1853: Wayman Crow's charter for establishing WU was accepted by the Missouri legislature
(corporation composed of 17 members of Unitarian Church of the Messiah; named institution Eliot Seminary
after church's pastor, and granted tax exempt status; same 17 made up board of directors empowered to add
other board members and appoint faculty); renamed Washington Institute in 1854, then O'Fallon Institute in 1855,
then Washington University in 1856; Eliot president of the corporation and Crow vice-president in 1854. 
Note: O'Fallon Institute offered science lectures, library, etc—a major focus of trustees' interests and concerns for
the economic development of St. Louis
1853-1887: William Greenleaf Eliot, President of the corporation (board of trustees)
1857: First inauguration of the University; Charter revised
1858-1862: Joseph G. Hoyt, Chancellor (and professor of Greek); began work in 1859
1856: Academic Department established for men(secondary-level; later renamed Smith
 Academy)
1859: Mary Institute opened for women (secondary-level)
1859: Chancellor Hoyt established a college curriculum (Greek, Latin, mathematics)
1860: Mary Institute opened to provide secondary education for girls
1862: first collegiate degrees awarded
1862-1869: William Chauvenet, Chancellor (was professor of mathematics and
 astronomy)
1866: first Masters degrees awarded
1867: first class entered the Law School; Washington University Basketball Club organized
as the first athletics at the university
1869: first women enrolled—in the Law School: Lemma Barkeloo (stayed a year and passed the
bar) and Phoebe Couzins (LLB 1871)² ; O'Fallon Institute and University severed connection
1870: first female college student admitted, left after a year (Alice Mary Belcher)
1871: Marshall Snow appointed Dean of the College (professor of history, 1874-1912); Phoebe
Couzins first female graduate of the Law School
1871-1887: William Greenleaf Eliot, Chancellor; Polytechnic School took place of Scientific
 School and O'Fallon; Calvin Woodward named Dean (engineering, architecture; science)
1873: Mary Rychlicki and Ada Calista Fisher enrolled as sophomores in the college
1876: Rychlicki and Fisher graduated with the class of 1876 and were awarded Master's degrees
1870s: Divisions of University included: preparatory (Academy for boys, Mary Institute for
girls); College (liberal arts); Polytechnic School (engineering, architecture, sciences); Manual Training School;
Law School; Art classes (part-time); women enrolled in various classes, but not for degrees
1879-1880: Women's enrollment in college program increased and continued to grow in 
subsequent decades; by 1929 they made up more than half of undergraduate student body 
1881: study for Ph.D. authorized
1887:  Eliot died; Marshall Snow Acting Chancellor; George Leighton president of board
1889: Walter Moran Farmer, first black man to complete a Washington University
degree—finished in the Law School; Blacks admitted to Manual training School and other areas of the
university in the 1880s
1891: St. Louis Medical College affiliated with Washington University; Robert S. Brookings 
joined the board of trustees
1892: Termination of admission of African Americans due to Jim Crow attitudes of small
number of white students who protested their inclusion on a school trip
1891-1907: Winfield Scott Chaplin Chancellor; persuaded board to buy land at Hilltop site to
relocate the University from downtown to edge of Forest Park
1892: First Ph.D. awarded to faculty member Edmund Engler
1895: First student to earn Ph.D.—Anna Isabel Mulford
1895-1928: Robert S. Brookings, President of the Board of Trustees
1905: Washington University opened for college and engineering classes on Hilltop campus in
 January
1907: McMillan Hall opened as the first dormitory for women students
1907-1913: David F. Houston, Chancellor; medical school reorganized along lines advocated by
 Henry Pritchett of Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching (formerly
professor of mathematics and astronomy  at the university, 1881-1897) 
1908: Other schools moved to the Hilltop campus
1911: Women's Athletic Association of Washington University founded
1913-1920:  Martha McCaulley, first Dean of Women
