In the 1950s and 60s, Boston University saw the construction of the first large dorms on campus, the completion of the George Sherman Union and tumultuous student protests over the Vietnam War that culminated in the cancellation of final exams and commencement in 1970, capping off two decades of tremendous change.
By 1950, the university had become a fixture along Commonwealth Avenue, with Marsh Plaza the anchor of the developing Charles River Campus. Harold Case, the fifth BU president, continued the tradition of an ordained Methodist minister leading the university. His presidency lasted from 1951 through 1967 and marked the beginning of expansions and educational reforms still underway. Under Case’s direction, BU’s campus tripled in size from 15 to 45 acres and added 68 new buildings.
“It was Case who transformed Boston University,” Music professor Roye Wates, who has been at the university since 1962, said. “It was his idea to [expand] the Charles River campus and transform BU from a streetcar campus to a national university.”
Administrative changes at the university led to the creation of the offices of five vice presidents to share the responsibilities of the university. Case appointed Howard Thurman as dean of Marsh Chapel in 1953, making him the first black dean at a white university in the country, and Howard Gotlieb as the founder of BU’s 20th Century Archives.
In The College History Series: Boston University, Sally Ann Kydd writes that the BU administration began to more closely police its students as more dormitory space became available on the growing campus. Alcohol and gambling were strictly forbidden, and a dress code required women to wear skirts and men dress in jackets and ties. Students still found fun in diverse activities, including the all-university Parachute Club, the Perishing Rifles and the Folk Dance Club.
Martin Luther King, Jr. studied in the Division of Religion and Theological Studies at the university’s graduate school, earning a doctorate in 1955. King was a student of American Personalism, a philosophical movement emphasizing the importance and value of the human being.
“Personalism matched very harmoniously with Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.’s own commitment to dignity and equality before the law and deepened and broadened his own views,” President emeritus Jon Westling said.
One of the first major academic changes under Case was the absorption of the College of General Education into the College of Liberal Arts, now the College of Arts and Sciences, in 1958. According to Warren Ault in Boston University: The College of Liberal Arts, 1873 – 1973, the college began as a two-year experiment aimed at returning war veterans, but the lower admission standards of the college had earned BU a reputation among high school guidance counselors that “anyone can get into Boston University.” The new program became the Division of General Education and stressed the importance of a background in philosophy, literature, music and art in a liberal arts education.
The 1960s was a decade of construction and expansion into many of the key buildings on today’s campus. In 1961, the Law Education Tower was constructed next to the Charles River. The College of Engineering and College of Communication were housed in a former stable building and auto-show room, respectively. The university’s first major dormitories were constructed in the 1960s with the addition of Claflin, Rich and Sleeper Halls in West Campus and Warren Towers in 1965 at 700 Commonwealth Ave.
The construction of the George Sherman Union and Mugar Memorial Library adjacent to Marsh Plaza also began in the 1960s. Case approved budget funds for a university library for the first time in 1959, beginning the building’s six-year development process. Mugar was built with stacks for 1.4 million books and remains the main library on campus. The GSU, constructed in 1963, opened with a 10-alley bowling lane in its basement. Case also acquired the property formerly owned by the Boston Braves, renaming it Nickerson Field.
In 1967, the first class of the new six-year liberal-arts-medical program graduated from the university. Ault wrote that the class graduated with both Bachelor’s and medical degrees after studying at the CLA and the Medical School. The program continues today as a seven-year Bachelor’s and medical degree program.
Sweeping educational reforms changed CLA in 1968. Under the direction of Dean William Newman, the curriculum was changed to allow students to take four courses per semester, rather than the five previously required for graduation. According to Ault in his book, Newman also required students to take four semesters of a foreign language and eliminated credit for physical education courses. The curriculum introduced mandatory English composition courses, the forerunner to today’s writing program.
According to Wates, the educational reforms of the period also coincided with BU’s rise in status to a national university. The baby-boomer generation and strong economy led to a “dramatic increase in the quality of students.” Wates said the university hired many professors with doctorates in their fields.
“Some of the changes were very widespread in higher education in the 1960s, not something unique to Boston University, but characteristic of most prominent universities,” Westling said. “It was recognized that fewer courses with more depth and focus were educationally better and also driven by recognition that faculty members were being expected to perform research [and teach].”
The late 1960s began an era of student protest and demonstration. Civil rights and the Vietnam War were the focal points of student causes. As early as 1965, students joined protest groups in the Boston Common where young men burned their draft cards. BU News, the university’s student newspaper, was passionately opposed the war.
Following Case’s retirement in 1967, Arland Christ-Janer was named the university’s first non-clergy member to hold the presidency. His time in office was marked by student sit-ins, protesting and leafleting, which Westling described as “a very rough go” and “a difficult presidency.” Wates said Christ-Janer was “smart and idealistic, but the university was over his head.”
In 1970, student protest groups staged a sit-in on Bay State Road and marched to the State House to join other college students. The widespread protests earned BU the nickname “Berkeley of the East.” In 70 Stories about Boston University, 1923 – 1993 by late dean of Sargent College of Health and Rehabilitation Sciences George Makechnie, bomb scares became so frequent on campus that building evacuation was no longer mandatory.
“It was a perfect example of the folktale about the boy who cried wolf,” Westling said.
According to Wates, the students of the 1960s often questioned the relevancy of subject matter taught in classrooms and thought learning should take place at active protests and demonstrations.
“Students constantly asked the relevance of this subject to my life at this moment,” Wates said. “Is the subject you teach relevant? Does it speak to the burning issues of the day? Professors were constantly being challenged by students.”
The final year of Christ-Janer’s three-year presidency ended with the cancellation of exams and graduation ceremonies following a series of fires set at the University Administration Building, a Bay State Road dormitory and Nickerson Field. A statement issued by the Office of Academic Affairs in 1970 cites a “clear and present danger to personal security on campus” due to vandalism, false fire alarms and bomb scares.
On May 6, student newspapers The News-Advocate and Logos combined to form The Daily Free Press, which published its first issue that day about the cancellation of commencement.
“The spring of 1970 was the high watermark of campus disruptions, and the Boston University administration, in a decision that is still difficult to understand and justify, cancelled commencement that year,” Westling said.
Westling, who described the cancellation as “cowardly and unnecessary,” said the decision affected students, graduates’ families who had traveled to Boston and honorary degree candidates. U.S. Sen. Edward Kennedy (D-Mass.) had been scheduled as the commencement speaker.
Student’s reaction to the cancellation was mixed. Westling said some were angry and disappointed, while others felt it was the right decision in a time of great crisis. Wates, a member of the CLA faculty group that voted in favor of the cancellation, said the faculty overwhelmingly supported the ending the year early. Christ-Janer resigned during the summer of 1970 amidst an ongoing era of tumultuous unrest and social protest at the university.