A piece of UND history

Call it the Resolute Desk of UND, this desk at which the University’s first president likely drafted speeches and read reports

Nancy (Murdoch) Englerth, ’58, and her daughter, Rachel (Englerth) Fay, ’81, recently donated a family heirloom rich in UND history back to the University of North Dakota.

Nancy recalls that the desk originally belonged to UND’s first president William Blackburn … or maybe it was UND’s second president Homer Sprague? Either way, it came into her family’s possession when her father, the late Rev. Eldred Murdoch, ’41, purchased it in the early 1950s when he and his wife, Elizabeth, taught at UND.

After Rev. Murdoch’s death in 1962, while Nancy and her husband Edward, ’58, along with their daughters Rachel and Alison, ’79, traveled abroad, UND’s Dean Wilkins used the desk in his Merrifield Hall office.

(When Blackburn sat behind the desk, it was housed in Old Main, the first building on campus and the current site of UND’s iconic Eternal Flame. The desk was later moved to Merrifield Hall.)

“I remember when Alison and I helped to carry this enormous and very heavy two-piece article of furniture out of Merrifield Hall in 1973 or 1974,” Rachel said. “It has been in my mother’s possession ever since.”

It was Nancy’s wish to gift the desk back to the University from which it came. And we thank her for sharing this rich piece of history.

About the author

Alyssa Konickson is director of Storytelling & Content Strategy and editor of UND Alumni Magazine at the UND Alumni Association & Foundation.