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Wesleyan University, one of
the first institutions of higher learning established by the Methodists,
opened in 1831 with 48 students, five
faculty members (including the president), and a tutor. Originally
called The Wesleyan University, the name
honors John Wesley, the founder of Methodism. The tuition was
$36. Religious connections, which waned after about 1910, were officially
severed in 1937.
Foss Hill took its name
from a professor, Archibald Foss, who lived in a house near the College
Cemetery in the mid-1800s.The house,
purchased by Wesleyan in 1880, was demolished in 1955 to make
room for construction of the Foss Hill dormitories.
The College Cemetery, on
Foss Hill, was established in 1837. The first burial, in 1837, was a
student; the final one, in 1980, was
Philip Brown ’44, former chairman of the Board of Trustees. Among the
40 or so graves are those of the
first president, Willbur Fisk, and the third president, Stephen Olin,
and their families; two members of
the early faculty; a founding trustee and three later trustees; faculty
sons and daughters who died in
childhood; four alumni; and eight who died while students on
campus. Two Chinese students also
are buried in the cemetery. One died in 1918 of the flu; the other had
left Wesleyan and died in Norwich,
Connecticut, in 1923.(Near the turn of the 20th century, several Wesleyan
graduates went to China as missionaries and founded universities. As a
result, a number of Chinese students
came to Wesleyan.)
Andrus Field opened in
1898 with a baseball game against the University of Virginia. Trustee
John Andrus had provided the funds
to turn the swampy "rear campus " into the athletic field..
In 1865 Wesleyan’s
first intercollegiate game was played. Yale won the baseball game, at
Wesleyan, 39 –13. It also was Yale’s first intercollegiate game.
On September 28, 1872,
coeducation began at Wesleyan with the enrollment of four
courageous women. All graduated with
the Class of 1876 and were elected to Phi Beta Kappa. Although three
other New England colleges admitted
women at about this time, the Wesleyan "experiment " was the
most visible because of the number
of women involved. Women were banished once again from Wesleyan in
1912 and would not return until 1968,when
University trustees voted for the resumption of undergraduate
coeducation.
In 1906, one of the
first-ever forward passes in a collegiate football game was thrown by a
Wesleyan student in a game against
Yale.
Woodrow Wilson, president
of the United States from 1913 – 1921, taught history and political
economy at Wesleyan from 1888 –
1890. Before
Wesleyan, Wilson taught at Bryn Mawr, where he felt "overworked,
underpaid, and much less than enthusiastic about the higher education of
women," according to historian
David B. Potts ’60, author of Wesleyan University, 1831 –1910:
Collegiate
Enterprise in New England.
On June 7, 1964, from
Denison Terrace, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. addressed the Wesleyan
community at the baccalaureate
ceremony. Dr. King, who visited Wesleyan several times in the early
1960s, was awarded an honorary degree
of Doctor of Divinity in 1964.
Three famous marathoners
are Wesleyan alumni: Bill Rodgers ’70,Amby Burfoot ’68, and Jeff
Galloway ’67.Amby Burfoot was a student
when he won the Boston Marathon. He went to classes the next
day.
Four volumes of the
Wesleyan University Press poetry series have won the Pulitzer Prize
since 1959, including 1994’s
winner, Neon Vernacular by Yusef Komunyakaa.
O ’Rourke’s,
Middletown
’s all-metal diner, was featured in Gourmet
magazine. "Have a good
sniff when you enter," the
article advised.. "If you are a student of dinerology, or if you
are the slightest bit hungry, you
are bound to swoon with pleasure."
In 1961, the Highwaymen, a
group of Wesleyan undergraduates, hit the top of the pop charts with
their single, "Michael, Row the
Boat Ashore." They performed for alumni at the 2002 Reunions. Dar
Williams ’89 also performed for
alumni at the 1996 and 1999 Reunions.
Flying south? Maybe you’ve booked a flight on Southwest Airlines, whose Chairman of the Board
is Wesleyan alumnus Herb Kelleher
’53.
On May 3,1970, the
Grateful Dead gave a free concert at Wesleyan. John Perry Barlow ’69,
now
head of the Electronic Frontier
Foundation, co-wrote several Dead songs with Bob Weir, including
"Hell in a Bucket " and
"I Need a Miracle."
Top box-office films are
frequently directed by Wesleyan graduates, including Michael Bay ’86 (The
Rock, Armageddon,
Pearl
Harbor ), Jon Turteltaub ’85 (While
You Were Sleeping, Phenomenon
), Daisy von
Scherler Mayer ’88 (Party Girl,
Madeline),
Paul Weitz ’88 (American Pie,
About a Boy ), and Miguel
Arteta ’89 (Chuck and Buck, The
Good Girl ).
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