Associated Colleges of Upper New York (ACUNY) and Champlain College records
Scope and Contents
This collection contains the records of the Associated Colleges of Upper New York (ACUNY), with a heavy focus on Champlain College. It is unclear whether the focus on Champlain College is because the records of Sampson and Mohawk were not retained, or whether Champlain was simply the last college open and therefore produced far more records. Regardless, most files in the collection are either from an ACUNY or a Champlain perspective, and most documentation of the other colleges are reports or correspondence sent to Champlain.
The records in the collection were kept by the colleges' administration and were created an maintained by the Deans, Provosts, Presidents, and other administrative staff. Files include legal information, financial planning and reports, administrative forms and policies, employment records, correspondence with legislators and other colleges, promotional and recruiting materials, reports from various college departments, records of buildings and renovations, reports tracking the academic attainment of students, course planning and academic calendars, and board meeting minutes. The founding and closure of each college is particularly well documented.
There is a large section of the collection made up of newspaper clippings, many organized into scrapbooks. These clippings were collected from newspapers across the United States, and document all three colleges. They are grouped chronologically.
Because of the administrative focus of the collection, there is limited material in the collection from students' perspectives. However, the Dean of Students kept records related to the student events and activities, the dorms, and student publications. Student publications in the collection include student newspapers and literary magazines. There is also a large number of photos of student life, largely taken for the purpose of promoting the colleges to prospective students.
Amy Gilbert, the Dean of Administration at Champlain College, was appointed as the official historian of ACUNY and she produced a book, ACUNY, the Associated Colleges of Upper New York: A Unique Response to an Emergency in Higher Education in the State of New York in 1950. The collection includes files related to the publication of this book, as well as some of Gilbert's research and photo files. As Dean of Administration, Gilbert was highly involved in the closure of Champlain in 1953, so her name appears on many files in the collection.
CONTENT WARNING: All three of the ACUNY colleges, but especially Mohawk College, used racist caricatures of Native Americans and red face in social events, sports competitions, and student publications. Because of this, researchers should expect to find racist materials scattered throughout the collection.
Dates
- Creation: 1932 - 1957
- Creation: Majority of material found within 1946 - 1953
Conditions Governing Access
The collection is open for research use and has no known restrictions.
Historical Note
The Associated Colleges of Upper New York (ACUNY) was a group of 3 GI colleges established in 1946: Champlain College, Sampson College, and Mohawk College. The colleges were intended to offer a two year program of education. Mohawk College closed in 1948 and Sampson College in 1949. Champlain became a 4-year liberal arts college in 1950, and closed in 1953.
The Associated Colleges of Upper New York (ACUNY) were created at the end of World War II. Their purpose was to provide educational opportunities for returning servicemen, denied admission to existing schools because of overcrowding. ACUNY was originally intended to operate for two years, so the three campuses had identical programs of study: pre-engineering, liberal arts, and business administration. These programs were intended to provide a foundation, allowing students to transfer to a four-year program.
The U.S. Defense Department decommissioned three military bases to serve as temporary campuses—the Plattsburgh Barracks, the Naval Training Center at Hobart, and the Rhoads General Hospital near Utica. These bases became Champlain College, Sampson College, and Mohawk College respectively. The colleges opened to students in 1946.
Champlain College opened with 1,800 students. While students were mostly male veterans, Champlain actively recruited women. Although all ACUNY schools accepted female students, only Champlain College designated a dorm specifically for women.
The second of the ACUNY schools to open, Mohawk began classes on October 21, 1946. On a campus with a capacity of just over 2,200 students, Mohawk enrolled 1,973. While there were no resident co-eds enrolled, Mohawk was located near a metropolitan area, allowing for a more varied social life. Mohawk College operated for the expected two years. At that time, enrollment trends showed that ACUNY could operate using only two campuses, so Mohawk was no longer essential. On June 30, 1948, it ceased to exist, and its students were sent to Sampson or Champlain.
With an operating capacity of 5,900, Sampson College was the largest of the ACUNY schools and the last to open. It opened on October 28. 1946 with 2,500 students. When it closed in June of 1949, it had matriculated 7,500 students and awarded a two-year degree to 1,500.
With the exception of a few married students, the student body of each campus was composed of young males, living in more-or-less isolated military installations. As a result, social life revolved around organizations, clubs, and societies of interest to returning veterans. Religious organizations included Student Christian Association, Newman Club and Hillel Foundation; there were French, German, Italian and Spanish Clubs; hobby groups included chess, photography, radio, skiing, and skating. All campuses had yearbooks and newspapers. All had concert bands, orchestras, and glee clubs. All provided forums for drama, debate and public speaking, as well as art and literary societies. As many veterans had a strong interest in self-government, student councils were strong and active. Each campus fielded intercollegiate teams in football, lacrosse, soccer, cross country, basketball, swimming, baseball, track and field, tennis, and golf.
The initial absence of coeds on the campuses, led to importations of women for the big campus social events. It also led to an active effort to recruit women students from area high schools.
