Giving Clubs were established to recognize annual contributors to Wabash. All gifts secured between July 1, 2013 and June 30, 2014 will count toward fiscal year 2014 goals.
Lifelong friend and classmate of Edmund Hovey at Dartmouth, Caleb Mills came to Wabash College as her first teacher. Caleb Mills gave to Wabash an intellectual and moral character which has since become its most important source of strength. It was through his ideals, vision, and energy that he gave to the college its sense of mission which it has to this day never lost.
Byron K. Trippet Circle $2,500-$4,999
Byron K. Trippet enrolled as a freshman at Wabash in 1926, and for the following forty years he was a commanding and distinguished figure of the college. As a true spokesman for the liberal arts, he was a Rhodes scholar, had honorary degrees from four institutions, a member of the Phi Beta Kappa national lecture panel, and chair of the committee on liberal education of the Association of American Colleges. Far more than simply the ninth president, Trippet shaped the foundations of the Wabash experience.
Elihu W. Baldwin Circle $5,000-$9,999
Elihu W. Baldwin put his concept of the college's purpose indelibly on the character of Wabash. His presidency was the shortest of the first nine, but also the most important. Without him, an infant Wabash College might have disappeared, and his courage, resolution, and cheerfulness in the face of adversity were decisive in keeping Wabash alive through the years.
Frank H. Sparks Circle $10,000-$24,999
Frank Hugh Sparks was the eighth president of Wabash College who after a successful career in business early in his life found greater joy in teaching younger men. He came to Wabash to fulfill his dream of providing positive learning experiences for young men after returning to school himself to earn a PhD at the age of 40 solely to do so. Sparks introduced his ambitious strategy for building a "Greater Wabash" and the notion of its independence from government aid. Since then, Sparks has become one of the most recognized presidents of Wabash College.
If any single person stands out among the dedicated, courageous, tenacious missionaries and laymen who brought Wabash College into being, it has to be Edmund Otis Hovey. He was not only one of the founding fathers, but also a long time trustee, a teacher, treasurer of the college, fund raiser, and the first historian of the college - the original "Mr. Wabash". Most importantly, he was responsible for persuading Caleb Mills and Elihu Baldwin to leave the prosperous East and come to Wabash as the first teacher and president respectively.