And if you spent any time on Chelsea's campus or if you attended LSU, you know that when you go down to Berry Hall, well, now you know the boys with David Bowie, Thomas Boyd, you know now who they are and the impact they had on campus there.

How about Power Holland?

Yes, of course we're talking about Tiger Stadium.

And you might have seen those of us who aren't old enough to remember now, this younger generation.

Well, you and I will remember this, the younger generation of the generation now, just thanks to the LED lights and everything at Tiger Stadium.

But who knew that Huey Long was so sneaky to build dorms inside a Tiger Stadium so he could expand the stadium for tying in the housing to make a stadium even bigger?

Well, was this little tidbit which you learn in this show Louisiana ain't boring.

We already know that.

And, the stories where you think are just, easy cut and dry stories that just wouldn't be Louisiana.

And, you know the other thing, too.

And we're having so much fun talking about the sports angle because of Tiger Stadium celebrating 100 years.

But it also at the end of the program emphasizes the research at LSU, being a Division one research institution as well, and all the great work that they do when you're not wearing the pads or putting on the sneakers or getting out on the court.

Yeah, LSU is a flagship institution.

It is known beyond the sports.

It is known, for for its research.

Pennington and and groundbreaking research that is is seen one element to Louisiana Public Broadcasting's mission is telling more of those historic stories on a sports angle as that's spy.

You're looking at Victor right now because he is the newest member, a sports correspondent that will be sharing those insights and those interviews like no one else.

Where we enjoy.

We had a chance to do the induction this year up in Natchitoches for the Louisiana Sports Hall of Fame.

Seeing so many people who have spent careers in Louisiana, the impact they have had, how about with Robert Ellis from Grambling was 90 years old, still a director for the NCAA regional tournaments, still teaching kids that are 50, 60, 70 years, 80 years younger than you, teaching ten year olds.

And he's almost 90.

But it's his love of the game and the impact that he that he's had, not only in Grambling but just throughout the state of Louisiana.

At the induction ceremony, if he had if he didn't have 250 people there, he didn't have one.

There's a whole quarter side of the world great just to see him because of the lives that he has touched in so many lives.

You such as?

Speaking of Grambling, you know, there's an HBCU special celebrating the two HBCU schools here in Louisiana.

Of course, we're talking about southern on the north side of town on the bluff, and Grambling as well.

These are stories you would not know about if it wasn't for this guy right here.

And LPB, we are looking at the future 50 years we'll be celebrating, coming up very, very soon.

And we're looking forward into those next 50 years and having folks like Victor and other folks that are telling Louisiana stories.

It matters that we're in Natchitoches.

It matters that we're telling the stories and talking to Coach Ellis and talking to all of the other folks, because not only their story is wonderful on the sports side of things, they're wonderful on a human side of things that you don't have to be a sports fan.

I think a lot of times people will avoid watching, say, a sports channel or a game thinking, well, I'm not interested in sports.

Sports covers the whole gamut.

Well, sort of like we just saw the Olympics and we spent a time a few weeks ago, spent some time earlier in the summer on LPB talking about some of the Louisiana athletes with ties to LSU and the state that were in the Olympics model.

Duplantis is a perfect example.

Went to LSU.

He's basically competing in a competition of what he's the best in the world.

He won the go to win, but he has a touch with LSU, Sha'carri Richardson and so many of those athletes.

But to your point, you may not play the sport, but if you have pride like you do in your country for the Olympics, or you have pride in the purple and gold, just think of what's taking place.

You're watching a program here that's talking about the long history of LSU from its start to where we're getting now.

We'll think about the fact that this LSU program only athletics.

I just go back the last three years, you've had a baseball national championship.

Kim Mulkey comes to town after you saw the part about Sugano Garner in the special, how she used to play basketball games in the Maravich Assembly Center with a huge purple curtain dropped behind the bench.

Half of the arena wasn't even visible because I didn't want it to look empty from those days.

Now to a waiting list with Kim Mulkey in her second year, she wins the national championship.

How about what Jay Clark did this year?

After four decades with De Bo, he continues.

LSU gymnastics wins the national championship.

Football is trying to go for another one.

So you see how successful they are.

But it's those efforts and those people who make everybody have so much pride and what they watch with these athletes, wherever they represent the park and go.

And then do a full circle about this is what the mission of LPB is telling the stories, sharing the stories and having an opportunity.

It's really a big community that everyone gets a chance to join on this team.

We don't have tryouts, so we want to hear from you right now.

This is the time.

We have some wonderful thank you.

Gives me a good time to go over some of those thank you gifts again, including the Farrell.

forever LSU combo.

It's the mini of a tiger purple and gold glasses.

It's a set of four.

They're fantastic.

The hardcover book 100 Years in Death Valley and the LSU mug will be yours for a, a monthly donation of $25 at the $13 a month level, you'll receive the mini of AJ Tiger Purple and gold glasses, a set of four, and a few more gifts.

Well, if you can give up just one combo meal per month at lunch that way, then you can make this $10 donation per month.

And that donation will give you the hardcover book 100 Years in Death Valley.

And then maybe if you still need that meal, but maybe you can give up a cup of coffee every morning, how about just give up one for $7 a month?

And guess what?

We'll give you a much better offer.

Yes, beautiful LSU mug.

So from $25 down to $7, we can make it work for you.

Whatever fits best.

And just know that your donations and your contributions lead to programing like what you've been watching now and so much more.

It's called teamwork and we want you to join the team if you already are a member.

Thank you.

It could be time to, pony up again.

It might be time to renew your membership.

whatever it takes, we're here, we're listening.

And we're also thankful.

We're thankful for you out there who enjoy our stories.

You let us know about it.

You, have an opportunity now to be part of the team.

So, once again, we need to hear from you.

And now it isn't tomorrow.

It isn't in baseball season.

It isn't next next month right now.

And our thanks once again to many on the corporate sponsor and the chance to get those four beautiful glasses for LSU.

Thank you so much.