Champlain’s original two-year charter was extended twice. On June 6, 1950 Governor Dewey proclaimed “Champlain as the first liberal arts school of the newly created State University of New York.” In 1951, the "Champlain Plan" of education was inaugurated. According to this plan, freshman began with a general comprehensive course of study, followed by increasingly specialized instruction. As students progressed through the plan, they also received career guidance. Champlain’s commencement on June 11, 1951, saw the first graduating liberal arts class in the SUNY system.
In 1952, with the escalation of the Korean War, the United States Air Force expressed desire for a northeastern base. They initially looked near Burlington, Vermont, but Plattsburgh business and political interests pushed for Lake Champlain’s New York side. Local leaders offered Macomb Reservation, site of major military maneuvers in 1939, and Point au Roche, both now state parks, and Clinton County’s airport as locations. Soon military brass made it clear they would not locate near Plattsburgh unless the campus was part of the deal. Preexisting buildings would save the Air Force money. Proximity to the lake offered morale boosting recreation.
Thus began one of the more bitter public conflicts in Plattsburgh’s history. The City Council and County Board of Supervisors endorsed the Air Force concept. When the Chamber of Commerce initially agreed, then changed its position and supported retaining the college, the mayor responded in bitter terms. The Plattsburgh Citizens’ Committee for the Continuance of Champlain College, backed by several important state and local officials, released a sixteen-page brochure titled “Let This College Live” in March 1952. Compromise efforts to retain the college and have the Air Force accept donated land elsewhere gained no traction. Asserting a right to repossess the former Army barracks “in the interest of national security,” the Air Force announced it would indeed displace Champlain College. Congress passed the necessary bills. The decision was finalized. Champlain College’s June 15, 1953, commencement would be its last.
When Champlain closed, the records and some students and faculty were transferred to Harpur College in Binghamton (now Binghamton University). Harpur also received 16,000 non-duplicate volumes and the complete contents of the Champlain College library.
Sources:
Batesel, P. (n.d.). ACUNY-ChamplainACUNY-Champlain. Lost Colleges. https://www.lostcolleges.com/associated-colleges-of-upper-new-york
Frost, R. (2017). The First GI Institute. New York Archives, 16(3), 26–29.
Full Extent
41 Linear Feet (53 boxes and 1 map case folder)
Language of Materials
English
Abstract
This collection contains the records of the Associated Colleges of Upper New York (ACUNY), with a heavy focus on Champlain College. The records were kept by the colleges' administration and were created an maintained by the Deans, Provosts, Presidents, and other administrative staff. ACUNY was a group of three GI colleges established in 1946: Champlain College, Sampson College, and Mohawk College. The colleges were intended to offer a two year program of education. Champlain became a 4-year liberal arts college in 1950.
Arrangement
This collection is arranged largely in the order it was recieved by the archive. However, during processing oversize materials and publications were moved to the end of the collection.
Other Finding Aids
When the Binghamton University Special Collections first recieved the records, they were housed in several file cabinets and a list was created noting what was located in drawers together. This list may be helpful to researchers wishing to reconstruct how the administration kept its files, and is available upon request.
Immediate Source of Acquisition
When Champlain College closed in 1953, the records of the college were given to Harpur College (now Binghamton University). It is unclear when these materials were transferred to the Binghamton University Archives.
Existence and Location of Copies
Microfilm copies were made of all scrapbooks in the collection. These are held by the Binghamton University Archives.
Processing Information
In 2026, Madison White, Archival Processing Manager, processed the collection. Because material had been kept in file cabinets and appeared to have some intended arrangement already, files were generally left in their original order. It appears that filing cabinet drawers generally housed related materials. For example, there are several groups of alphabetical files and legal or financial files are often grouped together. An original listing of the file cabinet drawers is available upon request. However, it is unclear whether the order of the files was disturbed when the collection was moved, first to Harpur College when Champlain closed in 1953 and then later moved again to the archives.
There were no labels identifying the drawers or file groups, so any attempt to label these groups would have been a guess. Because of this, White left files generally in order but did not identify or split files into groups. However, oversize materials were moved to the end of the collection for easier storage, and publications were moved to the end of the collection for more effecient weeding.
White heavily weeded the collection, with particular focus on duplicates and restricted student records. Restricted materials removed from the collection include disciplinary files, student course lists, medical files, grade change requests, and lists of expelled and drop-out students. Some files related to staff and faculty employment, especially disciplinary and evaluative files were also removed. The goal of the weeding was to create a collection that could be open to researchers without restrictions. For publications, no more than 2 copies were retained.
After weeding was complete, a new finding aid was created to reflect the new contents.
Subject
Geographic
Occupation
Topical
- Title
- Guide to the Associated Colleges of Upper New York (ACUNY) and Champlain College records
- Author
- Madison White (Archival Processing Manager)
- Date
- 2026
- Description rules
- Describing Archives: A Content Standard
- Language of description
- English
- Script of description
- Latin
Repository Details
Part of the Binghamton University Libraries Special Collections Repository