Duke University. Woman's College

The Woman's College was established at Duke University in 1930, as a coordinate to Trinity College for men. As a coordinate college within Duke University, the Woman's College fostered a community that allowed for shared university faculty, curriculum, and educational facilities, while giving women an opportunity for leadership through their separate student government, social standards committees, and judicial board. Alice M. Baldwin was named its first Dean. The College merged with Trinity College in 1972.

From the description of Woman's College records, 1928-1974. (Duke University Library). WorldCat record id: 163576199

The Woman's College was established in 1930, as coordinate college to Trinity College for men, with the appointment of Alice M. Baldwin as Dean of the Woman's College. Prior to that women had a long history of attending Trinity College (the antecedent of Duke University). Three Giles sisters were awarded degrees in 1878 on the basis of private instruction by faculty members before Trinity College moved to Durham in 1892. In 1892 the Board of Trinity College officially admitted women to the college, and the first women to attend regular classes graduated in 1896. These women had been permitted to attend classes but they were not given residence on the campus.

In 1896, Washington Duke made a gift of $100,000 to Trinity College urging that women be admitted "on equal footing with men." A small dormitory, the Mary Duke Building was subsequently built in 1898; however it was torn down in 1912. It was replaced by Southgate dormitory for women in 1921. In 1903, Washington Duke removed the proviso attached to his 1897 gift in order to support academic liberty by removing all strings attached to his gift. By 1904 Trinity College had fifty-four women enrolled. The enrollment of women increased during the years of World War I as undergraduate men became scarce. The increase in women students gave rise to the instatement of a Dean of Women, Martha Buchanan, as well as the formation of the Woman's Student Government in 1918. In 1924, Alice M. Baldwin was named Dean of Women.

The establishment of the Woman's College in 1930 coincided with the movement of the men to the newly opened West Campus. The Woman's College was geographically distinct in that its administration building and dormitories were on East Campus (the old Trinity College Campus); however as a coordinate college within Duke University the Woman's College shared university faculty, curricula, and in most instances educational facilities with the other residential undergraduate arts and sciences college, Trinity.

The original enrollment, in 1930, was 506. Classes for freshmen and sophomore women were separate from those of the men and the women for the most part were taught on East Campus. In the 1950s and 1960s student interest in coeducation grew, and gradually coeducation became a reality in freshman and sophomore classes, as well, increasing intercampus travel. Enrollment increases occurred over time: during Dean Baldwin's tenure (1930-1947) enrollment increased to 1,000 students, and during Dean Brinkley's tenure (1947-1967) the enrollment increased from 1,000 to 1,262. This last increase in enrollment brought fundamental changes within the college. The Woman's College Student Government had operated in a town-hall fashion, but with the increase in enrollment the student body became too large to assemble together in the Woman's College Auditorium (renamed Alice M. Baldwin Auditorium in 1964). According to a report to President Knight entitled, The Woman's College in Duke University (1930-1969) submitted February 1969 this enrollment increase was partially attributed to changing student-government procedures and altering other college customs thereby making the student body less cohesive.

The completion of the new administration building (Allen) on West Campus in 1954 allowed for the record keeping and admissions to become centralized services. Thus the recorder and director of admissions for the Woman's College moved to the West Campus facilities. Further consolidation of campus life occurred when the Student Union, an all-university organization, was organized in 1954 on West Campus. This organization subsidized by the University, became the center of student activities for both men and women. However, three Woman's College organizations, the Freshmen Advisory Council, the Y.W.C.A., and the student government remained strong and active during the 1950s and early 1960s.

Dean Margaret Ball began her tenure of the Woman's College in 1963. Her charge as dean was to strengthen the autonomy of the College and to serve, along with the dean of Trinity College, as assistant dean of arts and sciences. Dean Ball also focused upon the physical facilities of East Campus establishing seminar rooms in several buildings, installing fire escapes, remodeling the old Dean's House into a Campus Center for students, remodeling various academic buildings for departmental uses, and installing a language lab, and computer card-punch room.

During the 1960s a perpetual request from the student body was the liberalizing of social regulations, especially those that were traditionally imposed upon women and not on men. This issue became a driving-force in the creation of a university unified student government (Associated Students of Duke University, ASDU) an organization that increasingly pressed for the elimination of all parietal concerns of the University.

Citing more efficient administrative procedures, more efficient representation of undergraduate education concerns and changes in social regulations and admissions' policy, in 1972 the Board of Trustees approved the merger of the Woman's College and Trinity College.

From the guide to the Woman's College records, 1928-1974, (University Archives, Duke University)