Originally published in 1939
Some of this information may no longer be current and in that case is presented for historical interest only.
Edited by GET NJ, COPYRIGHT 2003

Eighth oldest institution of higher learning in the country, and the only state university with a Colonial charter, Rutgers University (buildings open unless otherwise indicated) was founded as Queen's College in 1766 to prepare ministers for the Dutch Reformed Church. The university now includes the College of Arts and Sciences, College of Engineering, School of Chemistry, Department of Ceramics, New Jersey College of Agriculture, School of Education, New Jersey College for Women, New Jersey College of Pharmacy (at Newark), University Extension Division and the University College, which conducts evening courses in Newark and New Brunswick. The combined enrollment for all the colleges, evening courses, and special courses is 9,993. The faculty numbers 500.

The university has several scattered campuses, which tend to decentralize student life. In the northwestern part of the city is Queen's Campus, with the oldest buildings and fine trees. University activities are centered at Queens. Neilson Campus, with the library and technical departments, lies north of Queens. Still farther north is Bishop Campus, consisting chiefly of dormitories. The recently acquired River Road Campus, with a stadium, golf course and athletic fields, is on the opposite shore of Raritan River.

In the southeastern part of the city, separated from Queen's by the business district, is the campus of New Jersey College for Women. It is a colorful place in spring when the great cherry tree beside College Hall and the dogwood and crab apple near the chapel are in bloom.

Directly south of the women's campus is the college farm, a 750-acre tract with the six buildings and the greenhouses of the New Jersey College of Agriculture and the State Agricultural Experiment Station. The workmanlike aspect of this section is relieved by apple and peach orchards.

In contrast with nearby Princeton, many of whose students are from all parts of the country, the Rutgers undergraduates are chiefly from New Jersey's middle class. Most of the students are preoccupied with the serious business of getting an education-and preparing themselves for earning a living after graduation. Nevertheless, several of the fraternity houses along College Avenue suggest an opulence in marked contrast to the democratic tone of the campus.

Although the college's charter was granted in 1766 by George III through Governor William Franklin, the school did not open until November 1771. Eighteen-year-old Frederick Frelinghuysen was hired as the entire faculty; there was one graduate at the first commencement in 1774. When the British occupied New Brunswick in 1776, Frelinghuysen left to serve as an artillery officer. The institution was moved from the old Red Lion Tavern building in New Brunswick to Millstone and then to North Branch, but returned at the end of the war.

Classes were suspended between 1795 and 1807 for lack of funds. In 1811 the college was established on its present campus when Queen's Building was first occupied. Two lotteries netted the young institution about $27,000, plus a number of lawsuits from dissatisfied ticketholders.

The General Synod of the Dutch Reformed Church had taken over the college in an arrangement that lasted 57 years. When control of the college was returned to its trustees in 1864, the New Brunswick Theological Seminary became the separate institution that it is today.

During the period of church domination, the college officers anticipated the technique of obtaining large grants from wealthy individuals. Henry Rutgers, 80-year-old philanthropist, was a member of the Collegiate Church in New York whose pastor, the Rev. Dr. Philip Milledoler, had become president of Queen's College in 1825. Prudently the trustees renamed the college for Mr. Rutgers. Then they waited. After an anxious year, they received from Colonel Rutgers a draft for $200, to be spent for a bell. Later, Rutgers understandingly contributed a $5,000 bond.

When the college was designated in 1864 to receive $5,800 annually from the sale of government land, the work of the present State College of Agriculture began on a 90-acre farm.

Rutgers College became a State institution in 1917. A year later the New Jersey College for Women was opened as an affiliated institution. In 1924 the name "Rutgers College" was discarded for "Rutgers University." Since then the School of Education has been opened and the New Jersey College of Pharmacy,,at Newark, has been absorbed. Rutgers University is a State institution in a very real sense. Its educational work is by no means limited to the approximately 2,500 men and women undergraduates in the various colleges. County extension agents bring practical advice to housewives and farmers, answering questions on canning, poultry disease, and other problems of the home and farm. Campus buildings are thrown open for conventions; each year the university sponsors institutes on labor, banking and the press. Faculty members are constantly in service as speakers before women's clubs, civic groups and other organizations.

• QUEEN'S BUILDING, Hamilton St. between George St. and College Ave., is the central building of Queen's Campus, and the home of the university's administrative offices. It is one of the best examples of Post-Colonial college architecture in the country. Designed by James McComb, architect of New York's City Hall, it was occupied as the first structure 14 years before the central section and cupola were completed in 1825. It is simple in mass and fenestration, relieved by a delicate cornice and low-pitched pediments, and crowned with a fine Georgian lantern.

  The somber brownstone walls are overgrown with ivy, which has mellowed the lines of the composition. Queen's represents the culmination of classic simplicity in the development of the architecture during the early Republican period. Offices open within from the broad center hall, from which a divided stairway leads to the second floor.

