University of Virginia Library

Sesquicentennial Activity
Continues Into Winter

In 1819 the General Assembly
granted the University its charter.
Even though the first students did
not arrive in Charlottesville until
1825, some six years later, the
University is celebrating the 150th
year since its founding this year.

The University's sesquicentennial
celebration that began last
year will be highlighted with an
October convocation that will draw
representatives of professional and
cultural organizations, governments,
and universities and colleges
from throughout the world.

Convocation

The convocation October 19-21
will be the largest event of the
University's 150th year, which
began last January with a series of
events in Charlottesville and New
York.

The speaker at the convocation
will be Philip Handler, recently
elected president of the National
Academy of Sciences and former
chairman of the biochemistry
department at Duke University. He
will speak the morning of October
21 following an academic procession
down the University's famed
lawn.

The convocation will be coupled
with Commonwealth Day Week
End, October 17-18, when the
University is host to the Governor,
Mills E. Godwin, the Virginia
General Assembly and other state
leaders.

The sesquicentennial celebration,
whose theme is the "Illimitable
Freedom of the human mind"
began last January 15 when President
Edgar F. Shannon Jr. discussed
aspects of the 150th year
and the future of the University
before a group of student leaders
gathered in the Rotunda.

On January 19, a Charter Day
dinner honored descendants of the
families in this area who had
supported establishment of the
University, and four days later the
University was feted at a dinner in
New York City by the Newcomer
Society of North America.

As the 1969-70 academic year
opens, the University will continue
its anniversary program of bringing
leading scholars from throughout
the world to Charlottesville.

Visiting Scholars

September 23-27, public
lectures and a panel discussion led
by a group of visiting scholars will
focus on "The Future of Political
and Intellectual Freedom." The
visiting scholars will be Fawn
Brodie, senior lecturer in history at
the University of California at Los
Angeles; Peter Jay, economics
editor of the London Times; and
Herbert Wechsler, professor of
constitutional law at Columbia
University.

Symposia to be held October 20
as part of the convocation program
will bring a number of scholars to
the University to examine "Modern
Man and the Finite World" and
"Modern Man and the Enlightenment."

Principal participants will be
Raymond Aron, professor of letters
at the University of Paris; Daniel
Boorstein, director of the National
Museum of History and Technology;
Peter Gay, professor of
comparative European intellectual
history at Yale University; Sir Peter
Medawat, director of the National
Institute for Medical Research,
London; Kenneth Clark, professor
of psychology at City College of
New York: and Athelstan Spilhaus,
president-elect of the American
Association for the Advancement
of Science.

Special Exhibits

Guests at Commonwealth Week
End and the convocation will view
several special exhibits on University
and Virginia history, including
manuscripts and books
written by Virginia authors during
the last 150 years at Alderman
Library. Also, original architectural
drawings will trace 150 years of
Virginia architecture in a display at
the new School of Architecture
building.

Two other major symposia will
be held during the sesquicentennial
celebration. On October 8-11, the
Graduate School of Business
Administration and the psychiatry
and biology departments will focus
on "Allegiance and Hostility: Man's
Mammalian Heritage."

Examining the problems of
human relations, competition, conflict
and rivalry will be Peter Marler
from Rockefeller University,
Arthur Mirsky from the University
of Pittsburgh's Laboratory of
Clinical Science, Donald Kennedy
from Harvard University's School
of Public Health, John Spiegel from
the Lemberg Center for the Study
of Violence at Brandeis University,
Eliot Chapple from the Research
Center at Rockland State Hospital
and I. Charles Kaufman from the
University of Colorado Medical
Center.

Symposium

In celebration of the 100th
anniversary of Walter Reed's
graduation from the University's
School of Medicine, that school will
sponsor a symposium November 5
on "Infectious Disease in Historical
Perspective."

Among the participants will be
William B. Bean, chairman of
internal medicine at the State
University of Iowa, who is preparing
a biography on Dr. Reed, the
conqueror of yellow fever.

Internationally known astronomer
and author Fred Hoyle will
give the fourth annual Jansky
Lecture at the National Radio
Astronomy Observatory on
September 24. Mr. Hoyle, Plumian
Professor of astronomy and experimental
philosophy at Cambridge
University, will examine the relationship
of astronomy and physics.