In this week’s installment of our recurring series, a professor’s nickname raises eyebrows in Boston, a campus visitor is surprised to see someone throwing a telegraph pole around, and more.

July 25, 1867—The Boston Post reports, “The Princeton students call Prof. Aiken, late of Dartmouth, ‘Prof. Yank.’ They need two or three more Jerome medals down there.”

July 26, 1873—The Princeton Press prints an account from a recent visitor from Hightstown about his experiences:

While walking in the campus we came across a man who was apparently trying to lift a telegraph pole to his shoulder. We were surprised to see him hold it up perpendicularly and throw it a distance of twenty or thirty feet.

The athlete proved to be Princeton’s gymnasium director, George Goldie, practicing for a competition.

July 27, 1781—Peter Elmendorf, Class of 1782, writes to his mother to request a bit of money to buy “a broad Cloth for a winter’s dressing Coat…it is very necessary here as all the Students in general wear them.”

July 29, 1918—David Wade Guy, Class of 1919, is awarded France’s Croix de Guerre “For extraordinary ability as a pilot, seeking all occasions to fight, and exhibiting at all times courage and skill.”

For the previous installment in this series, click here.

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