This month in Harvard history

May 1976 — Before an overflow crowd in Sanders Theatre, Senior Professor John H. Finley Jr. — the legendary 72-year-old Eliot Professor of Greek Literature Emeritus — gives his final Harvard lecture in “Humanities 103: The Great Age of Athens.”

May 1976 — Denmark’s Queen Margrethe II and Prince Henrik visit Harvard for a day as guests of Cultural Survival, Inc. (founded in 1972 by Professors David Maybury-Lewis, Evon Z. Vogt, and Orlando Patterson to help endangered native cultures adapt to the modern world). In ceremonies at the Carpenter Center, the queen becomes Honorary Member and Patroness of the organization, in recognition of her “concern for the way of life of the small societies of this world and for her advocacy of that tolerance and mutual respect which is the foundation of peace and freedom for all mankind.”

May 2, 1978 — The Faculty of Arts and Sciences approves the creation of the undergraduate Core Curriculum Program to replace the General Education Program launched in 1945. Development of the new program is expected to be completed by spring 1983.

June 1890 — Thirty-one-year-old Clement Garnett Morgan, Class of 1890, makes national headlines as the first black chosen to deliver a Harvard senior class oration. Three years later, Morgan earns his LL.B. and becomes the first black with degrees from the College and the Law School.

June 1907 — Future dramatist Edward B. Sheldon, Class of 1908, takes the first history and literature examinations. Also given for the first time are examinations for the undergraduate degree, “with Distinction,” in history, economics, and political science.