Stanford University

Related Category: Colleges, U.S.

at Stanford, Calif.; coeducational; chartered 1885, opened 1891 as Leland Stanford Junior Univ. (still the legal name). The original campus was designed by Frederick Law Olmsted. David Starr Jordan was its first president.

In the decades since World War II, Stanford has become one of the most prestigious universities in the United States. It has extensive research facilities, including the Stanford Linear Accelerator, a remote sensing laboratory, and an earthquake engineering center. The school has excellent libraries, and its several museums include outstanding ones of zoology and entomology. The Hopkins Marine Station is at Pacific Grove. The Hoover Institution on War, Revolution, and Peace is located on the campus, as is the Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences. Stanford has several overseas campuses.

See J. P. Mitchell, Stanford University, 1916–1941 (1958) and P. Allen, Stanford (1991).