President’s Home

Before serving as the President’s Home in recent years, the stately house at the corner of University Avenue and Hiram Street previously served as home to the music department, residence hall, student union, art department and more. The home was built in the early 1900s by Colorado gold miner John Kuhn. Friends University purchased it in 1922 to house the music department. In 1930, it became a men’s residence hall that was officially called East Hall, but referred to by students as Menden Hall after Friends University President Dr. William O. Mendenhall. In the 1940s, it became a women’s residence hall with residents sleeping on unheated sleeping porches on the north and east sides. In the late 1950s and 1960s, it served intermittently as a student union and married students housing before becoming home to the Art Department in the 1970s. In 1984, the house was converted back into a private residence as housing for the president of Friends University.