UALR students are generally familiar with Fribourgh Hall, many having taken a science course there, or happened to pass by and notice its recent renovations.

Most of us, however, are not familiar with the man behind the name: Dr. James H. Fribourgh, legendary teacher, researcher, and administrator.

A personal experience from Dr. Fribourgh taken from UALR’s 1972 yearbook provides a comical glimpse into his first day on campus:

Dr. James H. Fribourgh, Vice Chancellor for Academic Affairs, came to Little Rock Junior College in 1949, after having received his Ph.D. at the State University of Iowa. This was the college’s first year on it’s present campus, when the city limits ended with Fair Park Boulevard and there was only pasture and farm land west of University Avenue, then a dirt road.

“This was my first job and I was a long way from home in Iowa. I had never been down to the school – at that time you just negotiated over the telephone and didn’t come in for a visit and all the formalities as done now.

I remember I got in late at night and spent the night in the Lafayette Hotel. The next morning I went to take a cab out to Little Rock Junior College and the cab driver had no idea where the junior college was. He called the cab company office on the car radio and they didn’t know.

By this time I was beginning to wonder “What have I gotten into, no one knows where this place exists!’ Finally after 15 or 20 minutes they figured out, ‘Oh, that must be the place out there the other side of Fair Park,’ and sure enough it was.”

Read the rest of Dr Fribourgh’s interview..

To offer a glimpse of how the UALR neighborhood must have appeared to Dr. Fribourgh in his first 1949 encounter, the top photo of University Avenue in the series below was taken in 1952.

image source: 25 Years of Arkansas Gazette Photography: 1950 – 1975

See Also:

Leadership Award to Honor UALR’s Fribourgh
“A former provost and vice chancellor for academic affairs, Fribourgh, 84, retired from administration and returned to his first love, teaching. As a retirement gift, his colleagues endowed a scholarship in his name.”