This is a story that ran in the Sidelines 100th Anniversary Edition newspaper, a print edition meant to commemorate the 100th anniversary of Sidelines.
The Student Government Association at MTSU will continue its efforts to rename the Forrest Hall building to the Army ROTC building, despite previous denial by the state.
University President Sidney A. McPhee and the SGA have made countless efforts in fighting for the removal of Confederate General Nathan Bedford Forrest’s name from the campus ROTC building for nearly a decade. Their efforts include recommendations, protests and hearings before the Tennessee Historic Commission, which has denied their petitions more than five times.
Louis Kyriakoudes, an MTSU history professor and director of the Albert Gore Research Center, has testified before the Tennessee Historical Commission on the history of Confederate symbols at MTSU twice. Kyriakoudes said that the Confederate imagery should be removed because it is outdated and holds no significance to the university.
“Nathan Bedford Forrest had no role or connection in the founding of the university,” Kyriakoudes said. “The university was founded over 30 years after he died.”
MTSU has also abandoned the use of Confederate imagery around campus, and the only remaining Confederate symbol is Forrest Hall, according to Kyriakoudes.
SGA president RJ Ware shared his plans to continue advocating for the renaming of the
building. He proposed an educational approach that would enable students to take a stronger stance toward their efforts.
“I think we should look into educating the student body and the general public about the building and its name,” Ware said. “I think we’ve gone a couple of years without really having an organized way to educate students to join us in those efforts so that they can have the appropriate education on the topic.”
According to MTSU, the initiative began in 2015 when McPhee appointed a 17-member Forrest Hall task force to review the building’s name in response to a national discussion concerning Confederate iconography on public property. The discussion followed a mass shooting at a historically Black South Carolina church.
MTSU also said the ROTC building was dedicated to Forrest in 1958 in honor of his tactical methods as a military Confederate officer. However, the MTSU community began rising against the dedication during the Civil Rights movement due to his affiliation with the Ku Klux Klan.
Former SGA Senator Autumn Gray said the presence of the general’s name makes her feel uncomfortable and that it misrepresents the university.
“They want to rename it because that name doesn’t represent MTSU,” Gray said. “We always pride MTSU [for] being very diverse, we’re very exclusive. We all welcome anybody from anybody’s race, background, orientation, whatever. So to have the name of the former grand wizard of [the] KKK on this building, for an African-American person myself, it makes me feel uncomfortable.”
The task force recommended the name “Forrest Hall” be changed to “The Army ROTC Building” after holding three public forums and two open deliberations. Following McPhee’s acceptance of the recommendation, the Tennessee Board of Regents, the former governing body of Forrest Hall, endorsed the president’s request.
A year later, the university began its long journey of petitioning the Tennessee Historic Commission to request waivers to rename Forrest Hall. They were denied many times until the commission’s disbandment in 2024.
Former two-term SGA president Michai Mosby was the first of three SGA presidents to fight before the commission on behalf of the student body, even being the first to testify before the commission. Mosby highly encourages the future administrations and other members of the student body to keep fighting because our voices matter.
“Just because we receive one ‘no’ does not mean that the purpose and the cause behind what we are fighting for is invalid,” Mosby said. “To those who are wanting to do more and wanting to see this name change, I say keep fighting, keep beating boots on the ground and keep gathering support from other students because there’s strength in numbers. The more students that actually vocalize and voice their concerns about it, the state is powered to listen.”
While many students are at loss on the next items of action, Ware maintains a bright outlook on the vital role SGA will continue to have on the issue.
“I will continue to fight to get Forrest Hall renamed,” Ware said. “You should be confident in your school’s administration in fighting to get that name removed. I hope that they will help us in that effort of it being solved and doing everything that we can to make sure that that name comes down off that building sooner rather than later.”
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