Susquehanna University's history from 1858 to 2000 has occurred in three
stages, each expressing a different mission. The school was founded in
1858 as the Missionary Institute of the Evangelical Lutheran Church to
fulfill the vision of the Rev. Benjamin Kurtz, a Lutheran cleric and
editor of the Lutheran Observer. He was a partisan of the American
Lutheran viewpoint caught up in a fratricidal battle with Lutheran
orthodoxy. The Missionary Institute sustained his viewpoint in the
preparation, gratis, of men called to preach the gospel in foreign and
home missions. A complementary purpose was to educate young people in
Selinsgrove, Pennsylvania at both the Institute and its sister school,
the Susquehanna Female College. When the Female College folded in 1873,
the Institute became coeducational.