George Washington University

George WashingtonGeorge WashingtonGeorge Washington (1732–1799) was the first president of the United States, serving from 1789 to 1797. Earlier he commanded the Continental Army in the American Revolutionary War and presided over the Constitutional Convention of 1787.Open the full entry wanted a national university in the federal city and selected the area of 23rd and E Streets as its site; at his death in 1799 his will left 50 shares of the Potomac Company to help endow it. Congress never provided support for the plan.⁠[1][2]

In 1819 Luther Rice and others formed an association to establish a college under the Baptist General Missionary Convention; Rice raised funds, bought a site and petitioned Congress for a charter. In 1820 the association bought land north of Florida Avenue, and Presidents James MonroeJames MonroeJames Monroe (1758–1831) was an American politician and diplomat who served as President of the United States from 1817 to 1825; his administration proclaimed the Monroe Doctrine.Open the full entry and John Quincy AdamsJohn Quincy AdamsJohn Quincy Adams (1767–1848) was an American diplomat and politician who served as secretary of state from 1817 to 1825 and as the sixth President of the United States from 1825 to 1829, and afterwards sat in the House of Representatives until his death.Open the full entry each gave $50.⁠[2][1]

Congress chartered The Columbian College in the District of Columbia, and Monroe approved the act on February 9, 1821. The charter protected the college’s nonsectarian character, allowing people of any religious denomination to serve as trustees or be admitted as students, while the college had Baptist sponsorship.⁠[1][2]

In May 1821 the Rev. Dr. William Staughton became the first president, and in September Professor Irah Chase opened the Theological Department with 11 students. The Rev. Obadiah B. Brown was the first President of the Board of Trustees.⁠[2][1]

On March 6, 1822, students formed the Enosinian debating society. The college graduated its first class on December 15, 1824, with Adams and the Marquis de Lafayette in attendance. The Medical Department began classes at 10th and E Streets NW in 1825, the year the Potomac Company went bankrupt and Washington’s shares became worthless.⁠[2]

Classes were suspended during a financial crisis on May 1, 1827, and senior professors resigned; they resumed on May 13, 1828, and Congress canceled $30,000 of debt in exchange for the Greenleaf’s Point property. In 1844 Congress granted a building on Judiciary Square for use as an infirmary, the first general hospital in the District of Columbia and one of the nation’s first teaching hospitals.⁠[2]

During the Civil War (1861–1865) the government commandeered the campus and the downtown hospital; the college became an 844-bed military hospital and classes were often held in professors’ homes. Its graduates included 46 medical alumni in the Union Army and 24 in the Confederate army. On April 14, 1865, Professor John F. May attended the dying President Abraham LincolnAbraham LincolnAbraham Lincoln (February 12, 1809 – April 15, 1865) was the 16th president of the United States (1861–1865). Born to a frontier farming family in Kentucky, he had less than a year of formal schooling, taught himself law, and served in the Illinois legislature and the U.S. House of Representatives before winning the presidency as the Republican candidate in 1860. During the Civil War he preserved the Union, issued the Emancipation Proclamation in 1863 and pushed the Thirteenth Amendment abolishing slavery through Congress. He was shot by John Wilkes Booth at Ford’s Theatre in Washington on April 14, 1865, and died the next day.Open the full entry, and the Law Department was revived that year.⁠[2]

In 1871 Congress created a nondenominational Board of Trustees, and James Clarke Welling became the first lay president. On March 3, 1873, the college became The Columbian University by Act of Congress.⁠[2]

The university adopted a trial policy of admitting women in 1881. On December 11, 1884, the medical faculty reversed course and admitted four women, and Clara Bliss Hines became the first female M.D. (Class of 1887). On September 24, 1888, Mabel Nelson Thurston became the first woman undergraduate admitted to Columbian College, and twelve other women were admitted that year.⁠[2]

The Dental School was organized in 1887, and the first Ph.D.s were awarded in 1888. In 1889 Supreme Court Justices John MarshallJohn MarshallJohn Marshall (1755–1835) was an American statesman and jurist who served as a U.S. Representative and Secretary of State and, from 1801 to 1835, as Chief Justice of the United States, establishing the principle of judicial review in Marbury v. Madison.Open the full entry Harlan and David Josiah Brewer joined the Law School faculty, each serving nearly 20 years. The School of Graduate Studies opened in 1893, and the School of Comparative Jurisprudence and Diplomacy was founded in 1898.⁠[2]

On January 23, 1904, Congress approved the change of name to The George Washington University. In 1905 continental blue and buff became the official colors, replacing orange and blue. The student newspaper The Weekly Columbian, launched in 1902, was renamed The Hatchet two years later.⁠[2]

In 1910 a financial crisis led to an investigation by the U.S. Attorney General, and the university sold its downtown property at 15th and H Streets and moved classes into rented buildings. In 1912 it borrowed from Riggs Bank to buy the property at 2023 G Street (now Lisner Hall), and from 1912 to 1916 it acquired more land and buildings in the G Street area of Foggy Bottom.⁠[2]

In 1913 the Law School reversed its earlier position and admitted five women. In 1924 the trustees rejected a takeover bid by the Baptist Convention, and Corcoran Hall on 21st Street became the first completed construction project in Foggy Bottom. Cloyd Heck Marvin began a 32-year presidency in 1927.⁠[2]

