Adams State College is a small state-supported liberal arts college in Alamosa, Colorado, U.S., in the San Luis Valley. Adams State was founded in 1921 as a teacher's college but now offers a variety of programs including masters degrees in many fields. Billy Adams, a Colorado legislator who would later become governor, worked for three decades before obtaining the authorization to found Adams State Normal School in 1921. His goal was to educate teachers for remote, rural areas, such as the San Luis Valley. The college's first graduate, in 1926, was Harriett Dalzell Hester, who went on to become the school's librarian and Alamosa County's schools superintendent. With only a grade school education himself, Adams came to the SLV in 1879 at the age of 17 to begin ranching. Within three years, he was mayor of Alamosa. Alamosa was a rough-hewn town in those days. The Rio Grande typically flooded each spring, turning Main Street to mud. Once the college was built, a hedge of Russian olives had to be planted along the campus edge to keep out herds of horses. Then, as now, potatoes were the area’s primary cash crop.