How Harvard celebrated
This fall Harvard will begin a yearlong celebration of its 375th anniversary. The focus will be on the future, and not the past — a feature of similar anniversaries going back to the first, in 1836. Yes, that’s right: Harvard waited until it was 200 years old to have a first birthday party, or to celebrate itself in any significant way. After that, similar events — in 1886, 1936, and 1986 — were celebrated in scale with their perceived significance. As any student of anniversaries knows, the idea of 100 years trumps 50, which in turn outweighs anniversaries that track each 25 years. So the University’s grandest celebration years were 1836, 200 years after the founding of the College, and in 1936, the 300th anniversary. But why nothing before 1836? No one seems to know for sure. Officials at the Harvard University Archives have scoured the earliest written records, which grow more...