  The CANNON on the lawn before the building was a gift from the Federal Government, marking the end of a campus war with Princeton College. In 1875 a group of Rutgers sophomores raided the Princeton campus and returned with a cannon, but not the one that Princeton men had boasted of stealing from Rutgers years earlier. After a reprisal by Princeton students, both sides returned stolen goods and Rutgers got a new cannon.

• GEOLOGICAL HALL, W. of Queen's Bldg. (open 9-5 weekdays), another brownstone structure dedicated in 1873, has a collection of minerals, Indian relics and New Jersey fossils, including a mastodon from a marl pit near Salem in 1869.

• WINANTS HALL, NE. corner College Ave. and Somerset St., houses the college postoffice, a cafeteria and dormitory rooms. The largest building on Queen's Campus, it has a columned porch, a brownstone first story and brick second and third stories. It was designed by Van Campen Taylor and erected in 189o.

• SOPHIA ASTLEY KIRKPATRICK CHAPEL, E. of Queen's Bldg., a brownstone building erected in 1872, contains more than 90 portraits of university presidents, trustees and other notables. Among the painters were Thomas Sully and John Vanderlyn. Memorial windows presented by graduating classes are in keeping with the French Gothic architecture.

• DANIEL S. SCHANCK OBSERVATORY (not open), SW. corner Hamilton and George Sts., was erected in 1865. Constructed of creampainted brick and modeled after the Temple of the Winds in Athens, it has two octagonal towers linked by a short passageway.

• The RALPH VOORHEES LIBRARY (open 8 a.m.-11 p.m. Mon.Fri.; 8-6 Sat.; 2-6 Sun.; 8-12 holidays), Hamilton St. between George St. and College Ave., opposite Queen's Bldg., contains 261,469 volumes and 150,000 pamphlets, maps and manuscripts. It is known for its collections of original documents relating to New Jersey and New Brunswick history, among them the Joyce Kilmer manuscript collection, letters to George Washington, and the records of many of the State's oldest families. The library also has the Defoe collection of first and second edition pamphlets, the Henry Janeway Weston memorial collections of books and pictures dealing with Napoleon I, and the Thomas L. Janeway memorial collection of casts and photographs. Among the historical relics are a compass, chain and vernier that belonged to Washington; early prints, drawings and paintings ; and a coin collection. Erected in 1902, the building is a squat structure of brownstone designed in the classic manner. The architect was Henry Rutgers Marshall.

• NEW JERSEY HALL (open upon application to Zoology Dept.), Hamilton St. between College Ave. and George St., built in 1888, is of raspberry-red brick, three stories high, with corner towers. The building contains 25,000 specimens of seed plants and oysters.

• CERAMICS BUILDING (open on application to Ceramics Dept.), 536 George St., is of red brick, in modified Georgian Colonial style. Various ceramic wares are manufactured on Thursdays, Fridays and Saturdays from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. The department also maintains ceramics exhibits.

• UNIVERSITY GYMNASIUM, College Ave. between Morrell and Senior Sts., is of modified Georgian Colonial architecture. It was built in 1931 on the grounds where the Nation's first intercollegiate football game was played by Rutgers and Princeton on Nov. 6, 1869. With 25 men on each team, Rutgers won, 6-4.

• COLLEGE HALL, N. side of George St., E. of Bishop St., is the central unit of the campus of the New Jersey College for Women. This converted brownstone residence, which was the entire college in 1918, now houses the administrative offices. Most of the other campus buildings were erected after 1918 and are largely of modified Georgian Colonial architecture.

• ELIZABETH RODMAN VOORHEES CHAPEL, E. of College Hall, is designed in the Post-Colonial style. Built in 1926 from designs by Ludlow and Peabody, it is finely proportioned and noteworthy in the lack of over-ornamentation. The building has a slender white spire.

• WOODLAWN (not open), Clifton Ave S. of George St., was the home of James Neilson, trustee and benefactor of the university. The colonnaded white frame house, built early in the 19th century, faces a broad lawn, and resembles Mount Vernon in its architectural simplicity.

• NEW JERSEY STATE COLLEGE OF AGRICULTURE and the AGRICULTURAL EXPERIMENT STATION, S. corner George St. and Nichol Ave., are housed in red brick buildings adjacent to tracts used for experimental farming. Here approximately 800 students obtain theoretical and practical training in scientific agriculture, for utilization in farming, teaching or in business associated with agriculture. The Experiment Station under the auspices of the Federal Government, established in 188o, seeks improved farming methods and new ways of fighting insect pests and plant diseases. The work of the station and the college has become widely known. A tablet marks the SITE OF THE JOHANNIS VOORHEES HOMESTEAD, built c. 1720 and partly burned by the British troops. The building was renovated and acquired by the trustees of the university in 1864. From this house scientific farm investigations concerned with tests of marl, manures and chemical fertilizers in the growing of corn, potatoes, wheat, clover and other crops were carried on as early as 1867. In 1872 the New Jersey Board of Agriculture was organized here.

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