History of Georgetown University

Robert Emmett Curran is a professor emeritus of history at Georgetown University, where he served as a faculty member for 32 years. He currently resides, with his wife Eileen, in Richmond, Kentucky.

• Foreword Preface Part 1: The Academy: Beginnings, 1773-1830 1. "Our Main Sheet Anchor for Religion" 2. "To Give Perpetuity..." 3. The Return of the Jesuits 4. "Instead of a Constellation...a Few Unfledged Bodys ..." Part 2: From Academy to College, 1830-1860 5. Building a College and More, 1829-1849 6. The 1850s: Refugees, Science, and the founding of the Medical School 7. "Alma Mater of the South:" Student Culture in the Antebellum Years 8. "The Great Object of Education": Curriculum, Student Societies, and Careers Part 3: From College to University, 1860-1889 9. Georgetown's Blue and Gray 10. A Decade of Reconstruction, and the Founding of the Law School 11. Patrick Healy and the Idea of a University 12. Georgetown in 1889: "...She Began with Our Fatherland." Appendices:A. Georgetown Student Enrollments, 1791-1889B. All Degrees Conferred by Georgetown University from 1817 through 1889C. Members of the Board of Directors from 1797 to 1817 and from 1844 to 1889D. Presidents, Prefects, and Deans in Georgetown's First CenturyE. List of Original College Buildings by Construction DateF. Summary Tabulations of Student Demographics for Students at Georgetown from 1791 to 1889 Notes Index

Georgetown enriched my life in so many ways, and the habits of mind and friendships I found there continue to enrich it today. I loved when I was there, I love it still, and I am honored to be part of a family that gave me so much. This beautifully told history by Professor Curran captures the unique spirit of a remarkable institution that has contributed greatly to our common good. -William Jefferson Clinton, Forty-second President of the United States Everyone who loves the Hilltop, and many of their friends too, will want to have a copy of this splendid history-exhaustively researched, comprehensive in its viewpoint, and vivid in its telling. It is a story both of the university and of the nation with which it was founded. -Leo J. O'Donovan, SJ, president emeritus, Georgetown University This modern history of Georgetown University is good news-and good reading-on several counts. It tells the 20th century story of Georgetown inside and out. It fills in gaps about Catholic higher education. Above all, it confirms Georgetown University's significance within the total landscape of contemporary American higher education. -John Thelin, university research professor, University of Kentucky In these meticulously researched and long-awaited volumes, Emmett Curran provides a rich, complex history of the first 200 years of America's oldest Catholic, Jesuit university, tracing the struggles of John Carroll's 'modest academy' in the new nation to the emergence of Georgetown as an international leader in higher education. Throughout, Curran demonstrates the university's remarkable fidelity to its mission of educating leaders who serve. It is fine history and a good read. -Dorothy M. Brown, professor of history emerita, Georgetown University