The transition from Trinity College into Duke University in 1924 brought not only a new name but a new visionary for women’s rights and education — Alice M. Baldwin.
In addition to the auditorium and leadership program that bear her name, Baldwin’s legacy endures on campus today in the opportunities she helped create for women at Duke.
Baldwin was the University’s first female full faculty member and helped launch the University’s Woman’s College, pioneering women’s involvement in campus social life and establishing a foundation for them to thrive academically. A century later, Duke is a coeducational institution with a nearly equal gender distribution among its students, largely due to Baldwin’s efforts.
“[Baldwin] was a pioneer at Duke, and she was a badass,” said Colleen Scott, director of the Alice M. Baldwin Scholars Program. “She saw potential in women when society didn’t.”
Born in 1879 in Lewiston, Maine, as the eldest of five, Baldwin grew up in Massachusetts in a congregationalist household. At the age of 9, Baldwin and her family relocated to East Orange, New Jersey, when her father accepted ministership at the Trinity Congregational Church. Following her family lineage of pastors, Baldwin’s early childhood was shaped by a strong moral and educational upbringing.
Baldwin stood out academically. She won the first prize in the freshman class for scholarship in 1896 at Bates College, her father’s alma mater, before transferring to Cornell University. She graduated in 1900 with a bachelor’s degree in history and later received her master’s degree in the same subject.
First dean of the Woman’s College
Early in her career, Baldwin bounced from a traveling fellowship to teaching foreign languages, history and literature in high schools and colleges in the Northeast. For two years, she served as dean of women and instructor in history at Fargo College, North Dakota.
“My experience [at Fargo College] had made me vow I would never take a position as dean and I had refused various offers of such a nature,” Baldwin wrote in her 1959 memoir “The Woman’s College, as I Remember It.”
However, Baldwin did accept a position as dean of women again — this time in 1924 at Trinity College, where she would later become the first dean of the Woman’s College.
Before accepting the job in 1924, Baldwin agreed to a six-week trial run over the summer, “intending fully to return” to a job at the University of Chicago after the period ended, according to her memoir.
“I had never been South and I thought that six weeks experience in N.C. would be interesting,” she wrote.
Those six weeks were indeed interesting, and Baldwin returned to Duke in September and accepted an offer to become permanent dean of women a few months later.
In 1930, Trinity College President William Few launched the Woman’s College, which was to serve as a counterpart to the all-male Trinity. The college was to be located on East Campus, and Baldwin was tapped to lead. She accepted, striving to build the college to be the best of its kind despite considering herself an advocate for coeducation, “to prove to the men that women could work satisfactorily on terms of equality and could be trusted with authority was the first necessity.”
Treated as equals
For Baldwin, it was essential to ensure that students of the Woman’s College were also students of the larger University and had access to the same opportunities as male students.
As dean of the Woman’s College, Baldwin oversaw “all matters involving the welfare of the undergraduate women.” Noting the absence of a physical education program for women, she hired Julia Grout in September 1924 as the first director of the college’s physical education department. That same month, she also hired the college’s first full resident nurse. In 1941, Baldwin established a department of aesthetics, art and music.
In the classroom, Baldwin advocated for the hiring of more female faculty members, the creation of a women’s student government association and for women to have access to upper-level courses previously reserved only for male students.
She also strived to build community, advocating for dormitory designs that facilitated connection between her students, from fireplaces in common rooms to shared dining tables. She recommended that faculty live in the residence halls to build mentorship and community, a tradition that continues on East Campus today.
In response to her students’ demands for representation in extracurricular activities and literary opportunities, Baldwin sponsored clubs like the Woman’s Debating Council, the Women’s Music Study Club and the Presidents Club.
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“At times [the women] felt it necessary to assert their rights to some of the same opportunities the men enjoyed,” she wrote.
Hence, “Distaff,” a monthly magazine edited exclusively by women, was established at Baldwin’s suggestion. The publication ran from 1931 until 1934, when male students promised to give women better representation in previously all-male publications.
Breaking the stereotype
Despite Baldwin’s success in creating opportunities for women, the founding dean of the Woman’s College faced obstacles at a predominantly-male institution.
The first hurdle was “working harmoniously and easily with the men,” many of whom had worked at the University for many years. Though her responsibilities grew, she noted that her salary was lower than deans in comparable positions and that she “never knew how [her salary] compared” to those of her male counterparts.
Upon her arrival, she was questioned by Few about whether she “could take criticism and disappointment without weeping.”
Baldwin defied such stereotypes — not just for herself, but for her students.
“During the first few years after my arrival, some of the parents were greatly opposed to their daughters going into any occupation but teaching,” Baldwin wrote. “I had occasion now and then to help some girl enter a business or nursing or medical field when the parents opposed it.”
Baldwin retired from her role in 1947, and the Woman’s College was merged with the larger University in 1972.
“I think the success of the Woman’s College was largely due to the quality and unselfish devotion of the women on the staff and faculty,” Baldwin wrote.
Baldwin’s legacy today
Since Baldwin’s advocacy for women in higher education, Duke has made significant strides. In the 2023-24 academic year, 44% of the University’s full-time faculty were women, and half of Duke’s 10 schools and colleges were led by woman deans. Women also make up about 53% of the Class of 2028.
Baldwin’s legacy lives on through the Alice M. Baldwin Scholars Program, established in 2004 to support undergraduate female-identifying students who are exemplars of “engaged, confident and connected leaders” at Duke and beyond. Through a living community and senior leadership seminars, Scott said the leadership program hopes to create “trailblazers in their own right,” following Baldwin’s footsteps.
Duke’s commitment to gender studies has also evolved. The women’s studies department was created in 1983 and became an official major in 1994. The department was renamed to gender, sexuality & feminist studies in 2016. Today, the department boasts an internationally recognized faculty and library resources that attract scholars from around the world, according to its website.
Ariella Maroni is a Trinity first-year and a staff reporter for the news department.