Cornell Law School: Historical Timeline

History of Cornell Law School

	1866	Laying plans for the new university, Cornell University president-to-be A.D. White proposes establishing a department of law
	1887	First law faculty members appointed Department of Law opens in Morrill Hall; Judge Douglas Boardman is department's first dean
	1888	First graduating law class (nine students)
	1889	Keigo Harada and Masayasu Naruse graduate; they are the Law School's first Asian students
	1890	George Washington Fields graduates; one of the nation's first law-school-graduates of color
	1891	Charles Evans Hughes joins faculty
	1892	Construction of Boardman Hall completed, will later house Law School
	1893	Myron C. Taylor becomes a student at Cornell Mary Kennedy Brown graduates; first woman graduate of the Department of Law
	1915	Cornell Law Quarterly established (Professor George G. Bogert is first faculty editor)
	1916	Cornell Law Quarterly now edited by student board
	1919	Mary Honor Donlon becomes first woman editor-in-chief of any law review in the U.S. and edits three issues of the Cornell Law Quarterly: November 1919, January 1920, and March 1920
	1924	Trustees approve College of Law as a graduate school
	1925	Renamed Cornell Law School
	1929	Graduate programs leading to J.S.D. and LL.M. degrees introduced Myron C. Taylor, class of 1894 provides $1,500,00 for new building
	1932	Myron Taylor Hall dedicated October 15
	1948	Program of specialization in international affairs established; LL.B. degrees established
	1954	Combined four-year programs leading to LL.B. and M.P.A. or M.B.A. degrees established
	1958	$1,000,000 gift from Myron Taylor for new residence center, to be named for his professor/mentor, Charles Evans Hughes
	1966	Cornell Law School becomes first law school to receive permission to permit court appearances by third-year students working at its Legal Aid Clinic
	1967	Cornell Law Quarterly becomes Cornell Law Review
	1968	First issue of Cornell International Law Journal
	1978	Law Library designated U.S. Government Depository
	1988	Opening ceremonies for new Jane Foster addition and remodelled Myron Taylor Hall
	1992	First edition of the Cornell Journal of Law and Public Policy Legal Information Institute established
	1993	Cornell Death Penalty Project created
	1994	Cornell Law School and University of Paris I law faculty launch Summer Institute of International and Comparative Law
	1997	Dorothea S. Clarke Program in Feminist Jurisprudence established
	2002	Clarke Program in East Asian Law and Culture established
	2004	First edition of the Journal of Empirical Legal Studies
	2005	First edition of electronic newsletter, the e-Forum, sent to alumni, friends of the Law School
	2006	Summer Law Institute in Suzhou, China, begins Labor Law Clinic starts
	2007	Seventy-fifth anniversary of Myron Taylor Hall; coincides with 120th anniversary of Cornell Law School Cornell e-Rulemaking Initiative (CeRI) launched Gifts from Jack G. Clarke LL.B. '52 and other alumni make possible the Jack G. Clarke Institute for the Study and Practice of Business Law
	2009	The Avon Global Center for Women and Justice at Cornell Law School is established The Clarke Middle East Fund becomes the Clarke Initiative for Law and Development in the Middle East and North Aftrica Regulation Room established
	2012	Cornell Law School breaks ground on new wing
	2014	Dean Schwab Celebrates the Grand opening of new academic wing.

 

The Deans of Cornell Law School

 

Douglas Boardman	1887-1891
Francis Miles Finch	1891-1903
Ernest Wilson Huffcut	1903-1907
Frank Irvine	1907-1916
Edwin Hamlin Woodruff	1916-1921
George Gleason Bogert	1921-1926
Charles Kellog Burdick	1926-1937
Robert Sproule Stevens	1937-1954
Gray Thoron	1956-1963
William Ray Forrester	1963-1973
Roger Conant Cramton	1973-1980
Peter William Martin	1980-1988
Russell King Osgood	1988-1998
Charles W. Wolfram	1998-1999 (Interim Dean)
Lee E. Teitelbaum	1999-2003
John A. Siliciano	2003 (Interim Dean)
Stewart J. Schwab	2004-2014
Eduardo M. Peñalver	2014-present