A Corporate Framework Before the Bequest
Johns Hopkins University's founding began with educational and charitable arrangements made by Johns Hopkins, a Baltimore merchant, banker, and railway investor. The incorporation document of August 24, 1867, established a university corporation under Maryland law to promote education in the state, appointing twelve trustees to manage its affairs. Thus, while 1876 was an important milestone in actual opening, it did not encompass the earlier process of legal organization.
Hopkins died in 1873, leaving approximately $3.5 million each to the university and hospital. In his inaugural address, Gilman specifically warned listeners not to count their combined $7 million as university funds. The university and hospital were connected but separately founded. Their benefactor had not prescribed a complete system of courses and research for the university.
Choosing a President and Opening in Stages
The trustees resumed preparations in 1874, collecting histories of universities, visiting institutions in Cambridge, New Haven, Ithaca, Ann Arbor, and elsewhere, and consulting Harvard President Charles Eliot, Cornell President Andrew White, and University of Michigan President James Angell. On December 30, they selected Daniel Coit Gilman as the first president. The following year he visited European academic institutions and translated what he observed into educational plans.
On February 22, 1876, Gilman delivered his inaugural address at Baltimore's Academy of Music, emphasizing research, talented people, and freedom in teaching. The chronology in the official 1879 university circular separately listed the opening on September 13 and the beginning of instruction on October 3. This entry uses October 3 as its date, distinguishing the start of teaching from the ceremony and preparatory opening. The initial premises were around Howard Street in central Baltimore; the permanent Clifton campus envisaged in the address remained a future plan.
Bringing Faculty and Students Together
Gilman put recruiting scholars before conspicuous buildings. Early teachers included classicist Basil Gildersleeve, mathematician James Joseph Sylvester, physicist Henry Rowland, chemist Ira Remsen, and biologist Henry Newell Martin. Textual study, languages, and experimental sciences developed together; the university did not serve only one form of professional training.
The president's 1879 annual report listed eighty-nine registered students in the first academic year, fifty-four of them graduate students, including fellows. The university also retained undergraduate instruction and study not directed toward a degree. The report described small classes, individual guidance, laboratory exercises, and field observation, with mathematics, Greek, and history adopting elements of German seminar methods. Graduate education emphasized entry into specialized problems rather than simply prolonging general courses.
Fellowships Turned Potential into Time for Research
Fellowships linked study with future careers. The 1879 report explained that selection was not simply a reward for past achievement but support for promising people to pursue advanced study and become teachers and researchers. Stipends enabled recipients to concentrate their time on learning; for the university, they also helped develop future teaching personnel.
Selection followed a specific procedure. Candidates submitted academic credentials, recommendations, existing work, and future plans. Subject leaders reviewed them first, professors discussed nominations collectively, and the president and executive committee forwarded them to the trustees for appointment. Seminars brought a professor and a small number of advanced students together on one problem. Gilman's 1893 report emphasized examining sources, tracing debates, and receiving continuing guidance. Larger meetings of scholarly societies separately allowed members to report diverse research, giving the two forms of organization different purposes.
From University Research to Scholarly Publication
The 1879 annual report treated publishing as an extension of teaching and research. There was a need for journals capable of promptly publishing substantial specialist papers, so the trustees supported new periodicals open to outside contributors. The American Journal of Mathematics had Sylvester as editor-in-chief and William Story responsible for daily editorial work, inviting mathematicians in Europe and America to collaborate. This explains its operation better than viewing publication as internal university publicity.
The report listed forty-nine contributions to the journal's first volume: eleven by Sylvester, seven by other university members, and papers by British scholars including Cayley and Clifford. The December 1879 circular also advertised subscriptions: four issues annually, at five dollars per volume, identifying the first volume as 1878–1879. Editing, regular publication, and external distribution connected faculty and student work with a transatlantic network of debate.
Research Ideals and Barriers to Admission
Educational ideals did not automatically produce equal access. The 1879 circular placed Christine Ladd in a note outside the formal list of fellows, stating that the trustees had allowed her to continue studying for another year with the usual fellowship stipend. Spillman's research based on original correspondence shows that she had special permission to attend Sylvester's classes but was not formally registered as a student. When she completed her research training in 1882, she still could not receive the corresponding doctorate. Institutional gaps separated faculty support, financial aid, and formal status.
Medical education also developed in stages. Gilman's 1893 report recorded that delays in hospital construction and other factors had postponed medical courses. Women donors subsequently raised funds on condition that women be admitted on equal terms with men, and the medical school opened in October 1893. The early university connected endowment, faculty, fellowships, seminars, and publishing, while its development also involved continuing disputes over eligibility and the distribution of resources.