The Murphy Farmhouse Arts and Crafts Center opened on the Murphy Farm, offering students "informal classroom surroundings for Vassar College classes and a place for experimental activities."
The faculty considered a proposal to extend the college calendar to a year-round operation, in which students would take three semesters each year at no extra cost.
Benita Valente, internationally-renowned soprano, performed songs by Haydn, Schubert, Debussy, Faure, and Rodrigo.
The Poynter Program, sponsored by Mr. and Mrs. Nelson Poynter, offered a discussion on "The Media and Elections: A Basis for Confidence?" at which five prominent journalists and a former congressman spoke.
The Science, Technology, and Society department sponsored a "Club of Rome Symposium," in order to examine the fragile relationship of man and earth. Professors from M.I.T, Amherst, and Vassar spoke at the event.
Reverend Benedict J. Groeschel, clinical psychologist and Capuchin friar, lectured on "The Psychology of Mysticism."
Christopher White, curator of graphic arts at the National Gallery of Art, lectured on "Dürer as Draughtsman."
Alexander Dallin, Stanford University, lectured on "Soviet Foreign Policy: Pressures and Constraints."
The Martin Luther King Glee Club performed in the Chapel.
Alan Gussow, artist and conservationist, lectured on "A Sense of Place: An Artist and the Hudson River."
Robert T. Francoeur, Fairleigh-Dickinson University, lectured on "Marriage, the Family, and the Future."
George E. Hibbard, collector of Tibetan art, lectured on "The Art of Tibet."
Allan Talbot, City College of New York, School of Architectural and Environmental Design, lectured on "Who Are the Environmentalists and Why Are They Saying Such Awful Things About Us?"
Main Building's dining hall, the oldest and original dining hall on campus, offered its last meal to students. Residents of Main wore semi-formal attire, invited guests, and took their time eating their "Last Supper" in Main Building.
The Student Fellow program, a new program in which upper-classmen are chose to be peer counselors to freshmen, selected its first Fellows for the following Fall.
Due to the construction of the new College Center, the Retreat and the College Store were forced to temporarity relocate. The College Store moved to the old Lathrop Kitchen and the Retreat moved into the Aula.
The All College Dining Center (ACDC) opened after months of delay. The dining center took the place of the dining rooms in individual dormitories, which were shut down.
Joel Sheveloff, Boston University, lectured on "The Bartok Quartets."
Elizabeth Lewisohn Eisenstein, American University, lectured on "Printing and the Permanent Renaissance."
Wilheim Magnus, Courant Institute of Mathematical Sciences, New York University, lectured on "Functions and Limitations of Mathematics."
The Julliard String Quartet performed the six quartets of Bela Bartok.
Carl N. Degler, Stanford University, lectured on "Neither Black Nor White: Slavery and Race Relations in Brazil and the United States."
The Topeng Dance Theater of Bali performed native dances.
Hans W. Frei, Yale University, lectured on "Biblical Narrative and Literary Sensibility."
The student body elected Steven J. Hueglin Vassar College's first male president of the student government.
Anwar Sani, Indonesian representative to the United Nations, lectured on "Indonesia's Foreign Policy in a Multi-Polar Asia."
Dr. Vance L. Sailor, Brookhaven National Laboratory, lectured on "The Future of Nuclear Power."
The Vassar Women's Liberation sponsored "A Women's Weekend," featuring several workshops dealing with the intersections of women, family, the arts, sexuality, and politics and economics.
President Alan Simpson dedicated the All College Dining Center (ACDC) to its donor, Mary Babbott Ladd '08.
After nearly a decade of tremendous change at Vassar, including co-education, plans for graduate institutions, and an increase in the student body to 2150 members, the faculty voted that the college "should not undergo any substantial expansion, so that it may have time to consolidate its efforts to maintain educational excellence with a student body of approximately the present size."
Vassar received a $3 million anonymous gift from a family associated with the college, breaking the college record for personal donations.
Frances Farenthold '46, first national chairperson of the National Women's Political Caucus, gave the 109th Commencement Address.
A fire destroyed a two-story barn on the Murphy Farm.
Vassar offered to let the Town of Poughkeepsie build an ice-skating rink on an 11-acre tract of the Vassar Farm. Talks between the college and the town continued about the proposa for some time, but the plan never materialized.
The new Olmsted Hall of Biological Sciences opened for classes.
The Hallie Flanagan Davis Powerhouse Theater opened for use in the college's former powerhouse. The powerhouse was no longer used to produce electricity after the college's conversion to AC current.
Dr. Gould Colman, Director of Department of Manuscripts and University Archives at Cornell University Library, lectured on "Documenting the American Culture: The Role of Oral History."
