Alma Mater Magazine - Fall 2004
From VPI to State University:
President T. Marshall Hahn Jr.
and the Transformation of Virginia Tech, 1962-1974
Warren H. Strother and Peter Wallenstein
A story of President Hahn and the transformation of public higher education in the South in the 1960s
In 1962, when Marshall Hahn became president of Virginia Polytechnic Institute, it was a small school, largely military, and overwhelmingly white and male. It was primarily a technical institution, focused on agriculture and engineering, and it emphasized undergraduate teaching over research or graduate programs. When President Hahn stepped down a dozen years later, he left behind a very different school, as symbolized by its new name, Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University - a coeducational, multiracial research university with a thriving college of arts and sciences and burgeoning graduate programs.
From VPI to State University brings together the biography of a man and the history of an institution as it explores multiple transformations in the size and scope of the school's operations; the changing makeup of its students and faculty; and major alterations in academics, athletics, and student services. Tracking the transformation of higher education in the United States, especially in the South in the 1960s, it places those changes in the broader contexts of politics, policy, and public higher education across the state, the region, and the nation. It emphasizes the first four or five years of Hahn's presidency, when the greatest changes at VPI were launched. Much of the book relies on the recollections of people who - as faculty, administrators, or public officials - participated in those changes.
This book's publication year marks the fiftieth anniversary of Dr. Hahn's arrival at VPI in 1954 to head the Physics Department. It marks the thirtieth anniversary of his stepping down in 1974 after twelve extraordinary years as president of Virginia Tech.
When asked about President Hahn's top achievements, Strother and Wallenstein speak of (1) scale of the university - the student population tripled in size; (2) diversity - far more students were female, civilian, and minority; (3) research - by faculty and in new graduate programs; and (4) curricular expansion, especially a new College of Arts and Sciences. Strother explains: "Dr. Hahn had enormous will as well as a striking ability to make friends with the right people to help make things happen." Wallenstein adds: "He foresaw the baby boom's impending impact on higher education, and he pushed for tremendous change, not only at Tech but throughout the state, including the establishment of a system of community colleges." In recent years, Dr. Hahn retired to his farm in Ellett Valley outside Blacksburg with his wife Peggy, and enjoys farming, hunting, and attending university events.
Warren Strother, a former newspaperman, worked with Marshall Hahn for ten years while Hahn transformed VPI into a university. Peter Wallenstein teaches at the university that Marshall Hahn transformed. He has taught history at Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University since 1983.
For more detail regarding President Hahn's impact on Virginia Tech and the state of Virginia, you may purchase From VPI to State University through the University Bookstore (www.bookstorevolumetwo.com) or Mercer University Press (www.mupress.org).