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Purdue University, referring to the main campus, is a public land-grant university located in West Lafayette, Indiana, USA. It is particularly noted for its schools of engineering and agriculture, and as of recently, for its
school of business. Equally renowned and lesser publicized are Purdue's strength in
liberal and fine arts. The
state of Indiana's school of veterinary medicine is at
Purdue. Purdue has six other campuses in other parts of Indiana, of which three campuses are also affiliated with Indiana University. Purdue's School of Technology also has seven
satellite locations throughout Indiana.
Purdue's athletic teams are called the Boilermakers. They participate in
the NCAA's Division I-A, and in the Big Ten Conference. The team name purports to have come from a former practice of illegally employing
industrial workers for its football team. Another story of the name's origin is that it was a derogatory name conferred by
another Indiana school, Wabash College, in order to insult the engineering students for being 'rude mechanicals.'
Classes at Purdue began in 1874 but it was not founded by philanthropist John Purdue, as
is commonly believed. The state of Indiana sought a location to establish its land-grant university, and John Purdue offered
$150,000 and 100 acres (400,000 mē) of land near the city of Lafayette. The university was named for him because of his generous donation. Legend has it that the
Purdue gift carried the stipulation that all permanent university buildings must be brick or the entire 100 acres (400,000 mē)
reverts to John Purdue's heirs. This legend cannot be substantiated.
Its alumni have a strong relationship with NASA and the space program. Purdue has
produced 22 astronauts, including the first and last humans to walk on the moon, Neil Armstrong and Eugene Cernan respectively. Two
alumni, "Gus" Grissom and Roger Chaffee, were killed on the launchpad in the tragic accident that befell Apollo 1. Other alumni have flown space shuttles and
boarded the Russian Mir space module.
Famous alumni
Alumni astronauts
Famous professors
External links and references
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