A walk on campus could become a lesson in ISU history.

Historical signs are being put up around Iowa State to educate people on important accomplishments at the university.

The 16 signs were the idea of Carole Custer, director of university marketing. “It’s been about a three-year project,” she said. “I asked colleges and units to suggest ideas for what we called `brag points’ about things that had occurred on campus.”

Custer said she felt these signs would help Iowa State establish itself as a leader in academics.

“This all goes with our strategic plan of becoming the best land-grant university,” she said.

With funding from the president’s office, Custer said she could afford to do the first 16 signs.

Steve Prater, an architect for Facilities Planning and Management, said many of the signs contain little-known ISU facts.

“An interesting one is that an Iowa State [agricultural] engineering professor developed a baler that produced those big round hay bales you see dot the countryside,” Custer said. “That is now the predominate forage-handling machine.”

Other signs include the first electronic digital computer, the first artist-in-residence and the first land-grant economics college. Prater said the signs are pieces of ISU history that shouldn’t be forgotten.

“I think the plaques are interesting, and they’re valuable assets to the university,” he said.

The signs are not meant to represent the exact location of the accomplishment, Custer said.

“We took a bit of license to position these in areas where we knew visitors would probably have the opportunity to read them,” she said. “Not only is this for visitors to campus, but this helps everybody who is on campus daily.”

There are plans for more signs to be put up in the future, she said.

“People who have seen them on campus already are sending me suggestions, and now we’ll go to work to try and verify [the facts],” she said. “We welcome all kinds of new ideas. We know that there are a lot more brag points out there, so we welcome additional suggestions.”

Suggestions for future signs can be e-mailed to Custer at [email protected].