In 1891, Fort Lewis was decommissioned and converted into a federal, off-reservation Indian boarding school.
In 1911, the fort's property and buildings in Hesperus were transferred to the state of Colorado to establish an "agricultural and mechanic arts high school." That deed came with two conditions: that the land would be used for an educational institution, and "to be maintained as an institution of learning to which Indian students will be admitted free of tuition and on an equality with white students" in perpetuity. Both conditions have been the missions and guides for the Fort Lewis school's various incarnations over the past century.
The Fort Lewis high school expanded into a two-year college in the 1930s, and in 1948 it became Fort Lewis A&M College, under the State Board of Agriculture's control. The "Aggies" studying at the Fort Lewis Branch of the Colorado State College of Agriculture and Mechanics could take courses in agriculture, forestry, engineering, veterinary science, and home economics.
Fort …
