Veritas, Roman Goddess of truth. Verity meaning truthfullness.
They maintain a high standard of educational quality and a whole bunch of individual schools inside. Initially it was called the "the new college." (on a tangential note - there is a para cheri porriki college in my area in Chennai called New College). A guy named John Harvard donated half of his estate - around 780 pounds and some 400 volumes of books to the New College set up in Cambridge. This New College was founded in 1636. Cut to some years later. 1674 to be specific. There was a massive fire which destroyed all the 400 volumes our man donated along with all pictures of him (God bless the poor guy). When they rebuilt the college they decided to name it after its major benefactor - Harvard and just decided to call it university.. Chumma for peethals sake...
Now in the middle of this wonderful school is a statue. I can aver that is the most photographed statue in Boston (atleast Cambridge!!) Tourists rub the toe of this statue for good luck. Harvard students pee on it. But I am not here to write a blog post about Harvard University... You can read about it elsewhere or come and visit it... But what I do want to talk about (this is probably when you want to switch to a different page..so I am getting to the point) The statue reads "John Harvard, Founder 1638."
John Harvard dint found Harvard. Some other dude did..He just donated money because he had no children and dint know wat to do with it.
Harvard University or for that matter New College wasnt founded in 1638 but in 1636.
I saved the best for last... In the big fire which razed the campus, all portraits of him were razed too!!!!!!!!!!! So who is this guy who is sitting there taking credit for wat he dint do... No one knows... Some guy who probably got paid $10 to sit for a statue. he he he.. Wait.. before you say it could be his son John Harvard the fifteen hunderdth!!(brit humor) JH dint have any children, which is why he donated the money in the first place.
Now coming to Veritas. This is the motto of the Harvard University. Easily the most prestigious school in America and probably one of the most prestigious schools in the world.
3 comments:
hehe... can only think of Goundamani's dialog in Suriyan:
Arasiyall la idhellam saadharnamappa!
"para cheri porriki college"
"Chumma for peethals sake"
Priceless!!!!
On the post- well the statue reads "John Harvard, Founder 1638."
Maybe they meant he was the one who "found" the college(like he found it in the middle of the woods)and not "founded". Of course then it should read "finder" but it was old times and they had no spell check back then:-))
@ttg.. this is education!!! teaching young(and therefore assumed) impressionable minds not arasiyall
@slash yeah..nice idea or maybe it was jus part of his name a misplaced comma, instead of a hyphen. John Harvard-Founder, 1638!!!!
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