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Bates College history
Bates College company history timeline
The college was founded by a group of Freewill Baptists in 1855 as the Parsonfield Academy in the town of Parsonfield.
With Cheney's influence in the state legislature, the Maine State Seminary was chartered in 1855 and implemented a liberal arts and theological curriculum, making the first coeducational college in New England.
The school was renamed Bates College in his honor in 1863 and was chartered to offer a liberal arts curriculum beyond its original theological focus.
The college's first African American student, Henry Chandler, graduated in 1874.
James Porter, one of General Custer's eleven officers killed at the Battle of Little Bighorn in 1876 was also a Bates graduate.
In 1884, the college graduated the first woman to argue in front of the United States Supreme Court, Ella Haskell.
In 1894, George Colby Chase led Bates to increased national recognition, and the college graduated one of the founding members of the Boston Red Sox, Harry Lord.
January 1920: The Outing Club’s winter birth
In February 1920, the debate team defeated Harvard College during the national debate tournament held at Lewiston City Hall.
In 1920, the Bates Outing Club was founded and is one of the oldest collegiate outing clubs in the country, the first at a private college to include both men and women from inception, and one of the few outing clubs that remains entirely student run.
In 1921, the college's debate team participated in the first intercontinental collegiate debate in history against the Oxford Union's debate team at the University of Oxford.
Oxford's first debate in the United States was against Bates in Lewiston, in September 1923.
During 1943, the V-12 Navy College Training Program was introduced at Bates.
December 1946: A bowl bid for Bobcat football
November 1956: A State Series victory for football
January 1958: The Winter Carnival torch tradition
During this time the college began to compete athletically with Colby College, and in 1964, with Bowdoin created the Colby-Bates-Bowdoin Consortium.
April 1968: Benjamin Mays ’20 delivers final eulogy for the Rev.
Ultimate reemerged at Bates during the '80s with official recognition by the college of the Ultimate Frisbee club in 1981.
February 1983: The final episode of “M*A*S*H”
In 1984, Bates became one of the first liberal arts colleges to make the SAT and ACT optional in the admission process.
Reynolds began the Chase Regatta in 1988, which features the President's Cup that is contested by Bates, Colby, and Bowdoin annually.
About 650 employees are eligible to join, and organizers are working with MSEA-SEIU Local 1989.
In 1989, Donald West Harward became president of Bates and greatly expanded the college's overall infrastructure by building 22 new academic, residential and athletic facilities, including Pettengill Hall, the Residential Village, and the Coastal Center at Shortridge.
August 1995: A tragic death, a hopeful legacy
In 1996 the team changed its name to Big Fat Yak.
Eventually rules and end zones were introduced to their new game (Bates Magazine 1999). However, Ultimate faded away and disappeared from the Bates campus.
Dedicated in 1999, the 90,000-square-foot Pettengill Hall provides innovative teaching spaces, faculty office, laboratories, and other facilities for eleven social science departments and interdisciplinary programs.
On July 1, 2002, Elaine Tuttle Hansen, formerly provost at Haverford College, assumed office as the seventh president of Bates College.
In 2005, Bates College celebrated its Sesquicentennial, 150-years of history, excellence, and quality.
Elaine Tuttle Hansen was elected as the first female president of Bates College and managed the second largest capital campaign ever undertaken by Bates, totaling at $120 million and lead the endowment through the 2007–08 financial crisis.
Spencer assumed the presidency in 2012, and created diversity mandates, expanded student and faculty recruitment, and financial aid allocation.
The campaign is the largest ever undertaken by the college totaling $300 million, with $168 million already raised as of May 2017.
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| Company name | Founded date | Revenue | Employee size | Job openings |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Bowdoin College | 1794 | $11.0M | 1,562 | 97 |
| Middlebury College | 1800 | $12.0M | 1,873 | 238 |
| Colby College | 1813 | $19.0M | 1,610 | 22 |
| Emmanuel College | 1919 | $95.2M | 1,100 | - |
| Connecticut College | 1911 | $148.9M | 1,453 | 107 |
| Delaware State University | 1873 | $50.0M | 133 | - |
| Pacific Union College | 1882 | $60.8M | 488 | 3 |
| Berea College | 1855 | $126.7M | 500 | - |
| Goshen College | 1894 | $50.0M | 306 | - |
| Sarah Lawrence College | 1926 | $76.4M | 822 | 14 |
Bates College history FAQs
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