An Overview of the Newcomb College Broadway Campus: 1918 to Present

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In 1908, the present Newcomb Campus was purchased for $434,672. This campus includes the entire second block of Audubon place, and two squares bounded by Zimple, Broadway, Plum, and Audubon Street, which were chosen because the property adjoined the main campus of Tulane University. Newcomb College was always a part of Tulane, but in the 1908 purchase, it was the intent of the administrators to allow greater sharing of laboratories and libraries as well as the employment of professors at the colleges for men and women.

The Newcomb alumnae were alarmed with the purchase since the Washington Avenue campus had offered considerable independence and indeed the feeling of a women's college isolated from that of men. The move to Broadway did not occur for another decade (in 1918), by which time, Newcomb students were more pleased with the move, though still wishing to create an atmosphere where women were educated separately from men. During the 1910s, for example, Newcomb students became more involved in various efforts of the University, such as participation as cheerleaders at football games, and even as managers of the various male teams. At the same time, Newcomb students had their own student government and student athletic teams that they brought to the Broadway campus. Male students were the first to cross register into Newcomb art and music classes; Newcomb students made the reverse journey by attending classes at Tulane in such subjects as business, law, medicine, and journalism.

When Newcomb was first set up on Broadway, there were only four buildings – Newcomb Hall, the Josephine Louise dormitory, the art building, and the power plant. However, from 1923 on, the campus experienced rapid growth, and it was forced to evolve to match both the increase in enrollment and the needs of the University, students, faculty, and staff alike.

To continue the walking tour, please proceed to Newcomb Hall, campus building number 74.