The plans for what would become MSUM were laid down in 1885, when the Minnesota State Legislature passed a bill declaring the need for a new state normal school in the Red River Valley, with an eye on Moorhead. The State Senator who proposed the bill, State Senator Solomon Comstock, donated and appropriated the funds that would go to form Moorhead Normal School, which opened in 1888. In 1921, the State authorized the school to offer the four-year Bachelor of Science degree in Education in order to satisfy the need for high school teachers in northwest Minnesota, and the school became Moorhead State Teachers College.