Hampshire College. All rights reserved.
© 2004 Hampshire College. All rights reserved.
Hampshire College, an experimental institution founded under the auspices of Amherst College, Mount Holyoke College, Smith College and the University of Massachusetts, admitted its first class in 1970. This record group contains files from planning committees involved in creating the new college. The first committee, Committee for an Experimental College, was formed by the four neighboring institutions in 1958 to gather and synthesize ideas for this new departure in higher education. The committee's first publication, The New College Plan (1958) was widely read and influenced the planning for other experimental colleges of the 1960s and 1970s. The pledge of $6 million by Amherst College alumnus Harold F. Johnson in 1965 made Hampshire College a reality, and planning began in earnest that year.
The first series contains records for the Committee for an Experimental College, which was known as the Committee for New College after the publication of The New College Plan. The other series in this group contain records of the Education Advisory Committee (1965-66), the Hampshire College Conference (1966), the Making of a College by Hampshire's first president, Franklin Patterson, files of Planning Bulletins and Progress Reports, and files from a number of planning committees formed by early faculty and administrators of the college.
Committee files contain agendas and minutes of meetings, memoranda and reports, and correspondence. The most extensive files are those in Series 1: Committee for an Experimental College. Also present are published reports in Series 7: The Making of a College, and Series 8: Planning Bulletins/Progress Reports. Series 11: Miscellaneous Planning Materials, contains films and audiotapes relating to the planning process.
This collection is organized into twelve series:
Access is unrestricted except for Series 12: Compensation Committee
Please use the following format when citing materials from this collection:
Hampshire College. Planning Bodies, 1958-1977. Archives, Hampshire College, Amherst, MA 01002
Most of the material in this record group was collected by the administrators and faculty who were members of these committees. The major exception is the material in Series 1, Boxes 2-9 which was transmitted to the Hampshire College Archives from the Smith College Archives in 1994. This series is processed in acid-free folders.
In 1958, the Presidents of Amherst, Mt. Holyoke, and Smith Colleges and the University of Massachusetts appointed this faculty committee to develop plans "for a new experimental college located in close proximity to the four institutions, aimed at producing education of the highest quality at a minimum cost per student and with as small a faculty relative to the size of the student body as new methods of instruction and new administrative procedures can make possible," (From the charge to the committee).
The committee, thereafter known as the Committee for New College, continued to work and issued two more reports, present in this series. Boxes 2-5 contain early committee files and work on
With the pledge by Harold F. Johnson of $6,000,000 to start a new college along the lines laid out in the New College Plan, the planning for Hampshire College gained a firm basis in reality. This committee was appointed by the newly formed trustees of Hampshire College and consisted of a member of the faculty of Amherst, Mt. Holyoke and Smith Colleges and the University of Massachusetts, selected by the President of each institution. Charles R. Longsworth, chairman of the Hampshire College Educational Trust, was a member ex officio and represented Hampshire College. The committee was charged with advising the academic leadership of the college as to the design of an educational program for Hampshire College. This series consists of memoranda and reports prepared for the committee, notes on meetings, and copies of the final report of the committee.
The Hampshire College Conference, held in June 1966, brought together a group of educators, artists and intellectuals to discuss plans for the educational program of Hampshire College. The file contains a report of the conference, with letters and reports by some of the participants.
This committee, composed of the first faculty of the College, was formed to plan the academic and curricular structure of the new college, including faculty number, characteristics and recruitment, the course calendar, examinations and grading. It was succeeded by the Academic Committee (Series 10). The file consists of agendas, minutes and memoranda, arranged in chronological order.
The Committee on College Policy was formed by President Patterson in September 1968. Having as members the principal academic officers of the college, this group was directly advisory to the President on all major policy matters during the final planning year. The file consists of agendas, minutes and correspondence from that year.
This committee, composed of the chief academic and administrative officers of the college, was responsible for the preliminary planning of all aspects of the college's program. The file contains, in chronological order, agendas, minutes, and correspondence by and to the members of the committee. The final section contains the same material sorted by subject.
This series contains the 1966 and 1975 editions of
The Planning Bulletins were intended to convey to the public a sense of the planning being done in specific areas in preparation for the opening of the College in 1970. Thus, they represent the original thinking and policy for many ongoing College programs. The series was continued by three unnumbered Bulletins published after the College opened. This file also contains three reports intended to be part of the series, but which were never published. The second box contains two Progress Reports, intended as a continuation of the Planning Bulletin series. Also present is a final grant report related to the second Progress Report
This committee, consisting of the Dean and several faculty members of the School of Social Science, was responsible for the planning of the first academic building, intended to house the School of Social Science. The file contains memoranda, reports, and minutes of meetings, arranged in chronological order.
This committee, successor to the Curriculum Committee of 1968-69, consisted of the faculty and Deans of the College, as well as the Directors of Admissions and the Library. It continued the planning for the academic and curricular structure of the College. The file consists of agendas, minutes and memoranda, arranged in chronological order. The file includes the official committee files kept by the Dean of Faculty office. Also present is a brief file of the Committee on Coeducation, of the same time period.
This file contains miscellaneous documents relating to the planning process, including films and audiotapes. The films have been transferred to videocassette (3/4" master, 1/2" copy) also present in this series.
This planning committee, composed of the chief admin-istrative and academic officers of the college, dealt with the issues of faculty and staff appointment, contracts, salary and benefits. The file is sorted into agendas, minutes, and several subject sections. Access to this file is restricted.