The university was founded Feb. 16, 1863, under provisions of the Morrill Act which established land grant colleges. Historians disagree over whether K-State or Michigan State was the first land grant college in the nation.
The 664-acre main campus is in northern Manhattan, convenient to both business and residential districts. Under an enactment of the 1991 Kansas Legislature, the Salina campus was established through a merger of the former Kansas College of Technology with the university.
Additional university sites include 18,000 acres in the four branch locations of the Agricultural Experiment Station at Hays, Garden City, Colby and Parsons, and 8,600 acres in the Konza Prairie Biological Station operated by the Division of Biology.
K-State accomplishments have far-reaching effects. Most NASA space shuttle flights carry K-State experiments aboard. Astronaut space gloves and the water-purifying system used on the NASA space shuttles were developed here. K-State is at the forefront of a national atomic physics research program that could mean nuclear power without nuclear waste. K-State is home to a national Center for Basic Cancer Research.
The university hosts the prestigious Landon Lectures on Public Issues, honoring the late Kansas statesman Alfred M. Landon. Since 1966 the series has featured more than 110 nationally prominent speakers. Past speakers include former Presidents Jimmy Carter, Gerald Ford, Richard Nixon and Ronald Reagan, who appeared twice in the series.
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