This life-size bronze statue of Ichabod Washburn is located in front of 720 S Kansas, in a pocket park. The statue is shown in a mourning coat with a cane in the right hand and a tophat in the left. The text of the nearby marker reads:
(Seal of Washburn University)
Ichabod Washburn
1798 - 1868
Innovative businessman, fervent Congrgregationalist,
abolitionist and philanthropist, Ichabod Washburn
is the generous benefactor from Massachusetts
after whom Washburn University was named.
Apprenticed at the age of nine into the trades of
harness making and blacksmithing, by the age 20
Washburn had struck out on his own. Ultimately,
with innovations and inventions which revolutionized
the manufacture of wire products, he became a
captain of industry and made his fortune.
Washburn was a man of deep convictions. He was
a deacon in his church, active in abolitionist causes,
served a year in political office, and was an active
proponent of education as a right for all people
including women and people of color. He hoped
that education might one day take the place of
indentured apprenticeship.
His philanthropy focused primarily on education,
health care and churches. He, with two other men,
established a technical school in Worchester known
today as Worchester Polytechnic Institute. Other gifts
established Memorial Hospital (Worchester), Mission
Chapel, ans a home for elderly women.
In 1868, a mere two months before his death,
Washburn was approached about the financial
struggles of a small college in Topeka. Lincoln
College had been founded by the Congregational
Church in 1865 and had admitted women and African
Americans from its inception. Washburn pledged
$25,000 to the cause, ensuring the school's future.
Dedicated October 2015 as part of Washburn University's sesquicentennial celebration.
From Wikipedia - (
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"Ichabod Washburn (1798–1868) was a church deacon and industrialist from Worcester County, Massachusetts, United States. His financial endowments led to the naming of Washburn University in Topeka, Kansas and the foundation of Worcester Polytechnic Institute in Worcester, Massachusetts.
Washburn became an apprentice in a Leicester, Massachusetts blacksmith shop at the age of sixteen. He attended Leicester Academy with his distant relative Emory Washburn (later Governor of Massachusetts) and Stephen Salisbury II, both of whom would many years later help in the founding of Worcester Polytechnic Institute.[1]
By 1865, Washburn was co-proprietor (with his son-in-law Philip Moen) of Washburn and Moen Manufacturing Company, the world's largest wire mill. The company manufactured piano wire, crinoline and supports for hoop skirts, wire for fences and other similar products."
Information on Washburn University - (
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"Washburn University was established in February 1865 as Lincoln College by a charter issued by the State of Kansas and the General Association of Congregational Ministers and Churches of Kansas on land donated by abolitionist John Ritchie. The school was renamed Washburn College in 1868 after Ichabod Washburn pledged $25,000 to the school. Washburn was a church deacon, abolitionist and industrialist who resided in Worcester, Massachusetts.
Washburn University’s mascot, The Ichabods, honors the school’s early benefactor, Ichabod Washburn. The original design of the studious-looking, tailcoat-clad figure was created in 1938 by Bradbury Thompson (B.A. ‘34), who became an internationally acclaimed graphic artist.
In 1913 the medical department of Washburn College closed. Previously the Kansas Medical School had become infamous on December 10, 1895, when it was discovered that some of the bodies used for anatomical study had been stolen from local cemeteries. As the news was being printed (eventually across the country) the governor called out state troops to protect the school in fear of a riot. Three of the doctors, including the Dean of the school, and a janitor/student from the school were arrested as well as one man not a member of the school. Charges against the doctors were discharged, the janitor was convicted but had his conviction reversed on appeal and the final man was convicted but later pardoned.
During World War II, Washburn Municipal University was one of 131 colleges and universities nationally that took part in the V-12 Navy College Training Program which offered students a path to a Navy commission.
On June 8, 1966, only a few days after classes were dismissed for the summer, much of the campus was demolished by a tornado, and completely denuded of trees. Three months before the tornado struck, the Washburn Board of Trustees had reinsured every building on campus for the maximum amount. A week after the tornado struck, summer classes began at Topeka West High School. By the fall of 1966, Stoffer Hall was repaired and trailers were in place. It took years to reconstruct the campus, with students attending classes in trailers well into the early 1970s.
Formerly a municipal university, the university's primary funding was moved from city property tax to county sales tax sources in 1999, with the school retaining status as a municipal subdivision of the state. Washburn is governed by its own nine-member Board of Regents."