January 3, 1825: America's First Engineering College Opens

Today is the 181st anniversary of the opening of the Rensselaer School, the first engineering college in the United States and, according to one historian, "the first school of science and school of civil engineering, which has had a continuous existence, to be established in any English-speaking country." The Rensselaer School's founder, Stephen van Rensselaer III, was a soldier, statesman, and landowner who graduated from Harvard University and served as regent of the State University of New York. On November 5, 1824, van Rensselaer sent a letter to his friend Rev. Dr. Samuel Blatchford, announcing the establishment of a school in Troy, New York "for the purpose of instructing persons who may choose to apply themselves in the application of Science to the common purposes of life." In his letter, van Rensselaer asked Blatchford to serve as the school's new president and named Amos Eaton, a graduate of Williams College, as the first senior professor. A lawyer by trade, Eaton had spent nearly five years in prison, during which time he studied botany and geology while tutoring the sons of the jail's board of governors.

The efforts of van Rensselaer, Blatchford and Eaton ensured that the Rensselaer School opened as planned on Monday, January 3, 1825 at the Old Bank Place, a building in Troy's north end. On December 28, 1824, the Troy Sentinel published a notice from Rev. Blatchford, announcing the opening of the Rensselaer School. A day later, the Board of Trustees met to formalize methods of instruction. Unlike other colleges, the Rensselaer School would require students to perform their own experiments instead of just watching demonstrations. Eaton, who had advised the New York State legislature about the Erie Canal after his release from prison, thrived in this dynamic environment. As news of Eaton's professorial skills spread in academic circles, graduates from older institutions such as Harvard, Yale, Princeton, and Columbia flocked to the Rensselaer School. "I am inclined to believe that competent instructors may be produced in the school at Troy", van Rensselaer wrote, "(and) who will be highly useful to the community in the diffusion of a very useful kind of knowledge."

Today, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (RPI) still values its hands-on approach to undergraduate education. Indeed, as the Christian Science Monitor reports, "Rensselaer's approach is nothing short of revolutionary among research universities".