Headlines from Harvard’s history

Headlines from Harvard’s history

Cartoon shows an audience viewing a 3D rendering of the Holland Tunnel, with a ship floating above it and a car emerging from one end

Illustration by Mark Steele

1930

The Harvard Engineering Society enjoys an illustrated address on the building and running of the first vehicular tunnel under the Hudson River from Manhattan to New Jersey: the two-year-old Holland Tunnel, named for its first chief engineer, Clifford M. Holland ’05, S.B. ’06.

1940

The editors encourage readers to help the University Archives by clipping news of Harvard men, particularly from papers outside the Boston and New York areas: “the more obscure the man and the paper, the more useful the clipping.”

1945

Among the 189 degrees awarded at the close of winter term is the first posthumous A.B. for a student killed in action during the current war: Pfc. William Scoville Moore Jr., who died on a battlefield in France on Armistice Day 1944.

1955

Signs of spring: the Cambridge police begin a crackdown on the latest undergraduate vehicular craze—secondhand hearses. Local citizens, reports a spokesman, find them “depressing.”

1970

Despite limited publicity, note the editors, some 150 people turned up for the first meeting of the Harvard University Ecology Coalition in February. The loose union of campus groups “worrying …about the decline of our environment” made plans for teach-ins and other activities scheduled for April 21 and 22.

1995

Inaugurating its new business section, The New York Times reports publishers’ fevered efforts to find a new college-level introductory economics textbook, noting that Harvard’s N. Gregory Mankiw has received a $1.4-million advance for his nearly finished volume.

2005

The Corporation announces the divestment of stock holdings in PetroChina (which sought drilling rights in Sudan during the brutal war in Darfur) on the recommendation of its Committee on Shareholder Responsibility. Seniors Matthew Mahan and Brandon Terry had launched a campaign urging classmates to put their senior gift into an escrow account unless divestment occurred.

Related topics

You might also like

A Forgotten Harvard Anthem

Published the year the Titanic sank, “Harvard’s Best” is a quizzical ode to the University.

Yesterday’s News

A co-ed experiment that changed dorm life forever

Highlights from Harvard’s Past

The rise of Cambridge cyclists, a lettuce boycott, and Julia Child’s cookbooks

Most popular

Why Men Are Falling Behind in Education, Employment, and Health

Can new approaches to education address a growing gender gap?

The 1884 Cannibalism-at-Sea Case That Still Has Harvard Talking

The Queen v. Dudley and Stephens changed the course of legal history. Here’s why it’s been fodder for countless classroom debates.

Harvard’s Class of 2029 Reflects Shifts in Racial Makeup After Affirmative Action Ends

International students continue to enroll amid political uncertainty; mandatory SATs lead to a drop in applications.

Explore More From Current Issue

A jubilant graduate shouts into a megaphone, surrounded by a cheering crowd.

For Campus Speech, Civility is a Cultural Practice

A former Harvard College dean reviews Princeton President Christopher Eisgruber’s book Terms of Respect.

A bald man in a black shirt with two book covers beside him, one titled "The Magicians" and the other "The Bright Sword."

Novelist Lev Grossman on Why Fantasy Isn’t About Escapism

The Magicians author discusses his influences, from Harvard to King Arthur to Tolkien.

A stylized illustration of red coral branching from a gray base, resembling a fantastical entity.

This TikTok Artist Combines Monsters and Mental Heath

Ava Jinying Salzman’s artwork helps people process difficult feelings.