Barnard College: A Timeline of Events Since 1945
| Year | Event | Tags |
| 1945-46 | Several faculty return from wartime service to take up their academic positions. Several senior faculty, who had delayed their retirement because of the war, retire. | Faculty |
| 1947 | June — The 70-year-old Virginia C. Gildersleeve retires as dean after 39 years. Moves with Elizabeth Reynard to Bedford, NY and Cape Cod. | Administration |
| 1947 | October — The 49-year-old Millicent C. McIntosh installed as Barnard’s 4th dean. Bryn Mawr graduate and Hopkins PhD, she had been headmistress of NYC’s Brearley School. Mother of five children | Administration |
| 1948 | Administrative restructuring, with more attention to student services and advising. Creation of the office of Dean of the Faculty. Thomas Peardon named to post. | Administration |
| 1949 | Launch of Barnard Development Campaign | Finances |
| Barnard receives $1,000,000 grant from Rockefeller Foundation. | Finances | |
| 1950 | Barnard introduces an “up or out” faculty tenure system, after Harvard does so but before Columbia. | Faculty |
| 1952 | Barnard establishes an Education Program to prepare some of its students to be classroom teachers; a McIntosh initiative that met some faculty resistance. | Curriculum |
| 1953 | McIntosh’s title changed from “Dean” to “President” at the urging of the Ford Foundation; intended to emphasize Barnard’s autonomy. Gildersleeve disapproved. | Administration |
| 1954 | Barnard sells undeveloped lot on Claremont back to the Rockefeller Foundation; to be site of Interchurch Center. | Campus |
| 1958 | Lehman Hall/Wollman Library opens on campus; to house library and offices for history, political science and economics. | Campus |
| 1961 | Reid Hall opens as Barnard’s third dormitory on southeast corner of campus. Underwritten with major gifts from the family of Helen Rogers Reid, BC 1903 | Campus |
| 1962 | Student Center groundbreaking; later designated “McIntosh Center.” | Camous |
| 1962 | President McIntosh retires after 14 years in office. Retired to Tyringham, Mass. | Administration |
| 1963 | Rosemary Park becomes Barnard’s second president (fifth head). A scholar of German literature, she had been president of Connecticut College. | Administration |
| 1963 | Barnard begins active recruitment of African American students | Students |
| Henry Boorse becomes Dean of the Faculty. Had been chair of the Physics Department. | Administration | |
| 1967 | President Park resigned to accompany her new husband to posts at UCLA. | Administration |
| 1968 | Martha Peterson becomes Barnard’s 3rd president; had been dean of students at the University of Wisconsin | Administration |
| 1968 | McIntosh Student Center opens on campus. | Campus |
| Barnard Junior Linda LeClair suspended for misrepresenting her off-campus housing arrangements to the Honor Board. | Students | |
| April 23-30 – Approximately 300 Barnard students spend time in some of Columbia’s five student-occupied (“liberated”) campus buildings in violation of University rules. | Student Life | |
| April 30 – 115 Barnard students among the 700 Columbia University students arrested when NYC Police cleared the occupied buildings. College authorities secure their release. | Students | |
| Barnard’s black students organize “BOSS,” [Barnard Order of Soul Sisters] , in call for changes in curriculum and recruitment. | Students | |
| 1969 | Plimpton Hall opens on Amsterdam Avenue and 121st St. as a dormitory. Named for longtime Trustee Treasurer George A. Plimpton | |
| 1969 | 14-story Helen Goodheart Altschul Science Tower opens | Camous |
| 1970 | Leroy Breunig becomes Dean of the Faculty; had been chair of the French Department. | Administration |
| 1970 | William McGill becomes Columbia’s 15th president; faces decade-long struggle to bring University into budgetary equilibrium. | Columbia |
| 1971 | BC trustees agree to reimburse Columbia for any net differences in the cross-registration of students. Also agree to annual payments for access to CU libraries and gym. Annual payment estimated to be $3,000,000 to $4,000,000. | Columbia |
| 1971 | Barnard commencement disrupted by student protests focused on US bo1970mbing of Cambodia. | Students |
| 1972 | Trustees authorize the creation of “Experimental College,” housed in the Hotel Paris on West End Avenue | Curriculum |
| 1973 | An intercorporate agreement between Columbia and Barnard gives Columbia the last word on Barnard tenure appointments. Establishes and Ad Hoc procedure overseen by the University Provost to do so. | Columbia |
| 1975 | Martha Peterson resigned the Barnard presidency; became president of Beloit College | Administration |
| 1975 | November — The 50-year-old Jacqueline Mattfeld chosen to be Barnard’s 4th president; a musicologist, she had been a dean at MIT and provost at Brown. | Administration |
| Columbia dean of graduate faculties, George Fraenkel, seeks to merge the Barnard and Columbia faculties as a University-wide cost-cutting step. President Mattfeld and most of Barnard faculty oppose these efforts. | Columbia | |
| 1976 | Spring — President-elect Mattfeld and President McGill off to a rocky start; soon not talking to each other. | Columbia |
| 1976 | Dean of Columbia College Peter Pouncey and CC faculty call for Columbia College to begin enrolling women. President McGill fires Pouncey, declaring such a move would likely destroy Barnard. | Columbia |
| 1977 | February – Charles S. Olton becomes dean of the faculty. An historian, had been an administrator at Buffalo State. | Administration |
| 1978 | Heightened tensions between Columbia and Barnard administrators over levels of curricular cooperation. | Columbia |
| 1979 | Mattfeld strategy of increasing enrollments to balance annual budgets leads to crunch on on-campus housing. Students protest increases in room and board. | Finances Students |
