Old School | The University Record

March 13, 2017

The history of maize and blue

In the late 1860s, a committee of U-M students charged with choosing the university’s colors recommended that “azure blue and maize” be adopted as the institution’s symbolic colors. The exact details of those colors have varied over the years.

March 6, 2017

Henry Carter Adams

Economist Henry Carter Adams started U-M’s first courses in business administration as well as courses in accounting, finance and marketing. Adams chaired the university’s department of economics until his death in 1921.

February 20, 2017

Tappan’s dismissal

On June 25, 1863, the University of Michigan Board of Regents voted to remove the university’s first president, Henry Philip Tappan, from office.

February 13, 2017

Targeting Tappan

Although U-M’s first president earned the love of students and the respect of many faculty, Henry Philip Tappan also had his fair share of critics.

February 6, 2017

Cooley and the looking-glass self

After graduating from U-M, Charles Horton Cooley started working at the Interstate Commerce Commission. He returned to join U-M’s economics department, where his ideas came to “undergird much of 20th century sociology.”

January 30, 2017

John Dewey and a new perspective

John Dewey, an early philosophy professor at U-M, became one of the chief theorists of the school of philosophy that became known as pragmatism.

January 23, 2017

Between two paintings, years of growth

A 1907 view of the University Michigan campus painted by Richard Rummell, an artist well-known for his “bird’s-eye” landscapes.

January 16, 2017

MLK keynote

In 1989, California State Assembly Speaker Willie Brown Jr. gave the opening address at Hill Auditorium as part of U-M’s celebrations honoring civil rights activist Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.

January 9, 2017

President Angell’s birthday

James Burrill Angell, the university’s third president, was born Jan. 7, 1829, in Rhode Island. Known as “Prexy” to students, he served as U-M’s president from 1871 to 1909.

December 12, 2016

President Robben Fleming’s birthday

Robben W. Fleming, the university’s ninth president, was born on Dec. 18, 1916. Fleming led U-M from 1968 to 1979.