Last year, the Iowa Wesleyan Board of Trustees chairman said after 181 years Iowa Wesleyan University would turn its lights off. “The board is committed that we would not start a semester if we did not have the funds to complete it,” Bob Miller said in March 2023 press conference. “That is what has forced us to this decision today.” He did not return numerous requests for comment for this story. The town of Mount Pleasant was incorporated in 1842, the same year the university was established. The town and gown siblings grew up beside one another. And since the news of the closure, residents of Mount Pleasant have been working to preserve the memory of the university while making sense of its 60-acre campus.
