Johns Hopkins: The First 150 Years

The definitive history of the first American research university. The Quaker merchant Johns Hopkins set in motion a revolution when he left what was then the largest philanthropic gift in the US: a $7 million bequest to found a university and hospital.In Johns Hopkins: The First 150 Years, historian Andrew Jewett, with Jonathan Strassfeld, captures the sweeping evolution of an institution that rose from the bustle of a post-Civil War port city to become a global titan of discovery and innovation.The book begins with a vivid portrait of Hopkins himself, whose life embodied the economic dynamism and deep moral tensions of nineteenth-century Baltimore.Jewett and Strassfeld then turn to the story of how the university's trustees worked with visionary leader Daniel Coit Gilman to establish original research and graduate training as defining features of American academic life-previously centered on classical education for undergraduates-and to position Hopkins as a global innovator in both t