LSU Campus
- LSU is a community of nearly 36,000 staff, faculty and students from every state and more than 120 countries.
- LSU's campus is situated on more than 2,000 acres bordered on the west by the Mississippi River, and contains nearly 1,200 live-oak trees.
- LSU is one of only 21 universities in the nation having land-grant, sea-grant and space-grant status.
- Fifty-seven of LSU's more than 250 principal buildings are listed in the National Register of Historic Places.
- The adjacent LSU Lakes were developed from swamps in the 1930s as a public works project.
- LSU's landscaping was called "a botanical joy" in its listing among the 20 best campuses in America in Thomas Gaines's The Campus as a Work of Art.
- During the 1930s, many of LSU's live oaks and magnolia trees were planted by landscape artist the late Steele Burden. The live oak trees on LSU's campus have been valued at $36 million. Through the LSU Foundation's "Endow an Oak" program, individuals or groups are able to endow live oaks across campus.
- In the 1970s, azaleas, crepe myrtles, ligustrum, and camellias were planted in the quadrangle, and sidewalks were added.
- Since the 1930s, more than 200 principal buildings have been constructed and others are currently under way.
- The University moved to its present location in 1926, the fourth move since its inception in 1860.
- Theodore C. Link was chosen to create the original campus master plan. Although he died before the plan was completed, his designs define the Italian Renaissance character of the campus, which is marked by red pan tile roofs, overhanging eaves, and honey-colored stucco.
- Louisiana State Agricultural & Mechanical College was established by an act of the legislature, approved to carry out the U.S. Morrill Act of 1862, granting lands for this purpose. It temporarily opened in New Orleans in 1874, where it remained until it merged with Louisiana State University in 1877.
This page was last updated Tuesday, August 10, 2010