Harvard University is pretty old. It's older than both the country and state where it's located, and old enough that something called the "Great and General Court" established it 378 years ago on October 28, 1636...and people totally took it seriously.

The first institute of higher learning established in the colonies, Harvard predates the U.S. Constitution by over 150 years. It was established in the Massachusetts Bay Colony, by the forerunner to the state legislature (the aforementioned Great and General Court). Here's another example of how old Harvard is: The October 28 when it was founded wasn't really our October 28. The British Empire (which extended to these shores at the time) didn't adopt the Gregorian calendar until 1752, so the colonists were still rocking the Julian calendar, with its 11-day discrepancy, in 1636.

The school became known as Harvard College in 1639, when a young clergyman named John Harvard (that's him deep in thought) made a deathbed contribution to the "schoal or Colledge" as he called it. (Seriously, folks...it's old.) Harvard was initially designed to turn out Puritan preachers, providing colonial pulpits with a steady stream of Unitarian and Congregationalist ministers, while always remaining a nondenominational institute itself. As New England's historical religions left Puritanism behind for the ideas of the Enlightenment, Harvard began to embrace a secular mission as early as the 19th century.

As Harvard lost religion, it gained football (which are kind of the same thing in other parts of the country), and its rivalry with Yale is one of the country's oldest. While Ivy League sports don't have the same draw they once did, Harvard-Yale (or just "The Game") has a storied tradition. In 1916, Yale's coach gave his team the following pre-victory pep talk: "Gentlemen, you are now going to play football against Harvard. Never again in your whole life will you do anything so important."

In the 20th century, Harvard made a concerted effort to recruit more middle-class students rather than just pulling from Boston's elite prep academies, which had been its historical practice. But with its $36 billion endowment, Harvard's role as training ground for the country's elite remains intact. If you happen to be a billionaire or Rhodes scholar (in which case, thanks for stopping by!), the odds are greater that you went to Harvard than to any other university in the United States. The old saw about "Pahking the cah in Hahvahd Yahd" is probably irrelevant if you actually went there, since you can just get your chauffeur to handle it.

http://alumniconnections.com/olc/filelib/HAA/cpages/237/Library/images/JohnHarvard-Fall-med.jpg