1913-1923: Frederic A. Hall Chancellor (acting, 1913-1917); new Medical School buildings
 opened 1915
1910s and 1920s: Student Life stories and articles demonstrate how threatened male students
were by women students' presence on campus
1914: The male and female student government organizations joined into one (after women had 
been excluded from the revitalized student government in 1910 and formed their own)
1917: School of Commerce and Finance founded (now known as the Olin School of Business)
1918: Women admitted to the School of Medicine
1920-1926: Edith Fenton, Dean of Women
1923-1927: Herbert S. Hadley, Chancellor
1924: Fund drive opened for new Women's Building; students raised $250,000 from alumnae
 and other donors between 1924 and 1926; strongly supported by Chancellor Hadley
1926-1930: Elizabeth Williamson, Dean of Women
1927: Cornerstone for Women's Building laid
1927-1945: George Throop, Chancellor
1930-1959: Adele Chomeau Starbird, Dean of Women
1942: All men's organized athletics cancelled due to World War II
1945-1953: Arthur Holly Compton, Chancellor
1946: Mildred Trotter, first woman full professor in School of Medicine (gross anatomy)
(initial appointment as instructor, 1924) ³
1947: Washington University trustees officially approved desegregating the University, 
beginning with the School of Medicine and the George Warren Brown School of Social
Work; intercollegiate football reestablished
1949: The Student Committee for the Admission of Negroes (SCAN) formed to lobby for full
admission of African Americans; the Chancellor and Board opened all graduate divisions
to black applicants
1950: The Board of Trustees desegregated the undergraduate divisions of the University; 
A. Gwendolyn Drew, first woman full professor on the Hilltop (Physical Education) (arrived at university 1946)
1951: Virginia Fell' Dotto, first woman full professor in an academic subject (School of Art)
1952: The first class of African-American students admitted to the college
1953: Rita Levi-Montalcini, first woman full professor in sciences on Hilltop (Biology)
1954-1962: Ethan A. H. Shepley, Chancellor
1956: Intercollegiate athletics for women ended; intramural athletics managed by sororities only
1959: Dean of Women position abolished with Starbird's retirement
1962-1971: Thomas A. Eliot Chancellor
1965: Student protests against the Vietnam War began on campus
1967: Ruth Ellen Moore, first woman trustee appointed (by Chancellor Eliot)
1968-1970: Student protests increased; ROTC building burned May 5, 1970
1968: Black Manifesto published; Association of Black Students (originally Association of
 Black Collegiates) formed
1969: African and AfroAmerican Studies Program (AFAS; originally Black Studies) formed;
renamed AFAS 1986
1970: First coeducational dormitory opened (Lee Hall)
1971-1995: William H. Danforth, Chancellor
1972: Women's Studies Program established--among the first in the U.S (now known as Women
 and Gender Studies);Title IX passed
1974: The Mr. and Mrs. Spencer T. Olin Fellowships for Women established to support women
students in the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences and the professional schools; Student Life first comments on Title IX
1976: Under federal pressure Washington University proffered plan to comply with Title IX
1979: Linda B. Salamon, Dean of the College of Arts and Sciences, first woman dean of an 
academic unit on the Hilltop campus
1987: Ervin Scholarship Program for African American students started
1991: Academic Women's Network (of the Medical School) established to address concerns
 about and discrimination against women faculty in the medical school (check date);
 Chancellor's Fellowships established for minority students in doctoral programs
1993: Cynthia Weese, Dean of Architecture, first woman dean of a professional school; Mellon
 Minority Undergraduate Scholars program established
1995: Association of Women Faculty (of the Hilltop campus) formed to address concerns about
 and discrimination against women faculty (check date)
1995-present: Mark S. Wrighton, Chancellor
1998: Endowed Chair established in Women's Studies, gift of Susan and William Stiritz
2000: Linda J. Nicholson, first Stiritz Professor of Women's Studies; Director of Women and
 Gender Studies (2001)