La Salle University - Explorer Yearbook (Philadelphia, PA)

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PAST and PRESENT Although youthful and slender in the shadow of today ' s massive educational establishments, La Salle, with a present enrollment of 5300 and facilities now valued at $15,000,000, stands no less in contrast to our modest beginnings. The Christian Brothers Academy, a high school consisting of three classes, having been established at St. Michael ' s parish, 1419 N. 2nd Street, in 1862, was on March 20 of the following year granted a charter by the Commonwealth as La Salle College in the City of Philadelphia. Following the Civil War years, the College was re- located to the northeast corner of Juniper and Filbert Streets. The passage of twenty years found this quiet neighborhood of Penn Square transformed— the Ma- sonic Temple and City Hall had been constructed— and in 1886 the College moved to 1240 North Broad Street, site of the brownstone mansion that was to be-La Salle ' s home for nearly a half century. By the 1 920 ' s the desire for more suitable surround- ings again necessitated the acquisition of a new resi- dence. Christopher Morley once wrote, It would be hard to find a more lovely spot in the flush of a summer sunset than Wister Woods, and here in 1928 a tract of land was purchased which is the home of La Salle today. The changes that have since occurred at 20th Street and OIney Avenue are now manifest, but it was not always so. In contrast to the optimism which should have imbued the new campus environs, the Great Depression brought only debt and concern for the future. Students and teachers from the early 1930 ' s can still recall frigid College Hall classrooms when the luxury of heat could not be afforded. Surviving this and a wartime enrollment which in 1943 shrank to fewer than 100, the School in 1946 found the G.I. Bill pushing our numbers above 1300. Only with this postwar influx was provided the stimulation which in the last decade has given us a new La Salle. Yet, today in 1963, if we feel justly proud of our new size and vigor, as we page through the past we still must acknowledge the efforts of earlier genera- tions at La Salle which, although sometimes forgotten in our day, were fruitful; for indeed the past is pro- logue.

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■- ' La Salle College begins its second century amid several para- doxes. For example, the College was chartered when the Civil War raged between the States, but in only the past seven years a doubling of student body, faculty, and campus facilities has made it, in a real sense, o new institution. Similarly, La Salle is essentially a city college, but increasingly it is becoming a residential college as well; it has been a Christian Brothers ' college, but is now one in which laymen have assumed im- portant roles. To assess these and other developments in its present situa- tion and to make plans for the future, the College is engaged in a serious self-study. Whatever impact this study will have — on a clearer defmition of objectives, new directions in the c( r4 riculum, the application of advanced methods in teaching and learning — one thing is certain: as our second century opens there is new vigor and impetus in the academic life of teachers and students who make up the La Salle community. . j| —Brother Fldelian of Mary, F.S.cJ i J Vice-President for Academic Affairs THE COLLEGE

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POPS pxTxs nc. € .:,U-rr.. c.y ,»iy.-- yt ' n,, WEDNESDAY. JUNE I7TH. 187 1878: An advertisement which appeared in the premier edition of The La Sa e Advance, a monthly publication of the College ' s students v hich was devoted to art, science, literature, moral improve- ment, and the mental development of the rising generation. 1883: Cardinal Wiseman ' s Hidden Gem, about the life of Alexius, son of a Roman Patrician, was a Christmas-time offering of the students of La Salle. 1903: An early publicity blotter circulated by the College pictured La Salle ' s 1902-03 City Championship basketball team. 1874: Program of the Seventh Annual College Commencement. The school had an enrollment of 250 students at the time. STUDENTS OF LA SALLE COLLEGI HIDDEN GEM ta a tle C0tk g» Sroab BU above (3(rarb Hve. Sg lr: Coilegiale, Commercial. Academic, Prepdratory .Depaftments £) M » m. W0LFRE9, F. S. 6.