This Week In KU History

September 1, 1914: Dr. Ralph H. Major joins the KU School of Medicine faculty, becoming both professor and chairman of the Department of Pathology, and launching a career “that can never be measured in terms any more precise than immense or profound.” Read the full story.

September 5, 1894: Bacteriologist Marshall A. Barber, whose invention of the micropipette will enable him to conclusively prove the germ theory of disease, begins his 17-year teaching career at the University of Kansas and the KU School of Medicine. Read the full story.

September 6, 1905: The new four-year KU School of Medicine begins its first day of classes with a faculty complement that includes several physician-educators with outstanding reputations. Read the full story.

September 7, 1917: Lt. William T. Fitzsimons, a KU Alum and US Army doctor serving in France, becomes the first American casualty of the First World War. Read the full story.

September 11, 1924: Watson Library opens for student use. Read the full story.

September 12, 1996 : Fifty years after creating the “smiling” Jayhawk image that helped pay for his KU education, Harold “Hal” Sandy is honored by the University with a parade on Jayhawk Boulevard. Read the full story.

September 17, 1971: The Kansas Board of Regents approves the KU Medical Center’s request to establish a clinical training branch of its School of Medicine in Wichita. Read the full story.

September 18, 1998: Strong Hall becomes the fourth KU building to merit a listing on the National Register of Historic Places. Read the full story.

September 21, 1939: Charter members of the Jayhawk Co-op formally adopt a constitution, establishing their Kentucky Street residence as the first independent cooperative housing arrangement at KU. Read the full story.

September 22, 1939: Deane W. Malott, associate professor of business at Harvard, becomes the first native Kansan and KU graduate to be inaugurated as chancellor of the University of Kansas. Read the full story.

September 27, 1957: 700 KU students participate in what will be the final Nightshirt Parade, putting to bed a University tradition that stretches back more than half a century. Read the full story.

September 29, 1944: Forty World War II veterans, enrolled as freshmen at KU, refuse to don “freshmen beanies,” thus marking the beginning of the end of this controversial, decades-old tradition. Read the full story.

Compiled by H.J. Fortunato
University of Kansas

This Week In KU History is a project of the KU Memorial Unions.

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