Fairfield University - Manor Yearbook (Fairfield, CT)

Page 16 text:

An act of incorporating Fairfield University of Saint Robert Bellarmine, Incorporated. Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives in General Assembly convened: Iames H. Dolan, Leo A. Reilly, Iohn VV. Doherty, YV. lfVaIter Kennedy, Iohn A. King, and their successors, and such other persons as may be associated with them in accordance with the by-laws of the corporation, are constituted a body politic by the name of: Fairfield University of Saint Robert Bellarmine, Incorporated, to be located in the Town of Fairfield, County of Fairfield, and State of Connecticut. 'ii' l ITI-I the signature of the Governor of Connecticut, His Excel- lency, Raymond E. Baldwin, the confirmation of Fairfield Uni- versity as a legal entity was completed in Hartford, on the 29th day of May, 1945. But the birth of the youngest American Iesuit Univer- sity was more than a legal charter to many, who saw in it the beginnings of what will one day be a leading American Catholic University. It was late in the year 1941, when the Society of Iesus, at the invitation of the Very Reverend Bishop, Maurice F. McAuliffe, began to plan for the first Catholic University in the state of Connecticut. Through the efforts of the Very Reverend Iames H. Dolan, then Provincial of the Province of New England, the estates of Oliver Gould Iennings and Walter B. Lashar were purchased as the site of the new university.

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Page 17 text:

On Iuly 15, 1942, the olllcial Hag-raising ceremony was held. The Reverend lohn lVlcF,leney, the first Rector of the College Preparatory School, together with the first faculty of eighteen Iesuit fathers and the prospective students and their parents. attended. Iennings Castle was renamed McAuliffe Hall and be- came the Hrst classroom building of the Preparatory School. The forty-room manor of the Lashar Estate, Hearthstone Hall, was made ready to serve as the residence of the Iesuit faculty with the new name of Bellarmine Hall. The inaugural graduation exercises with a class of nine took place on Iune 16, 1943, on the south terrace of Bellarmine Hall. From this small begin- ning the growth of the Preparatory School has spiralled with a constantly in- creasing student body and faculty. And as the Preparatory School matured, the Reverend Iames H. Dolan, in 1944, came to Fairfield as Rector with plans for a full-scale university. Blueprints and dreams now materialized into excavation and construction, electricians and carpenters classrooms and laboratories. First Berchmans Hall and then Xavier Hall appeared on the new campus overlooking Long Island Sound. In March, 1947, the Reverend Laurence C. Langguth was appointed Dean of Freshman and the acceptance of candidates for admission was begun. In October of that same year, the culmination of the years of planning and prepara- tion was reached when the first class of Fairfield University began its formal studies and the first Catholic University in Connecticut became a reality. i C,13C