Our Princeton Newsletter

Rumor has it, Hamilton really did throw away his shot, and he threw it straight into Nassau Hall!! Ever since Sir George Otto Trevelyan published “The American Revolution” in 1905, word on the street has been that Alexander Hamilton shot a famous cannonball into Nassau Hall.  In the story, Sir George Otto Trevelyan tells of…

  CONGRATULATIONS TO MY FRIEND GRANT SOMERVILLE! Grant and Judy were married last weekend.  When the pastor asked for a funny story about their courtship, WE WERE MENTIONED DURING THE WEDDING CEREMONY! Here’s the sweet story Judy shared with the pastor:  On our second date Grant invited me to dinner at Mediterra in Princeton.  After…

ON BLOOMSDAY, june 16, 2021, PRINCETON UNIVERSITY’S UBER COOL PROFESSOR, Paul Muldoon WILL BE ZOOMING A 1 HOUR READING OF favorite passages and FORBIDDEN TEXTS FROM BLOOMSDAY BY James Joyce!!   (did you know Princeton’s own Sylvia Beach, owner of Shakespeare and Co., published the scandalous novel?  TRUE!)   She actually had to publish it…

Today in 1920, sparks literally flew destroying Marquand Chapel and Dickinson Hall.     The destruction prompted the construction of the internationally famous Princeton Chapel. Did you know ….. The University Chapel the second-largest university chapel in the world? The organ inside has 109 stops and 8,000 pipes? The oak pews in the nave are made…

Go to Grounds for Sculpture – You may have heard about the 35 acre cultural park with amazing views: …. Did you know there’s an open air outdoor employee shower at Grounds for Sculpture?  TRUE!         (Here’s a shot of one of the employees taking a quick rinse! I KNOW!) Did you know J….

  Students at Princeton University were surprised to find a plethora of reporters that ask for their reaction to the admittance of Brooke Shields to the class of 1987. (It’s not unusual to see Brooke back on campus – especially during reunions!  Towns people remember her attending mass at St. Paul’s on the regular as…

  Yep, April 26, 1997, Mike Beer *95 and Jason Rudy ’97 became the first same-sex couple to marry in Princeton University Chapel. Amen (& Cheers) to that! Given that same sex marriage was not yet legal and Mr. Beer and Mr. Rudy were atheists, there was quite a bit of commotion on campus about…

On April 8, 1960, The Board of Trustees of Princeton University selected the color that would hereby be the official “Princeton orange.”  (Insiders know in 1866, George Ward, a member of the Class of 1869, proposed the color orange in reference to the Prince of Orange, William III of the House of Nassau. The first…

Well, that’s kind of how it happened ……   Every 17 years a special group of cicadas emerge from Princeton’s underground.  The last time they were here was 2004, where people tell grizzly tales of being covered by the bugs, having to walk the streets with an umbrella and, if the buzzing noise of the…

This article is too fascinating to paraphrase so read all about it here!  (If it’s too long for you to read, just get to paragraph seven:  “During the 1950s and 1960s, mobsters helped build the Sahara, the Sands, the New Frontier and the Riviera. Money from organized crime combined with funds from more respectable investors—Wall Street banks, union pension funds, the Mormon Church and the Princeton University endowment.”)   Did you know Princeton University Investment Company (PRINCO) now oversees the largest per student endowment of any college in the United States …. today it’s about $26.1B AND it’s money managers are among the most diversified in any college campus?  TRUE!      

  From 1896 to 1915, clever tigers would dress up and create a parade going through campus to celebrate St Patty’s Day!  The costumes were so silly it became so popular that townspeople would all stop working to see the revelry! Read all about the history of the event here!

Today back in 1974, the same year Hank Aaron broke Babe Ruth’s record, the University began advertising for bids from contractors to remodel what was the Dormitory and Food Services warehouse into a Wawa.    The world class re-design of the 125th Wawa now stands beside the renovated Dinky Station in a modern sheath of…