Lombard College

Lombard College was founded in 1853 by the Universalist Church as the Illinois Liberal Institute.

In 1855, however, a major fire damaged much of the college, placing its future at risk, but a large gift from Benjamin Lombard (1815–1882), a Massachusetts-born farmer and businessman,[1] rescued the institution, rechristened as Lombard University.

Lombard College was a member of the Illinois Intercollegiate Athletic Conference from 1910 to 1929.

Sigma Nu fraternity's Delta Theta chapter, which formed at Lombard in 1867 as the Delta Theta Society (local) and became a part of Sigma Nu in 1891, continues its activities at Knox to this day.

When the college closed in 1930, the Lombard charter was transferred to Meadville Theological School in Chicago, a Unitarian seminary, bringing with it Lombard's privilege of a tax exemption, "one of only three in Illinois granting full tax-exempt status in perpetuity for all college-owned property.