Rot, Riot, and Rebellion: Mr. Jefferson’s Struggle to Save the University That Changed America

Today, the University of Virginia is among America’s elite public institutions, but, as journalists Bowman and Santos point out in this sometimes workmanlike, yet often gripping, chronicle of “Mr. Jefferson’s university,” the institution’s first two decades were fraught with violence generated by restless, riotous, and rebellious students. Often broke, Jefferson’s “academic village” also faced the wrath of his opponents, who called his experiment a “godless” attempt to replace the church-centered colleges—like William & Mary—that dotted the colonial landscape. Bowman and Santos bring to life the university’s growing pains through a roughly year-by-year account of the unruly and out-of-control students who “randomly [shot] at passersby” and dogs, “whip[ped] professors,” disrupted classes in various ways, and settled disputes with knives. The murder of a professor in 1840 proved to be the pinnacle of the university’s unchecked bad behavior, but within the next few years, the school grew into what Jefferson had imagined: a secular place of learning where students could forge their own academic paths, and where they would govern themselves—innovations that have come to largely define the modern American university. 22 b&w illus. (Aug.)