Younger Things

This February during Charter Day, William & Mary will turn 319 years old. There are a great many things in the world that are younger than the ancient College, which has influenced the world and educated those who shape it in various forms throughout the course of five different centuries. Today, students walk amongst a campus that has existed since the 17th Century. Consider that in 1693:

• The infamous pirate Blackbeard would not be killed for another 25 years.
• The steam engine would not be invented for another six years.
• The American Declaration of Independence would not be adopted for another 83 years.
• The American, French and Industrial Revolutions would not take place until the following century.
• Voltaire wasn’t born yet.
• John Locke and Issac Newton were still alive and contributing to the Age of Enlightenment.
• W&M was 15 by the time Bach was appointed chamber musician at the court in Weimar.
• 47 years later Handel’s Messiah would first be performed.
• 59 years later, Benjamin Franklin would have a run-in with electricity.
• 63 years later, Mozart would be born.
• 76 years later, Napolean would be born.
• The original Tea Party (of the Boston variety) takes place a full 80 years later.
• 85 years later, Hawaii is discovered.
• 92 years later, America adopts the dollar.
• 96 years later, French protestors would storm the Bastille.
• 100 years after W&M is founded, the Cotton Gin was invented and construction began on the US Capitol.
• W&M had existed for 111 years by the time Lewis & Clark began their expedition.
• W&M was already celebrating its 112th birthday by the time the Holy Roman Empire was dissolved.
• The US gained Florida from Spain on W&M’s 126th birthday.
• Charles Darwin sailed aboard the H.M.S. Beagle 138 years later.
• The first telegraph would not be dispatched for another 151 years.
• The planet Neptune would not be known to exist for another 153.
• Brian Focarino would not be born for another 295 years.

I think I’ll stop there.

Truly there is only one William and Mary. and it’s old.