In 1939 Niels Bohr, Enrico FermiEnrico FermiEnrico Fermi (1901–1954) was an Italian-American physicist who received the 1938 Nobel Prize in Physics and in 1942 led the team that achieved the first controlled nuclear chain reaction in Chicago.Open the full entry, Edward Teller and George Gamow announced the fissionable nature of uranium at a conference at the university; that year Lisner Library opened as its first separate library.⁠[2]

In 1946 Lisner Auditorium hosted its first commercial production, Ingrid Bergman in “Joan of Lorraine”; the auditorium was segregated, and Bergman joined protesters objecting to the exclusion of African Americans. That year Margaret Truman received her B.A., and President Harry S. TrumanHarry S. TrumanHarry S. Truman (1884–1972) was an American politician who served as a U.S. senator from Missouri and as vice president in 1945, succeeding Franklin D. Roosevelt on his death that year and serving as the 33rd president of the United States from 1945 to 1953, a period spanning the end of World War II and the early Cold War.Open the full entry received an honorary doctorate the same day. In 1954 the university abolished restrictions on the admission of minority students, effective by 1955.⁠[2]

In 1961 the university awarded an honorary degree to President John F. KennedyJohn F. KennedyJohn F. Kennedy (1917–1963) was an American politician who represented Massachusetts in the U.S. House of Representatives and the U.S. Senate and served as the 35th president of the United States from 1961 to 1963. The youngest person elected president and the first Roman Catholic to hold the office, he was assassinated in Dallas on November 22, 1963.Open the full entry. In 1963 Rocky Wright became GW’s first African American athlete, on the men’s basketball team, and in March Norm Neverson became the first African American to receive an athletic scholarship, in football. Lloyd Hartman Elliott was named the 14th president in 1965.⁠[2]

In 1968 more than 2,000 students rallied in the University Yard against the House Un-American Activities Committee, and in May 1970 students went on strike over the invasion of Cambodia and the killings at Kent State UniversityKent State UniversityKent State University is a university based in Kent, Ohio, United States, established under Ohio law in 1910 as a normal school; it now has eight campuses. On May 4, 1970, the Ohio National Guard fired on protesting students on its campus.Open the full entry. On October 18, 1977, President Jimmy CarterJimmy CarterJimmy Carter (1924–2024) was an American politician and Democrat who served as the 39th president of the United States from 1977 to 1981. His administration brokered the Camp David Accords between Egypt and Israel, signed the Panama Canal treaties and established relations with the People’s Republic of China, but he lost his reelection bid amid the energy crisis, inflation and the Iran hostage crisis; after leaving office he founded The Carter Center to work on mediation, election observation and disease control, and received the Nobel Peace Prize in 2002.Open the full entry approved the George Washington University Charter Restatement Act, which fully restated the charter and superseded the 1821 act and its amendments. After the attempted assassination of Ronald ReaganRonald ReaganRonald Reagan (1911–2004) was an American politician and actor who worked as a radio sports announcer and film actor before serving as governor of California from 1967 to 1975 and as the 40th president of the United States from 1981 to 1989.Open the full entry in 1981, GW Hospital successfully treated the wounded president.⁠[2][3]

In 1988 Stephen Joel Trachtenberg succeeded Elliott as president, and the School of Public and International Affairs was renamed the Elliott School of International Affairs. The Virginia Campus opened in Loudoun County in 1991. In 1998 GW and Mount Vernon College began an 18-month transition.⁠[2]

In 2007 Dr. Steven Knapp, formerly of Johns Hopkins University, was elected the 16th president and took office on August 1; the endowment crossed $1 billion that year. Thomas J. LeBlanc was elected the 17th president on January 6, 2017, and began on August 1. In 2021 GW celebrated its bicentennial, and LeBlanc announced plans to retire at the end of June 2022.⁠[2]

Ellen M. Granberg became the university’s 19th president on July 1, 2023, the first woman to lead the institution in its more than 200-year history. She had been provost and senior vice president for academic affairs at the Rochester Institute of Technology and a tenured faculty member and senior leader at Clemson University; she holds a B.A. in history from the University of California, Davis and an M.A. and Ph.D. in sociology from Vanderbilt University, and worked for eleven years in the telecommunications industry before graduate school.⁠[4][5]

As of November 2026 the university’s leadership page lists Granberg as president and Mark H. Chichester as chair of the Board of Trustees.⁠[5]

Fall 2025 census figures put total enrollment at 24,500: 11,148 undergraduates, 10,485 graduate students, 2,451 professional (law and medicine) students and 416 non-degree students; the entering class included 2,405 new first-year residential undergraduates.⁠[6]

In the Columbian College era the campus, College Hill, covered 46 acres between present-day 14th and 15th Streets, extending north from Florida Avenue to somewhat beyond Columbia Road, while the Medical School was downtown; in the Columbian University era the buildings stood along H Street between 13th and 15th Streets; the campus later developed in Foggy Bottom, between 19th and 24th Streets south of Pennsylvania Avenue.⁠[1]

George Washington University: Official website: https://www.gwu.edu/ (opens in a new window).⁠[5]

X: Public account: https://x.com/GWtweets (opens in a new window).⁠[5]

YouTubeYouTubeYouTube is Google’s video-sharing and creator platform, founded in 2005 by Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, and Jawed Karim and acquired by Google in 2006. Built around video uploading, viewing, and creator earnings, the platform has developed Shorts, YouTube Music, Premium, YouTube TV, and products for children, and is headquartered in San Bruno, California, United States.Open the full entry: Public channel: https://www.youtube.com/user/discovergw (opens in a new window).⁠[5]