This week in Cornell history

Policeman standing in front of Willard Straight Hall
University Photography file photo
Policeman standing in front of Willard Straight Hall during occupation, April 1969.

April 18, 1974 Cornell scientists announce they have discovered pieces of the Earth's core. The “startlingly unique” iron-nickel rocks, called “josephinite” because they were found in Josephine County, Ore., showed evidence of the unusual chemical and physical processes that could have occurred only under the extreme heat and pressure existing near the center of the Earth. The team chemically analyzed the josephenite using methods developed at Cornell for studying lunar rocks.

April 19, 1969 Members of the Afro-American Society (AAS) occupy Willard Straight Hall for 36 hours to protest Cornell's perceived racism, its judicial system and its slow progress in establishing a black studies program. The takeover was prompted in part by a handmade, 2-by-2-foot crucifix left burning on the porch of Wari House, an African-American women's cooperative, at 3 a.m. that morning. Three days later, on April 22, nearly 5,000 students occupied Barton Hall in support of the AAS's demands. The events prompted decades of social, cultural and political change on campus.

April 21, 1923 Future Baseball Hall of Famer Lou Gehrig becomes the second person to hit a home run on Cornell's Hoy Field. Gehrig was playing for Columbia University. The first home run on the field was hit by a student from Syracuse University shortly after the field opened in 1921.