Revisit the "Wives of the Presidents" by USU Former First Lady Phyllis Hall

As Utah State University celebrates the Year of the Woman, it invites everyone to learn about USU's first ladies of the past.

Former USU First Lady Phyllis A. Hall reviews the lives and contributions of past USU first ladies in a small pamphlet she assembled in 2003 titled, “Wives of the Presidents: Agricultural College of Utah to Utah State University, 1890–2002.”

Starting with Belle Graham Osborn Sanborn, the first, first lady at the Agricultural College of Utah, and moving through 2002, Hall looks at the institution’s 14 first ladies.

“There seems to be no direct evidence that Belle moved to Logan,” Hall wrote in the pamphlet. “Her fourth child was born 18 years after her first child in Missouri, the same year that Jeremiah Sanborn (1890-1894) became president. At this time they also had a three-year-old son. Their oldest son, Harry, became a student in the Agricultural College of Utah. Evidence for this exists in the demerit books where Harry’s name appears. Nothing further is known about Belle Graham Osborn Sanborn.”

The university’s second first lady, Annie Maria Pettegrew Paul (1894-1896), chose not to live on campus with her family. Her husband reported in 1895 that: “I found it necessary in order to meet what seems to be public requirements of the president of the college to remove from the College House, built for the President, to a more accessible portion of Logan City.”

Renovations were made to the president’s home on campus when the third president, Joseph Marion Tanner (1896-1900), and his somewhat extended family moved back into the farmhouse on campus. The following renovations were requested: "electrification, indoor plumbing, re-papering, a new furnace and the installation of a telephone."

Hall found that various first ladies had multiple interests, ranging from work with the PTA to writing. Leah Eudora Dunford Widtsoe (1907-1916) spoke often on health and nutrition. Phebe Almira Nebeker Peterson (1916-1945) was a graduate of the Agricultural College, and as first lady she organized the Dames Club for wives of married students and the Newcomers Club. Her first dinner party at the school was for the entire football team. Many of the university’s first ladies were teachers, including Hall.

Hall joined the first ladies club in 2001 when Kermit L. Hall became the university's 14th president, a position she held until January 2005. She received a bachelor's in education at the University of Akron and earned a master's in library science from George Peabody College for Teachers in Nashville. She worked as a teacher and as a children’s librarian. 

For more information on the First Wives of Utah State University, visit The Encyclopedic History of Utah State University, by Robert Parson. The wives are featured under the topic “First Ladies.”