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Jonathan Smith serves as editor.
The Optimist was named the top student newspaper in Texas at the annual Texas Intercollegiate Press Association convention. The Sing Song issue also won Best in Show. Paul Anthony served as editor.
Former Optimist photographer and Dallas Morning News senior photographer David Leeson won journalism's highest award: the 2004 Pulitzer Prize. Leeson, a 1978 ACU graduate, shared the award for Brea...
The Optimist made news in more ways than one. Not only did the Optimist make news by reporting events affecting students and presenting it in the newspaper, but it also made news with revolutionary...
Spanning the campus with music, news and sports became a reality for KACU radio when the station acquired a low-power transmitter in January. The transmitter allowed students on the northwest edge ...
District Judge Pat Boone issues a restraining order against ACU and the family of donor F.O. Masten in a lawsuit over his death-bed will, which left the university roughly $50 million in assets, pr...
Second-year editor Ron Hadfield and his staff made the change from the basement of the Campus Center to the third floor of the new Don H. Morris Center. With the change in offices came a change in ...
Lowell Perry, who founded KACC (now KACU), is killed when the airplane he was riding in to scout potential sites for a short-wave Christian broadcast transmitter exploded and crashed in the Carribb...
During Rick Hagar’s year, ACC changed its name to Abilene Christian University. The Board of Trustees met on a Friday to discuss the change, and the staff, anticipating they would change the name, ...
The infamous "White Book" of 1972 was pulled by the university administration, which objected to its counter-culture themes. The books were repurchased from students who bought them and destroyed, ...
During editor Mark Cunningham’s term, the newspaper was threatened seriously when two weekly columns angered President John C. Stevens. The two columns, “Sons of Sceva” and “Random Notes,” were sat...
Robert English and Mary Grady become the first African-American Optimist staff members.
A student demonstration during Billie Silvey’s term as editor depicts the unrest of the era. Silvey says students demonstrated against a speaker from the radical John Birch Society. “We had a great...
Heber Taylor and Reg Westmoreland leave ACU, forcing the closure of the Department of Journalism and a reduction in the number of journalism courses offered.
Dudley Lynch became editor in 1960-61 but resigned at mid-semester because of differences with President Don H. Morris. An article published in Lynch’s last paper said Lynch “blamed his action on a...
Mac Bedichek, son of Wendell H. Bedichek, became editor of the Optimist. Wendell and Mac Bedichek have been the only father-son pair to edit the paper in its history.
The Department of Journalism is spun off from the English Department with Dr. Heber Taylor and Reg Westmoreland directing it.
Known as "The voice and choice of Abilene Christian College," KACC·FM now serves Abilene and the surrounding territory within a 40-mile radius. Control rooms. studios. and equipment are located in ...
The first station manager of KACC is Bill Teague, future president of the university.
KACC begin its inaugural year with an opening marathon. DJ Jack Stovall spun the vinyl records during that first broadcast.
With ACC's acquisition of a printing press, printing of the Optimist moved to campus from downtown Abilene and the paper's size went to tabloid from broadsheet.
Louie Welch serves as business manager of the Optimist. He goes on to be elected mayor of Houston for five terms.
During 1932 the Optimist began another long-standing tradition, the April Fool’s edition. Usually called the Pessimist, the edition featured stories created in jest, often about faculty members or ...
During this year the administration canceled a popular column called “Hoots of the Owl.’’ The column began in 1928 and was written by a variety of staff members and never was signed. The article fe...
Paul Southern served as ACU Press Club President
The Optimist and Prickly Pear formed the Press Club and became associated with the Texas Intercollegiate Press Association. The Press Club elected editors for both publications during the early yea...
Arthur Slater distributed the first student newspaper at Abilene Christian College in 1912. He put that first paper together himself, acting as reporter, copyeditor and typesetter. He even supplied...
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