In 1839, the University of Missouri's
founders incorporated many of President Thomas Jefferson's ideas about
higher education into our charter. After his death in 1826, friends
discovered Jefferson's own designs for his burial monument and epitaph,
which named what he believed were his three greatest achievements:
writing the Declaration of Independence, the establishment of the
Statute of Virginia for Religious Freedom and founding the nation's
first public university. In 1883, the U.S. Congress funded a new
memorial marker for Jefferson's grave, and Missouri won the competition
for his original marker on the basis of our status as the first public
university in the vast Louisiana Purchase territory negotiated by
Jefferson.
Jefferson's legacy lives on at MU in the physical and
philosophical. His original graveside marker resides on the east side of
Francis Quadrangle, within view of the magnificent Columns and just
outside the historic Residence on Francis Quadrangle. In 2000, Jefferson
Club Trustees funded the creation of a life-size bronze statue of the
former president seated on a bench, grasping a quill between his
fingers, with paper ready for his words of wisdom. This eye-catching
monument to our inspirational leader quickly became a landmark on the MU
campus.