On Campus, Fall 1966—Spring 1970

During the late 1960s, Trinity College underwent its share of turmoil related to changing student expectations, new curriculum choices, and anxiety over the involvement of the United States in southeast Asia. Even before the class matriculated in 1966, student activism and social protest became increasingly visible and better organized. A Trinity chapter of Students for a Democratic Society (SDS) had been founded in February of that year. The Trinity Association of Negroes (TAN) was established in April 1967 and renamed itself Trinity Coalition of Blacks (TCB) during the following year. At the same time, college administrators and faculty seemed to be open to the idea of letting students contribute to the transformation of the curriculum, the guidelines for selecting prospective students, and the decision to change the school's composition by allowing women to apply.

This highly selective collection captures just a slice of the experiences of the Trinity class of 1970. Events may be followed more closely by reference to the coverage in the Trinity Tripod and local newspapers.

Hover cursor over each article to browse the titles of each article. 

Click on items——to read further.

-----------------------

Timeline

Among the most notable events between fall 1966 and spring 1970:

• the Curriculum Revision Committee, which included Steven Bauer '70 and Eric T. Rathbun '70, formed in March-April 1967;

• a call for a general student strike in February 1968;

• an SDS-led sit-in during April 1968 in which 168 students—47 of whom were students in the class of 1970 (or 14% of that class)—held President Albert Jacobs and the Trustees for 30 hours in a room in the Downes Memorial building;

• The 1968 Sit-In and Demonstration of Support in Pictures
• Trinity Ivy Pictures Explained

• the Committee on Coeducation, including John C. Chapin, Jr., '70, met in October 1968 to study the possibility of introducing coeducation at Trinity;

• the Trinity College Council, an advisory group of faculty, administrators, and students, including James M. McClaugherty '70, was formed to negotiate a number of concerns important to students;

• 33 Trinity students, including at least 17 members from the class of '70, spent the spring semester of 1969 taking classes at Vassar College in Poughkeepsie (NY) as part of a four-college exchange program to understand the issues around becoming coeducational, which Trinity's Trustees approved on January 11, 1969;

• a large group of students demanded in early 1970 that the Trinity faculty offer a teaching position to Professor Sumner (Chuck) Stone, an African-American who had taught as a visiting professor at Trinity, though Stone ultimately turned down the eventual job offer;

• a fire bomb on March 25, 1970 destroyed an office in Downes Memorial, near the administrative suite of President Theodore Lockwood; and

• a voluntary general strike in May 1970, of some 800-900 students who protested the Cambodian intervention by writing letters and circulating petitions.

Just weeks before Trinity's class of 1970 graduated—on May 2, 1970—four Kent State students lay dead at the hands of National Guardsmen and, on May 15, 1970, two African-American students at Jackson State College were killed (and others injured) by city and Mississippi state police.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------