| 1980 | June — President Mattfeld is abruptly terminated by the Barnard trustees ; a 30-year old attorney and recently elected trustee, Ellen V. Futter (BC 1971), is installed as acting president. | Administration |
| 1980 | July – 30-year-old trustee Ellen V. Futter named acting president, while search for permanent replacement begins. | Administration Trustees |
| 1981 | April – Futter named Barnard’s 5th president; at 31, the nation’s youngest college president. | Administration |
| Fall – President Sovern calling for “defacto co-education” at Columbia College, to be achieved by more Barnard students taking more of their classes (including the Core) at Columbia. If implemented, would make Barnard payments to College much larger and many Barnard faculty redundant. | Columbia | |
| 1982 | January — Three weeks after Columbia announced its decision to begin to admit women in the fall of 1983, Futter and Columbia President Michael I. Sovern effect revisions in the intercorporate agreement that agrees to Columbia doing so. Impact on Barnard perceived to be negative. | Columbia |
| 1983 | Faculty approves Freshman Seminar Program as required component of all first-year student programs. First product of intensive curricular review in face of Columbia going co-educational. | Curriculum |
| Cross-registration financial arrangements lead to sharp swings in Barnard annual payments to Columbia. | Finances | |
| Columbia and Barnard effect a consortium allowing Barnard women to compete on Columbia intercollegiate teams in Divison I competition. | Students | |
| 1986 | Barnard board borrows money from New York Dormitory Authority to undertake construction of a new dormitory, needed if College is to offer on-campus housing to all admitted students. | Trustees
Finances |
| 1987 | July — Robert A. McCaughey, professor of history, becomes dean of the faculty. Serves until June 1993. | Administration |
| 1987 | Barnard board of trustees places restrictive cap on future tenuring of Barnard faculty as a cost-containment action. | Trustees
Faculty |
| 1989 | Barnard celebrates its centennial with year-long activities. | Events |
| 1989 | Centennial Hall opens on Barnard campus as a dormitory; renamed Sulzberger Hall in 1991 following a naming gift from the Sulzberger family. | Campus |
| 1991 | Barnard trustees approve a selective program of senior faculty research leaves {SFRLs] as a supplement to the standing sabbatical policy | Trustees
Faculty |
| 1992 | May — Ellen Futter resigns as Barnard president to become the head of the American Museum of Natural History; College Counsel Kathryn Rodgers becomes acting president. | Administration |
| 1993 | April — Judith Shapiro becomes Barnard’s 6th president; a Columbia-trained anthropologist, she had been provost at Bryn Mawr. | Administration |
| 1994 | July — Elizabeth Boylan becomes Dean of Faculty; title later expanded to include Provost. A biologist, had been an administrator at Queens College. | Administration |
| New arrangement for cross-registrations reduces the swing in annual Barnard payments to Columbia. | Columbia Finances |
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| 2001 | September 11 – Terrorist attack on the World Trade Center in lower Manhattan . | Event |
| Revamping of tenuring arrangements for Barnard faculty; now subject to scrutiny of a Columbia-appointed standing committee [TRAC], with modest Barnard representation. | Faculty | |
| 2007 | Financial collapse takes toll on Barnard fund-raising and equity holdings; Barnard endowment lost $50,000,000 (20% of its total). | Finances |
| 2008 | Judith Shapiro retires as Barnard president | Administration |
| 2008 | July — Debora Spar becomes Barnard’s 7th president; a political scientist, she had been on the faculty of the Harvard Business School. | Administration |
| 2009 | The Diana Center opens on site of the torn down McIntosh Center; principal funding from trustee Diana Vagelos and her husband, Roy Vagelos. | Campus |
| 2009 | Athena Center for Leadership Studies launched as a presidential initiative at Barnard. Kitty Kolbert first director | Administration |
| 2009 | Barnard mounts its first Global Symposium in Beijing, China | Event |
| 2009 | Linda A. Bell becomes provost. An economist, she had been an administrator at Haverford College. | Administration |
| 2013 | Barnard begins preparations for its 125th anniversary in the fall of 2014. | Events |
| 2014 | Year-long celebration of Barnard’s 125th birthday; festivities include a campus open-house, a lighting of Empire State Building and several campus events | Events |
| 2014 | Fall – Series of evening seminars for alumnae and retired faculty on “Making Barnard History” launched; sponsored by Barnard 125 Steering Committee, Office of Alumane Relations and the Office of the Provost. Bob McCaughey moderator. | Events |
| 2015 | March — Barnard hosts its 6th Global Symposium on campus. | Events |
| 2016 | January — Demolition of Lehman Hall underway to make way for a new Teaching and Learning Center | |
| 2017 | February — Debra Spar announces her departure as president | |
| 2017 | June — Sian Leah Beilock named Barnard’s 8th president and 12th academic head | |
| 2018 | Milstein Teaching and Learning Center Opens on the site of the demolished Lehman Hall |
| 2020 | March — College emptied by onset of COVID 19 — spring classes taught remotely | |
| September — AY 2020-21 classes to be taught remotely | ||
| 2021 | September — Barnard returns to pre-COVID-19 pandemic arrangements, with in-person classes | |
| 2022 | July — President Beilock selected as president of Dartmouth College; to leave Barnard June 2023 | |
Last updated: August 6, 2022
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