“You, as students, are a source of information of the first importance if the new center is to produce anything like a full return on its investment. Since it is for you primarily that the union is to be constructed, your needs, wants, feelings, opinions, and habits must be revealed clearly, or tens of thousands of dollars may be spent in erecting a monument to an unfulfilled purpose.

Although we are all admittedly less than perfect in our knowledge of our own needs and our ability to express them, and although it is unlikely that we can specify with exact accuracy the facilities and services that would be most beneficial and satisfying to us, there is nevertheless no better source for this information.”

Taken from the “Guide-Posts in Planning the Kansas State Union”. A 1950 address, at a K-State student convocation. ,given by Mr. Porter Butts, director of the Wisconsin Union, 1927-1968, and consultant during the planning of the K-State Student Union.

And so it was that in the early 1950's, the students of Kansas State University were given the charge to plan their student Union with the understanding of the debt they owed to the many students who were before them.

They were obligated to the students who, in 1938, voted, overwhelmingly, in favor of a student fee for the purpose of building a student union. Seventy two percent of the student body voted in this election with 76% of those voting in favor of the fee.

And they were obligated to the students in the 1940's who paid the student fee without experiencing the benefit of the building.

The K-State Student Union has gone through many changes in its first 50 years of providing quality programs and services to the students, faculty, staff, alumni and guests of K-State. But the foundation that was laid 50 plus years ago is the same principle that directs the Union today and the same one that will lead it into the future.

March 08, 2006 was the 50th anniversary of the day that the K-State Student Union first opened it doors for the K-State community. Lectures, entertainment, roll back pricing in our retail units, a huge anniversary cake and much more were involved in our celebration.