City College of New York - History - 20th Century

20th Century

Education courses were first offered in 1897 in response to a city law that prohibited the hiring of teachers who lacked a proper academic background. The School of Education was established in 1921. The college newspaper, The Campus, published its first issue in 1907, and the first degree-granting evening session in the United States was started. Separate Schools of Business and Civic Administration and of Technology (Engineering) were established in 1919. Students were also required to sign a loyalty oath. In 1947, the College celebrated its centennial year, awarding honorary degrees to Bernard Baruch (class of 1889) and Robert F. Wagner (class of 1898). A 100 year time capsule was buried in North Campus.

Until 1929, City College had been an all-male institution. During that time, specifically in 1909, the first chapter of Sigma Alpha Mu fraternity was founded. In 1930, CCNY admitted women for the first time, but only to graduate programs. In 1951, the entire institution became coeducational.

In the years when top-flight private schools were restricted to the children of the Protestant Establishment, thousands of brilliant individuals (including Jewish students) attended City College because they had no other option. CCNY's academic excellence and status as a working-class school earned it the titles "Harvard of the Proletariat", the "poor man's Harvard", and "Harvard-on-the-Hudson".

Even today, after three decades of controversy over its academic standards, no other public college has produced as many Nobel laureates who have studied and graduated with a degree from a particular public college (all graduated between 1935 and 1954). CCNY's official quote on this is "Nine Nobel laureates claim CCNY as their Alma Mater, the most from any public college in the United States." This should not be confused with Nobel laureates who teach at a public university; UC Berkeley boasts 19.

In its heyday of the 1930s through the 1950s, CCNY became known for its political radicalism. It was said that the old CCNY cafeteria in the basement of Shepard Hall, particularly in alcove 1, was the only place in the world where a fair debate between Trotskyists and Stalinists could take place. Being part of a political debate that began in the morning in alcove 1, Irving Howe reported that after some time had passed he would leave his place among the arguing students in order to attend class. When he returned to the cafeteria late in the day, he would find that the same debate had continued but with an entirely different cast of students. Alumni who were at City College in the mid-20th century said that City College in those days made UC Berkeley in the 1960s look like a school of conformity.

The municipality of New York was considerably more conformist than CCNY students and faculty. The Philosophy Department, at the end of the 1939-1940 academic year, invited the British mathematician and philosopher Bertrand Russell to become a professor at CCNY. Members of the Catholic Church protested Russell’s appointment. A woman named Jean Kay filed suit against the Board of Higher Education to block Russell’s appointment on the grounds that his views on marriage and sex would adversely affect her daughter’s virtue, although her daughter was not a CCNY student. Russell wrote “a typical American witch-hunt was instituted against me.” Kay won the suit, but the Board declined to appeal after considering the political pressure exerted. Also see the Bertrand Russell Case.

Russell took revenge in the preface of the first edition of his book An Inquiry into Meaning and Truth, which was published by the Unwin Brothers in the UK (the preface was not included in the U.S. editions). In a long précis that detailed Russell’s accomplishments including medals awarded by Columbia University and the Royal Society and faculty appointments at Oxford, Cambridge, UCLA, Harvard, the Sorbonne, Peking (the name used in that era), the LSE, Chicago, and so forth, Russell added, “Judicially pronounced unworthy to be Professor of Philosophy at the College of the City of New York.”

Many City College alumni served in the U.S. Armed Forces during the Second World War. A total of 310 CCNY alumni were killed in the War. Prior to World War II, a large number of City College alumni—relative to alumni of other U.S. colleges—volunteered to serve on the Republican side in the Spanish Civil War. Thirteen CCNY alumni were killed in Spain.

In 1945, Professor William E. Knickerbocker, Chairman of the Romance Languages Department, was accused of anti-semitism by four faculty members. They claimed that “for at least seven years they have been subjected to continual harassment and what looks very much like discrimination ....” by Knickerbocker. Four years later Knickerbocker was again accused of anti-semitism, this time for denying honors to high-achieving Jewish students. About the same time, Professor William C. Davis of the Economics Department was accused by students of maintaining a racially segregated dormitory at Army Hall. Professor Davis was the dormitory’s administrator. CCNY students, many of whom were World War II veterans, launched a massive strike in protest against Knickerbocker and Davis. The New York Times called the event "the first general strike at a municipal institution of higher learning." Also see the Knickerbocker Case.

In 1955, a City College student named Alan A. Brown founded the economics honor society, Omicron Chi Epsilon. The purpose of the society was to confer honors on outstanding economics students, organize academic meetings, and publish a journal. In 1963, Omicron Chi Epsilon merged with Omicron Delta Gamma, the other economics honor society, to form Omicron Delta Epsilon, the current academic honor society in economics.

During a 1969 takeover of South campus, under threat of a riot, African American and Puerto Rican activists and their white allies demanded, among other policy changes, that City College implement an aggressive affirmative action program. At some point, campus protesters began referring to CCNY as "Harlem University." The administration of the City University at first balked at the demands, but instead, came up with an open admissions or open-access program under which any graduate of a New York City high school would be able to matriculate either at City College or another college in the CUNY system. Beginning in 1970, the program opened doors to college to many who would not otherwise have been able to attend college. The increased enrollment of students, regardless of college preparedness, however, challenged City College's and the University's academic reputation and strained New York City's financial resources.

City College began charging tuition in 1976. By the 1990s, CCNY stopped admitting and offering remedial classes to students who did not meet its academic entrance requirements. CUNY then enrolled less well prepared students in its community colleges.

As a result of the 1989 student protests and building takeovers concerning tuition increases, a community action center was opened on the campus called The Guillermo Morales/Assata Shakur Community and Student Center located in the NAC building. The center was named after 1960s CCNY student activists Assata Shakur and Guillermo Morales.

CCNY's new Frederick Douglass Debate Society defeated Harvard and Yale at the "Super Bowl" of the American Parliamentary Debate Association in 1996. In 2003, the College's Model UN Team was awarded as an Outstanding Delegation at the National Model United Nations (NMUN) Conference, an honor that it would repeat for four years in a row.

The U.S. Postal Service issued a postcard commemorating CCNY's 150th Anniversary, featuring Shepard Hall, on Charter Day, May 7, 1997.