Rev. Dr. Edward Cooke was installed President of the University June 29, 1853.  At the same time the corner stone of the College building was laid by Hon. M.C.  Darling, Rev. Alfred Bronson, D.D., delivering the address.  The edifice, a substantial stone structure, one hundred and twenty by sixty feet, and five stories high, was pushed forward to an early completion by the untiring energy of the agents, Rev. J.S.  Prescott and Col.  H.L.  Blood.  For college purposes the building ranked among the first in the West.

In both Students and Faculty Lawrence University has been fortunate from the beginning.  As to the former, she has sent out not a few representative men to the several occupations of life, several of whom will find mention in these pages.  As to the latter, she has enjoyed the labors of a class of instructors whose names have found an honorable place in both the clerical and literary circles of the Commonwealth.

Of Rev. Wm. H. Sampson, the first head of the Faculty, a record has been made in a former chapter, and it would afford me pleasure to refer at length to the several members of the first Faculty, as also to all the Professors who have followed, but I find it will be impossible to do so in these brief pages.

Rev. Edward Cooke, D.D., the first President, entered the New Jersey Conference in 1843.  He was a graduate of the Wesleyan University, Middletown, Conn.  His first appointment was Principal of the Pennington Male Seminary, N.J.  In 1847 he was transferred to the New England Conference, and stationed at Saugus.  His subsequent appointments were Union Church Charlestown, D. Street, Centenary, and Hanover, of Boston, Mass.  He was transferred to the Wisconsin Conference in 1853, having been elected President of the University.  As a President he was very popular, and during his administration of six years had the satisfaction to see the Institution rise from a feeble preparatory school to a full-fledged University.  In addition to the ordinary duties of his position, he was largely concerned with the financial matters of the enterprise, but in every portion of the work Dr. Cooke showed great wisdom, tact and devotion.  And during his term he laid the friends of education in the State under lasting obligations.

After leaving the University, he was stationed at Summerfield Church, Milwaukee, but, returning to Boston at the close of his term, he was elected Principal of the Wesleyan Academy, Wilbraham, Mass., where he has enjoyed great success in his administration.  Dr. Cooke is a man of fine presence, and a good Preacher.  Genial in spirit, full of anecdote and well read, he is very companionable.  He has a multitude of friends in Wisconsin.