Yesterday’s News

From the pages of the Harvard Alumni Bulletin and Harvard Magazine

Illustration by Mark Steele

1923

The Bulletin notes, without comment, a report in The Harvard Crimson that the Ku Klux Klan has an organization at Harvard, and the first step toward a Harvard branch was taken two years earlier.

1938

The Graduate School of Public Administration (forerunner of the Kennedy School) opens its first regular session with 15 students, 10 of them veterans of federal government service.

1953

Harvard’s new president, Nathan Marsh Pusey, has visited football practice twice during his walks around the University, part of a self-imposed refresher course during which, he says, he is “finding things I did not know existed.”

1963

The 1962-63 Treasurer’s Report indicates that Harvard’s expenses, for the first time, approximate $100 million.

Bursar’s cards are replaced by plastic student identification cards, in part to speed up operations at Widener Library’s circulation desk.

1968

The University Barbershop on the corner of Mass. Ave. and Plympton Street has closed after more than 80 years of service. Co-owner Allen Moloney, son of the founder, laments that most Harvardians are shunning the shears in favor of more substantial decoration for the gray matter below.

1973

A gift from the Andrew H. Mellon Foundation establishes Harvard’s first professorship in African history; Kenneth O. Dike is named the first incumbent.

1978

President Bok announces that the CIA has chosen to ignore a request that all government agencies reveal any contracts, covert operations, and consulting agreements with Harvard personnel. University guidelines urge community members to avoid participation in intelligence operations.

You might also like

Reparations as Public Health

A Harvard forum on the racial health gap

Unionizing Harvard Academic Workers

Pay, child care, workplace protections at issue 

Should AI Be Scaled Down?

The case for maximizing AI models’ efficiency—not size

Most popular

Diagnosis by Fiction

The “Healing Quartet,” by “Samuel Shem,” probes medicine—and life.

AWOL from Academics

Behind students' increasing pull toward extracurriculars

Who Built the Pyramids?

Not slaves. Archaeologist Mark Lehner, digging deeper, discovers a city of privileged workers.

More to explore

Darker Days

The current disquiets compared to Harvard’s Vietnam-era traumas

Making Space

The natural history of Junko Yamamoto’s art and architecture

Spellbound on Stage

Actor and young adult novelist Aislinn Brophy