History
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March 22, 2019
This Week in U-M History — March 25-31
The cornerstone of the Michigan League was set in place on March 29, 1928. Read about some of the other things that happened in U-M history during the week of March 25-31.
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March 18, 2019
This Week in U-M History — March 18-24
On March 18, 1837, the Michigan Legislature voted to establish the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor. Read about some of the other things that happened in U-M history during the week of March 18-24.
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August 29, 2018
Gary Krenz named director for post-bicentennial planning
Gary D. Krenz, formerly executive director of U-M’s Bicentennial Office, has been appointed director for post-bicentennial planning at the Bentley Historical Library.
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August 13, 2018
Angell’s diplomatic journey to China
U-M President James Burrill Angell once played a crucial role in negotiating two treaties with China — an immigration treaty at the behest of the U.S. government, and a second trade treaty drafted by the Chinese, which in part enacted an absolute ban on Chinese-American commerce in opium.
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July 23, 2018
Failed predictions
Albert Porta, a professor of civil engineering at Santa Clara College in California, developed a weather and earthquake forecasting service. Despite media perceptions, he never served on the U-M faculty, but a U-M professor and The Michigan Daily ultimately cast doubt on Porta’s cataclysmic predictions.
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July 2, 2018
After loss, a medical journey begins
Built in 1926 by famous architect Albert Kahn, the Thomas Henry Simpson Memorial Institute for Medical Research on Observatory Street was the result of a $400,000 bequest by Christine Simpson of Detroit. Her gift stipulated that the institute should be primarily devoted “to the study of pernicious anemia.”
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June 25, 2018
The legendary ‘Cat Hole’
Along Washtenaw Avenue toward the sharp bend into Huron Street is the site of a long-lost Ann Arbor landmark known to generations of Michigan students and staff as the Cat Hole.
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June 11, 2018
The president and the photographer
As a U-M student, Margaret Bourke-White’s interest in photography was encouraged by Professor Alexander Ruthven. She would go on to become a legendary news photographer and he would later become the university’s seventh president. Their friendship would last for nearly 50 years.
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May 21, 2018
Feeding the animals
In 1929, an anonymous benefactor paid for the construction of a small zoo behind the Alexander G. Ruthven Museums Building on Washtenaw Avenue. The donor in part hoped the zoo would bring comfort to the children in University Hospital across the street.
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May 7, 2018
U-M’s jazz paradise
In 1894, U-M alumnus and regent Levi Lewis Barbour donated a patch of property along Woodward Avenue in Detroit. After forgoing plans to build a luxury apartment building on the site, the university sublet the property, leading to the eventual construction of the Graystone Ballroom.
