Midway University

Midway University is a private Christian liberal arts university in Midway, Kentucky. Related by covenant to the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ), it enrolls approximately 1,600 students earning two-year and four-year degrees as well as master's degrees. Midway was the only women's college in Kentucky until 2016. In May 2016, Midway's Board of Trustees voted unanimously to begin admitting male undergraduates for the first time in the school's history in the fall 2017 semester. The Day College offers majors in business, marketing, equine studies, sports management, english, mathematics, biology, nursing, psychology, criminal justice and teacher education. In addition to the Day College, Midway University offers evening and online accelerated degree-completion programs for working adults.

Midway University originally opened as the Kentucky Female Orphan School on October 3, 1849, with one teacher and sixteen female students. The nine members of the Board of Trustees oversaw the school's endowment, the building and five acres of land.

The co-founders of the school were Dr. L.L. (Lewis Letig) Pinkerton (1812–1875), minister of the Midway Christian Church (Disciples of Christ) from 1844 to 1860,and Mr. James Ware Parrish, a Midway Christian Church elder. They obtained a charter on February 17, 1847, from the Kentucky legislature through the help of Kentucky Senator Major George W. Williams.Before the school was permitted to open, an endowment of twenty-five thousand dollars had to be secured and investments made. This time was used for soliciting funds, purchasing land, construction of a building, and drafting and outline of government and management for the school.

The school is located on a 200-acre (0.81 km2) working farm in the heart of the Kentucky Bluegrass region. The campus overlooks Midway, a small town in central Kentucky. The National Park Service placed Pinkerton Hall, the oldest building on campus, on the National Register of Historic Places on November 20, 1974.