Albany College
The Oregon Legislature chartered the Albany Collegiate Institute in February
1867 and Albany residents raised $8,000 in cash and promissory notes to
erect a building for the school on land donated by Thomas and Walter Monteith.
Rev. William Monteith became the first president of Albany College and
86 students enrolled in 1869. Four women comprised the first graduating
class in 1873.
In 1905, the college purchased 46 acres on the edge of town for a new campus. Beset by the Great Depression, in 1934 the trustees authorized class offerings in the Portland area. The last class graduated from the Albany campus in 1938. The campus was sold to the U.S. Bureau of Mines.
In 1941, Albany College became Lewis & Clark College and moved to the campus on Southwest Palatine Road, Portland. Northwestern School of Law merged with Lewis & Clark in 1965.
Today, Lewis & Clark College is the state's largest private college
with 1,600 undergraduates and over 1,100 graduate students in law, education,
counseling psychology, and other programs. The college draws students
from every state in the U.S. and many foreign countries. 
The college affirms
its history and its presence in Albany. Albany Hall, a quadrangle of buildings
on the campus, speaks to that heritage. The college also has the original
foundation cornerstone of the Albany Collegiate Institute, the brass keys
to the building's doors, the original cash box, and many other historical
objects, documents, and photographs related to its origins in Albany.