Authors David Halberstam (The Best and the Brightest) and Frances Fitzgerald (Fire in the Lake) spoke on a panel about "Vietnam Retrospect: What Lessons for Journalism?"
A sukkah, commemorating the Jewish Festival of Harvest, was set on fire and burned down in the early morning hours. At 1:48 a.m. a student in Lathrop reported a muffled explosion and fire. Within a few minutes the campus fire truck responded and extinguished the fire. A gasoline soaked rag was found at the scene and many students believed that the act of arson was politically motivated. The incident was investigated by the campus police.
Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, world-renowned meditation leader, lectured in "Transcendental Meditation."
Over 400 hundred Vassar students held the area's first "Impeach the President" rally in Taylor Hall. Students had also begun letter-writing campaigns, public polls, research organizations, and newspaper editions for the impeachment of President Richard M. Nixon, due to the Watergate scandal.
Theodore Wies, Princeton University, read some of his works for the Class of 1928 Poetry Reading.
Stephen Koerner, Yale and Bristol Universities, gave the Matthew Vassar Lecture on "The Structure and Function of Metaphysics."
Philippa Foot, Princeton University, lectured on "Can There Be a Moral Ought?"
The Ridiculous Theatrical Company, performed Bluebeard for a Dickinson-Kayden Event.
Vassar students joined students from several other local colleges in signing a petition for the impeachment of President Richard M. Nixon due to the Watergate scandal.
The College decided to lower the average temperature in dorms by 10% in response to the energy crisis.
Alan Charity, York University, England, gave the Class of 1928 Lecture on "T. S. Eliot and the Dantean Recognition."
Ingeborg Glier, Yale University, gave the Matthew Vassar Lecture on "Courtly Love-Reconsidered."
The New York Pro Musica Antiqua performed 15th-century Flemish music.
Dr, Harold Fleischer, IBM, lectured on "The Physical Basis of Computers."
Ramsey Clark, former U.S. Attorney General, gave the Sharpe Memorial Lecture on "The Nixon Administration and the Rule of Law."
Daniel O'Keefe '75, Vassar junior, became the youngest member to be elected to the town council of the Town of Poughkeepsie.
Vassar held a "Black Weekend," featuring a bazaar, a talent show, athletic activities, a dinner, and a dance.
Congressman Ronald Dellums, Berkeley, California, gave the Angela Davis Lecture on "Strategies for the Seventies."
Dr. James Hillman, Jung Institute, Zurich, lectured on. "The Archetypical Child in the Myth of the American Family."
Jonathon Kozol, prominent educational critic and author, lectured on "Ghetto Schools and Thanksgiving 1973."
José Olivio Jiménez, Hunter College, CCNY, lectured on "Aproximación Existencial a José Martí."
James Brain, State University of New York at New Paltz, lectured on "The Hazda: The Life of Hunters and Gatherers in East Africa."
Robert Lowell, Harvard University, read some of his poetry for the "Class of 1928 and Changing American Culture" Lecture.
Vassar College exceeded its goals in its $50 million dollar capital campaign, making it the largest campaign ever for a small college.
President Alan Simpson decided to postpone for further study a prior decision to cut the position of "Assistant to the President for Black Affairs," due to campus protest and the resignation of two professors.
Over 400 students (1/4 of the entire student body) attended a meeting in Taylor at which they expressed their concerns about the administration's educational policies. They demanded the hiring of forty additional faculty members, a student to sit on the Board of Trustees, access to student evaluations of faculty, and a meeting between the Student Senate, students, and the faculty.
David Perry, representative of the American Friends Service Committee, lectured on "South Vietnam: A Question of Torture."
Elaine Folkers, Asnuntuk Community College, Fairfield, Connecticut, lectured on "Eating Low on the Food Chain: The Ecology of Nutrition."
Robert Black, student at Julliard, performed piano works of Berg, Boulez, Debussy, Messiaen, Schonberg, Stockhausen, and Wyttenbach.
Mahatma Jagadao, disciple of Guru Maharaj Ji, lectured on "Who is Guru Maharaj Ji?"
Michael Graves, Princeton University, lectured on "A Little of the Old In and Out."
Dr. Phyllis T. Bodel, Yale School of Medicine, lectured on "Medical Training and Admissions."
Dr. Frederick Chromey, astronomer, lectured on "Violent Galaxies: Evidence of a Scientific Revolution."
Spencer Holst read some of his short stories for the Matthew Vassar Lecture.
Iris Zavala, State University of New York, Stony Brook, lectured on "Literature y Sociedad en Puerto Rico en el siglo XIX."
Last updated: 10 November, 1999, by Jeremy R. Linden, '00.