On this day in 1789, Georgetown University is founded in Georgetown, Maryland (now a part of the District of Columbia) when Bishop John Carroll, Rev. Robert Molyneux, and Rev. John Ashton purchase land for the proposed academy for the education of youth.
The Province of Maryland was founded in 1634 by a group of settlers from England accompanied by Jesuit priests. In 1646, the defeat of the Royalists in the English Civil War led to stringent laws against Catholic education, and the destruction of their school at Calverton Manor. Following the end of the American Revolutionary War, plans to establish a permanent Catholic institution for education in the United States were ready to be realized.
At Benjamin Franklin’s recommendation, Pope Pius VI appointed former Jesuit John Carroll the first head of the Catholic Church in the United States, even though the papal suppression of the Jesuit order was still in effect. Carroll began meetings of local clergy in 1783 near Annapolis, where they orchestrated the development of a new university. On January 23, 1789, Carroll finalized the purchase of the property in Georgetown. Future Congressman William Gaston was enrolled as the school’s first student on November 22, 1791, and instruction began on January 2, 1792.
President James Madison signed into law Georgetown’s congressional charter on March 1, 1815, creating the first federal university charter, which allowed it to confer degrees, with the first bachelor’s degrees being awarded two years later.
Georgetown alumni pursuing graduate study have been recipients of 32 Rhodes Scholarships, 46 Marshall Scholarships, 33 Truman Scholarships, 15 Mitchell Scholarships, and 12 Gates Cambridge Scholarships. Georgetown is among the nation’s top producers of Fulbright Scholars, with 565 over its history, and produced more than any other institution in 2020, 2021, 2023, and 2024. It is also one of the top-ten yearly producers of Peace Corps volunteers as of 2016.
Georgetown Alumni are heavily represented in government and politics. Alumni include Bill Clinton, 42nd President of the United States, is a 1968 graduate of the School of Foreign Service. Former officials of the United States Cabinet include 59th Secretary of State and former Supreme Allied Commander Europe, Gen. Alexander Haig; 22nd Secretary of Defense and former CIA Director Robert Gates; 5th Secretary of Homeland Security and retired Marine Gen. John F. Kelly; and 76th Secretary of the Treasury Jack Lew. Other cabinet-level and senior executive branch officials include former Director of National Intelligence Avril Haines, former CIA Director George Tenet, 16th Chair of the Federal Reserve Jerome Powell, Director General of the Foreign Service Marcia Bernicat, and seven White House Chiefs of Staff that include Ron Klain, Denis McDonough, and John Podesta.
In the 119th U.S. Congress, alumni Hakeem Jeffries, John Barrasso, and Dick Durbin hold party leadership positions, serving among a total of seven alumni in the United States Senate and 21 alumni and faculty in the House of Representatives.[313] In total, 116 alumni have served in Congress and 26 have served as state governors, including Terry McAuliffe and Pat Quinn. On the U.S. Supreme Court, alumni include the late Associate Justice Antonin Scalia and former Chief Justice Edward Douglass White.
Patrick Francis Healy, born a slave and the first African-American to become a Jesuit, helped transform the school into a modern university after the Civil War
Donut infusion…
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On this day in 1965, ‘Downtown’ made Petula Clark the first UK female singer to have a No.1 on the US singles chart since Vera Lynn in 1952. The song was also a No.2 hit in the UK. Recorded in three takes (with the second take ultimately chosen as the completed track), session players in the studio recording included Jimmy Page. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zx06XNfDvk0
