Among the university's most notable alumni were several women who were influential music pioneers in the early 20th century, including Eva Jessye, who created her own choir and collaborated with major artists such as Virgil Thomson and George Gershwin in New York City.

Nora Douglas Holt was a composer, music critic and performer who toured in Europe as well as the United States.

Expanded around the start of the 20th century with an industrial department modeled after Booker T. Washington's Tuskegee Institute, the university served African Americans for several generations.

The town had been started in 1856 by abolitionists, Wyandot, free blacks, and settlers from the New England Emigrant Aid Company.

After the war, a committee of white men in the community, former abolitionists, organized a school to educate freedmen who had resettled in Quindaro and the Kansas City area.

In 1872 the state increased funding to establish a four-year normal school curriculum for the training of teachers.

In the late 19th century, the African Methodist Episcopal (AME) Conference began to help provide financial support for the school.

In 1890 the expanded college's first African-American president was appointed.In about 1911, students, faculty, and churches raised $2,000 (~$47,576 in 2023) to erect a statue of abolitionist John Brown.

In 1899 he gained legislative approval and financial support to add industrial education to the college, which prompted building numerous structures for the new classes, as well as dormitories.

It toured the United States and Canada, performing on the Chautaqua circuit, where it helped create goodwill and raise money for the college through fundraising.

Eva Jessye went to New York and founded her own choir, which was featured in her collaboration with composer Virgil Thomson and writer Gertrude Stein on Four Saints in Three Acts.

[10] The Great Depression reduced available financial support, and the university faced increasing competition to attract students.