He was born 1860 in Lee County, North Carolina and graduated from UNC-Chapel Hill, where he was a member of the Dialectic and Philanthropic Societies, in 1881.

The North Carolina legislature passed this bill, and issued a charter for a ″Normal and Industrial School for White Girls″ on February 18, 1891.

[2] McIver was chosen to be the first president of the State Normal and Industrial School (now UNCG), which opened to students on October 5, 1892.

He died on September 17, 1906, of apoplexy on a train taking William Jennings Bryan from Raleigh to Greensboro.

It was a campus tradition to paint messages and clothes on the beloved founder until the donation of "The Rawk" in 1973.