Although women had previously enrolled in Cornell as early as 1870, the absence of a women's dormitory was problematic in attracting and retaining female students. Sage Hall was built in 1875, financed by Ithaca businessman Henry W. Sage, to fill this need. "When you are ready to carry out the idea of educating young women as thoroughly as young men," Sage told his friend Ezra Cornell in 1868, "I will provide the endowment to enable you to do so." Sage and Andrew Dickson White toured Oberlin College to study facilities being used there to successfully undertake coeducation.