Daniel Coit Gilman

Geographer and university administrator, born in Norwich, Connecticut, USA. A graduate of Yale (1852), he returned to help create Yale's Sheffield Scientific School (1856), later becoming professor of physical and political geography there (1863–72). He then became president of the University of California, Berkeley (1872–5). At the recommendation of the presidents of Harvard, Cornell, and Michigan, he was chosen to be the first president of Johns Hopkins University (Baltimore, MD) (1875–1902). Stressing the importance of graduate schools, he founded Johns Hopkins Medical School (1893), which immediately attracted leading physicians and top-ranked students. After retiring, he helped found the Carnegie Institute in Washington, DC (1902–05).

Born in Norwich, Connecticut, Gilman graduated from Yale College in 1852 with a degree in geography. After serving as attaché of the United States legation at St. Petersburg, Russia from 1853 to 1855, he returned to Yale and was active in planning and raising funds for the founding of Sheffield Scientific School.

From 1856 to 1865 Gilman was librarian of Yale College and was also concerned with improving the New Haven public school system. His work there was hampered by the state legislature, and in 1875 Gilman accepted the offer to establish and become first president of Johns Hopkins University.

Before being formally installed as president in 1876, he spent a year studying university organization and selecting an outstanding staff of teachers and scholars. His formal inauguration, on February 22, 1876, has become Hopkins' Commemoration Day, the day on which many university presidents have chosen to be installed in office.

Gilman's primary interest was in fostering advanced instruction and research, and as president he developed the first American graduate university in the German tradition. Gilman was also active in founding Johns Hopkins Hospital (1889) and Johns Hopkins Medical School (1893). He founded and was for many years president of the Charity Organization of Baltimore and served as a trustee of the John F. He retired from Johns Hopkins in 1901, but accepted the presidency (1902–4) of the newly founded Carnegie Institution of Washington. Gilman died in 1908. The main academic building at Johns Hopkins University, Gilman Hall, is named in his honor. On the University of California, Berkeley campus, Gilman Hall, also named in his honor, is the oldest building of the College of Chemistry and a National Historic Chemical Landmark. In 1897, Dr. Gilman helped found a preparatory school called 'The Country School for Boys' on the Johns Hopkins campus. Upon relocation in 1910, it was renamed in his honor and today, Gilman School continues to be regarded among the nation's elite private boys' schools.

Gilman married twice. Mary Ketcham Gilman died in 1869, and Daniel Coit Gilman married his second wife, Elisabeth Dwight Woolsey, in 1877.