Located in the Center for the Arts on the Valparaiso University campus, the Brauer Museum of Art is home to a nationally recognized collection of 19th, 20th, and 21st-century American art and includes works by Frederic Edwin Church, Asher B. Durand, Childe Hassam, Georgia O'Keeffe, and Ed Paschke.

It also houses the largest known collection of works by Junius R. Sloan (1827-1900), a Hudson River School painter who lived and worked in the Midwest. Other focus areas within the collection include world religious art and Midwestern regional art. As well as displaying selections from its permanent collection, the Brauer Museum hosts a full schedule of special exhibitions and events.

History

1859

Valparaiso Male and Female College was founded as one of the first coeducational colleges in the United States.

1871
Valparaiso Male and Female College was forced to close because of reverses brought about by the Civil War.

1873
Revived by an enterprising educator, Henry Baker Brown, as the Northern Indiana Normal School and Business Institute, it became a flourishing proprietary institution.

1900
Renamed Valparaiso College.

1906
Rechartered as Valparaiso University.

1925
The Lutheran University Association, an independent organization promoting higher education in the Lutheran-Christian tradition, purchased the school and operates it today.

History Shows Three Eras

In its 150-year history, Valparaiso University has passed through three distinct phases. Begun by Methodists in 1859 as an institution pioneering coeducation, the Valparaiso Male and Female College was forced by the reverses of the Civil War to close its doors in 1871.

It was revived in 1873 by an enterprising educator, Henry Baker Brown, as the Northern Indiana Normal School, renamed Valparaiso College in 1900, and rechartered in 1906 as Valparaiso University. During the next 20 years it won national recognition as a low-cost, no frills institution of higher learning; many alumni of this period achieved distinction in their fields as governors, legislators, scientists, business leaders and other professionals.

The modern era in University history began in 1925 with purchase of the institution by the Lutheran University Association, a group of clergy and church laity who saw a bright future for the University. Distinguished by its Lutheran heritage of scholarship, freedom and faith, the dreams of these modern founders continue to be fulfilled in the new chapters of Valparaiso University history.