Headlines from Harvard’s history

The Carpenter Center celebrated

Illustration of Carpenter Center

1919 

Alice Hamilton is appointed assistant professor of industrial medicine, becoming the first woman to hold a professorial position at the University.

1939 

A negotiated agreement on raises ends the threat of a strike by dining hall workers, and the American Federation of Labor is recognized as their sole bargaining agent.

1944 

Between matinees at the RKO Theatre in Boston, Duke Ellington visits Harvard to discuss “Negro Music in America” before a crowd in Paine Hall, and then treats the audience to a medley that includes “Don’t Get Around Much Anymore” and “Mood Indigo.”

1959 

Radcliffe’s weekly paper, Percussion, has sponsored a fashion contest to pick the best-dressed Radcliffe girl, who will enter a national contest sponsored by a fashion magazine. Barnard and Moors Halls voted not to participate, calling the contest “against Radcliffe’s principles.”

1964 

Sixteen predominantly Negro colleges have been invited to send one student each (preferably a junior contemplating graduate study) to Harvard’s summer school on scholarships “to [enable] the students to attend a cosmopolitan, integrated university to test their ability for…and interest in” graduate work.

1974 

A $200 increase in tuition and a $125 increase in room-and-board rates raise the cost of a Harvard-Radcliffe education to $5,350.

1979 

Sixteen-year-old Carpenter Center, the only building in North America designed by the Swiss architect Le Corbusier, has won a listing in the National Register of Historic Places. (The Center celebrated its sixtieth anniversary in 2023.)

1984 

The Business School has announced that M.B.A. students will be required to use portable IBM personal computers as part of regular class preparation, and the Expository Writing program is offering an experimental section in which the papers are written and critiqued on computers on loan from IBM.

You might also like

250 Years Ago, Harvard Was Home to a Revolution

A look at the sights, sounds, and characters that put the University on the frontlines of history

The Woman Who Penned the Case for War

Mercy Otis Warren’s poetry and plays incited the Patriot movement.

The Harvard-Trained Doctor Who Urged a Revolution

Before his heroic death, General Joseph Warren was dubbed “the greatest incendiary in all of America.”

Most popular

AI Outperforms Doctors in Emergency Room Tasks, New Harvard Study Shows

Researchers say the technology could help physicians with triage, diagnosis.

Harvard Finances 2018

A survey of the University’s annual financial report

Harvard Alumni and Faculty Win Six Pulitzer Prizes

Winners include Jill Lepore, Bess Wohl, Pablo Torre, and Hannah Natanson.

Explore More From Current Issue

A woman in glasses gestures while speaking to two attentive listeners at a table.

How to Cook with Wild Plants

From wild greens spanakopita to rose petal panna cotta, forager and chef Ellen Zachos makes one-of-a-kind meals.

A woman with long hair leans on a table, looking out a large window with rain-streaked glass.

A Harvard Economist Probes the Affordable Housing Crisis

From understanding gender pay gaps to the housing crisis, Rebecca Diamond’s research aims to improve lives.

A man holding a revolver and lantern, wearing a hat and coat, appears to be walking cautiously.

Scoundrels, Then and Now

On con men, Mark Twain, and the powers of the Harvard name