Phillip Frederick Meusch

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Phillip Frederick Meusch, a minister who came to the United States from Germany in 1850, built the Proseminary's faculty and student body as its second inspector. By1879, enrollment had swelled more than seven-fold from the initial fourteen students who had arrived at the instituition which would later come to be known as Elmhurst College. Severe overcrowding during Meusch's inspectorship led to the construction of the first permanent classroom building on campus, the Hauptgebaude, later to be known as Old Main, which is still in use to this day at the College.

Reverend Meusch also oversaw the expansion and refinement of the school's curriculum. By 1878, when the school published its first catalog, the curriculum had expanded to include a distinctly modern discipline, laboratory science. Students held Inspector Meusch in high regard, even renaming a student society in his honor. Meusch died suddenly in 1880 while still in office. He is buried in a cemetery adjacent to the College.