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Category: Campus Life

  • Woodrow Wilson and the Eating Clubs

    Written by Anna Rubin ’15 We are pleased to announce another newly digitized collection: the Woodrow Wilson Correspondence in the Office of the President Records. Wilson was president of Princeton University from 1902-1910, Governor of New Jersey 1911-1913, and U.S. President 1913-1921. This collection contains correspondence between Wilson and University faculty, administrators, alumni, and parents,…

  • Princeton University During World War II

    By April C. Armstrong *14 and Allie Lichterman ’16 In October 1939, as the Nazi war machine crushed Poland, Princeton University’s newly admitted freshman Class of 1943 voted Adolf Hitler the “greatest living being.” A year later, the next freshman class concurred with this decision. These votes reflect the widespread American apathy toward the Nazi…

  • Princeton University During World War I

    By Spencer Shen ’16 On the afternoon of September 24, 1914, President John G. Hibben gave an address to incoming freshman in Marquand Chapel, acknowledging that “the opening of this new academic year…presents to our minds a striking contrast: the peaceful setting of this assembly against the dark background of the terrible European war.” With…

  • Study of Education at Princeton and the 1954 Advisee Project

    By Madeline Lea ’16 The Study of Education at Princeton was a unique project that evolved during post-World War II discussions of education at the University led by economics professor Frank W. Notestein. Professor Samuel S. Wilks of the mathematics department and Dean of the Faculty J. Douglas Brown ’19 were also involved. They asserted…

  • Imaginary Princetonians

    There have been many famous Princetonians, but there have also been a number of famous—or perhaps infamous—imaginary members of the Princeton community. Here we take a look at the nonexistent people who became legends on campus. Adelbert L’Hommedieu X (Bert Hormone), Class of 1917 The Class of 1917 invented an imaginary member and provided regular…

  • Announcing ASAP: Archiving Student Activism at Princeton

    Next Thursday and Friday, the Princeton University Archives will host a collecting drive to launch ASAP: Archiving Student Activism at Princeton, an initiative that seeks to collect and preserve individual and organizational records created by Princeton students who engage in activism on a broad range of issues and perspectives, both on campus and off. We…

  • “War Is Imminent”: The Veterans of Future Wars

    Though Princeton University has had a reputation as a relatively wealthy institution, both the school itself and its students faced economic struggles alongside the rest of the nation during the Great Depression. One March evening in 1936, two Princeton roommates, Urban Joseph Peters Rushton ’36 and Lewis Jefferson Gorin, Jr., ’36, went to the movies. The…

  • Power to the People: Princeton’s Black Activism Movement

    ABC was a place where we could go and it was us. We did have a kindred spirit. I mean because it was 98 black students, all of us knew each other. And even guys that you didn’t hang out with, at some point in time you might be in their dorm room. —Ralph Austin…

  • 75th Anniversary Exhibition Celebrates Princeton’s Beloved WPRB Station

    Princeton University’s radio station, WPRB, has for the most part been a frenetic hodgepodge where Beethoven plays alongside The Ramones and sports broadcasts back to back with national news. However, the radio station has also been the space where new bands get airplay, campus history is made, and revolutionary ideas are expressed without restraint. For…

  • Princeton Junction & Back: Our Dinky Archives

    Though New Jersey Transit lists the stop as the “Princeton Station,” locals refer to their train as the “Dinky” or “PJ&B” (Princeton Junction & Back). Recently, the station moved several hundred feet from its former site near University Place along Alexander Road, making it the talk of the town. Protests of a planned replacement of…