Ernest L. Wilkinson*

Born in 1899, Ernest Wilkinson grew up in Hell's Half Acre on the outskirts of Ogden, Utah. Wilkinson's father held two full-time jobs most of his life so that he could support his seven children.

During his high school years, Wilkinson attended Weber Academy, which later became Weber College. During the summers, he earned money by working on farms. After serving in the U.S. Army for a year during World War I, he returned to Utah. He enrolled in Brigham Young University (BYU), where he received a bachelor's degree in 1921. He taught English and public speaking at Weber College. He later attended George Washington University Law School, from which he graduated at the head of his class. He earned a law degree at Harvard Law School.

For several years, Wilkinson practiced law in New York City and taught at the New Jersey Law School, a predecessor of Rutgers Law School at Newark. In 1935, he organized his own law firm, Wilkinson, Cragun & Barker in Washington, D.C. In 1951, Wilkinson became head of BYU, building it over a 20-year period into the nation's largest religious university, with enrollment growing from about 4,600 to more than 25,000. He resigned in 1971 to write a comprehensive history of the university.