Six presidents of the United States-John Adams, John Quincy Adams,Theodore and Franklin Delano Roosevelt, Rutherford B. Hayes, and John Fitzgerald Kennedy-were graduates of Harvard. Its faculty have produced 34 NobeI Laureates.

　　Harvard College was established in l636 by vote of the Great and General Court of Massachusetts Bay Colony, and was named for its first benefactor, John Harvard of Charlestown, a young minister who upon his death in 1638, left his library and half his estate to the new institution.

　 During its early years, the College offered a classic academic course based on the English University model but consistent with the prevailing Puritan philosophy of the first colonists. Although many of its early graduates became ministers in Puritan congregations throughout New England, the college never formally affiliated with a specific religious denomination.

　　Under president Pusey（1953-71）,Harvard undertook what was then the largest undraising campaign in the history of American higher education,the $82．5 million Program for Harvard College. The Program strengthened faculty salaries, broadened student aid, created new professorships, and expanded Harvard's physical facilities.A similar but greatly expanded fundraising effort, the Harvard Campaign （1979-84）,was conducted under the leadership of Derek Bok （1971-81） and raised $356 million by the end of l984.

　　NeiI L. Rudenstine took office as Harvard's 26th president in 1991． As part of an overall effert to achieve greater coordination among the University’s schools and faculties. Rudenstine set in motion an intensive process of University. wide academic planning, intended to identifV some of Harvard's main intellectual and programmatic priorities.

　　Those have become an integral part of the current five-year capital campaign. In addition, Rudenstine has stressed the University's commitment to excellence in undergraduate eucation,the importance of keeping Harvard's doors open to students from across the economic spectrum, the task of dapting the research university to an era of both rapid information growth and serious financial constraints, and the challenge of living together in a diverse community committed to freedom of expression

　　哈佛产生了约翰·亚当斯、约翰·昆 西·亚当斯、西奥多及富兰克林·德来 诺·罗斯福、罗斯福德·B、·海斯和约翰· 弗斯杰罗涛·肯尼迪六位美回总统,并产 生了三十四位诺贝尔奖获得者。

　　哈佛大学建立于1636年,由当时的马塞诸塞湾殖民地选举产生。学校是以它的第一个捐赠者查里斯顿郡的约翰·哈佛命名的。约翰·哈佛是一位年轻的牧师。1638年地去世的时候,将他的藏书以及地产的一半捐赠给这所新建的学校。

　　在建校之初,课程设置依循英国大学的模式,以传统的学院式的课程为主,但又与当时美州盛行的第一批移民的清教思想相一致。尽管许多早期的毕业生成为新英格兰清教教会的高级官员,哈佛大学从没有正式与任何一种宗教信仰建立联系。

　　在蒲西校长在职的1953至1971年间。哈佛经历了美国高校历史上最大的筹款活动。共筹得八千两百五十万美元。这项活动提高了教师工资,增加了学生资助项 目,设置了新的教授职位,增设了哈佛的体育设拖,另一项类似然而更广泛的筹款 动于1979-1984年间展开,当时的领导人是德里克·福德（1971-91）,到1984年底其筹得三亿五千六百万美元。

　　内尔·L·瑞丁斯坦是哈佛的第二十六任校长,于1991）年上任。为了加强院系之间的合作,瑞丁斯坦大力号召展开一系列全校范围内的大规模学术计划活动,以加强哈佛主要的学术研究与突出项目。

　　这个活动成为美国三年计划的重要组成部分,而且,瑞丁斯坦强调哈佛应致力于提高学生教育,强调哈佛的大门应向各个经济阶层的学生敞开,大学应适应新纪元中信息迅速增长以及经济局势严峻的要求,迎接多元性社会团体坚持言论自由的挑战。