DU History

The Williams campus, in the rugged hills of northwestern Massachusetts, was Spartan. Men lived in barely heated halls, doing the necessary chores themselves. There were no women students on campus. Life focused on knowledge and discourse, religion, and family. There were no radios or televisions; the electric light nor the phonograph had been invented. Even the telegraph Morse code transmitted by wire - was years away. There were neither trains nor paved roads; the efficient use of internal combustion and "horseless carriages" was a good 60 years in the future. The nearest "large" cities, Troy and Schenectady across the New York border, together sheltered only 20,000. The Union had about 14.5 million citizens and slaves in 24 states. Andrew Jackson was President and Abraham Lincoln was a young man of twenty five. Canada was firmly under British domination. The modern world as we know it today lay undiscovered and barely dreamed.

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