My grandmother Mildred loved her days in college at Canyon. She graduated in 1930, and went on to teach school in a one-room school house in Pleasant Valley TX, near Floydada.
From the Handbook of Texas online, some history and the FIVE name changes for this institution: (
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"WEST TEXAS A&M UNIVERSITY. West Texas A&M University, originally called West Texas State Normal College, was established by the Thirty-first Legislature and opened in Canyon in the fall of 1910.
One of the seven state supported teachers' colleges of Texas, it was coeducational and offered one year above and two years below the present college level of courses. . . . In 1914 the administration building burned, but the college carried on its work in temporary buildings until a new one was completed.
In 1919 the first four-year college degrees were granted. . . . In 1923 it became West Texas State Teachers College.
In 1932 it was the first institution of higher learning in West Texas to offer graduate training. In 1932–33 the Panhandle-Plains Historical Society built its museum, Pioneer Hall, on the campus. . . . Annual enrollment for the college averaged 1,000. In 1949 it became West Texas State College.
Enrollment climbed from 1,913 students in 1950 to 4,500 in 1964. The school received authorization from the Texas legislature in 1963 to reorganize and to change its name to West Texas State University, recognizing the school's expanded scope and purpose.
. . . . At this time a marked expansion began on the physical plant, curriculum and program development, enrollment, and faculty, along with an increased emphasis on research. Construction of the Kilgore Research Center's first unit signaled the emergence of the university as a research focal point. The center housed an electronic computer system, laboratories, rooms for low-temperature physics research, and a library, in addition to offices for twenty researchers.
. . .
On September 1, 1990, West Texas State University joined the Texas A&M University System, and on September 25, 1992, the board of regents changed the school's name to West Texas A&M University. At that time the student body numbered 6,000, and class size averaged twenty-three students.
Undergraduates, who composed 80 percent of the student population, could choose among fifty fields of study, and forty-four graduate programs were offered. The university was the major institution of higher learning in the Panhandle region of Texas and also drew students from neighboring states. . . .
West Texas A&M was on a 135-acre main campus and had access to 294 additional acres for expansion purposes. The college occupied part of the T Anchor Ranch, and the old ranch headquarters has been preserved for historical interest. The university had a 186-acre farm, and its Nance Ranch was 2,400 acres. The school also ran a University Horse Center and a dairy. . . .
The Old Main Building, constructed in 1910, was renovated in 1988 and was the oldest building on campus. . . .
In 2000 the university offered fifty-four undergraduate and thirty graduate degree programs. Enrollment in the fall of that year was 6,775, including 5,561 undergraduates, and the faculty numbered about 270."