Bryn Mawr College history

The first class, 1886 photo, and the faculty.

In 1912, Bryn Mawr became the first college in the United States to offer doctorates in social work, through the Department of Social Economy and Social Research.

The origin of Harcum can be traced back to February 1913 when Edith Hatcher, a talented concert pianist and daughter of prominent Virginia clergyman and educator Doctor William E. Hatcher, married Octavius Marvin Harcum, another Virginian.

Bryn Mawr was the first institution of higher learning in the United States to offer graduate instruction to women; men were first admitted to the graduate program in 1931.

The Junto is a non-profit educational corporation founded in 1941 to promote adult education in the Philadelphia region, adopting the name of a group originally co-founded by Benjamin Franklin.

Her Collected Poems won the 1952 Pulitzer Prize for poetry.

In 1955, Pennsylvania granted the College the right to be the first two-year college in the Commonwealth’s history to confer the associate of arts and the associate of science degrees.

Harcum passed away in 1958 at the age of 80, leaving a legacy of compassionate and dedicated service to students and the community.

“In 1960, architect Louis I. Kahn and Bryn Mawr College president, Katharine McBride, came together in a mutually inspiring relationship as architect/client to create one of this century’s great buildings, the Erdman Hall dormitory.

Long before her death in 1972, Marianne Moore ranked with Emily Dickinson among America’s finest women poets.

[Adapted from Marianne Moore: A Literary Life, Charles Molesworth, Atheneum, New York, 1990]

Between 2000 and today, Harcum launched programs in nursing, occupational therapy assistant, physical therapist assistant, interior and residential design, and radiologic technology, among others.

In 2001 Faust became founding dean of the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study at Harvard, the successor to Radcliffe College, which had been Harvard University’s women’s college; she was also appointed Lincoln Professor of History at Harvard.

The College began admitting men in 2003 and officially became a co-ed institution.

In July 2007 Faust became the 28th president of Harvard University.

On February 9, 2015, the Board of Trustees announced approval of a working group recommendation to expand the undergraduate applicant pool.

Starting in 2017-18, departmental events (ranging from community-wide film screenings and discussions to public lectures) will be organized around a theme.

Faust stepped down as president in 2018.

The Open Letter will guide our department’s curricular and events-planning for 2020-21 and beyond.