Fun tidbits about Gallaudet that I picked up during today’s research:

  • In the 1890s, on 7th Street, halfway between Florida and H, was a deli owned by a couple – the husband was deaf.
  • During a Hare and Hound run around 1900, the men wore their black and white striped football uniforms. The hare led the hounds in the direction of the US Penitentiary, and some farmers called the police to alert them to escaped convicts. When the police caught up with the Gallaudet students, everything was cleared up – but they made sure no future Hare and Hound runs went near the penitentiary!
  • In 1871, Dr. Fay ate his meals with the student body for a week. He stated, “On the whole, I rather like it for the variety and the opportunity for free and easy conversation with the students.”
  • Every year, Edward Miner Gallaudet and other people from the school were forced to beg Congress for additional funding. At the 1871 discussion, U.S. Representative Benjamin Franklin Butler pronounced deaf people to be only “part men” and said that giving them a college education was “to educate them in a way God did not intend we should do.”
  • In the 1870s, the President of the United States regularly attended commencement ceremonies; Rutherford B. Hayes went several times. Can you imagine the security nightmare for this to happen today?
  • In 1880, the commencement speaker was Alexander Graham Bell, speaking on “Melville Bell’s Visible Speech” – he was awarded an honorary Ph.D. at the same time. The oral/manual debate was about to begin…
  • There is often confusion over the name of the school. The “Columbia Institution for the Deaf and Dumb and the Blind” was its original name in 1857. The elementary department was the “Kendall School” and when the college was formed in 1864 it became the “National Deaf-Mute College.” It became “Gallaudet College” in 1894 because alumni wanted to honor Thomas Hopkins Gallaudet. The “Blind” part was dropped after 1865 when the blind students were transferred to a school in Maryland, and the “Dumb” part was dropped in 1911.
  • Gallaudet had the fifth phone line in Washington DC! The first four were at the White House, the Capitol, the Associated Press, and the Treasury Department – and Gallaudet was the fifth. The switchboard was opened in 1878.
  • At some point in the 1930s, football was dropped as a sport!
  • In 1992, workers went into College Hall to replace some electrical wiring. They found a 12″ metal chute that extended from the top floor to the basement. They initially assumed it to be a mail drop, but later found a collection of trash on the second floor – newspapers, a letter dated 1884, candy wrappers, and a recipe for beer.
  • The first hearing students were Gregory Haretos and Gary Smith in the 1980s. President Lee allowed “new constituencies” to attend because the rubella bulge had ended and enrollment was declining.
  • Two Native American girls from the Ponca tribe attended the school around 1885. The first African American students were not admitted until the mid-20th century.