This month in Harvard history

April 10, 1950 — Ralph J. Bunche — AM ’28, PhD ’34, Director of the United Nations Trusteeship Department, and future winner of the 1950 Nobel Peace Prize — is appointed to a government professorship. He is the first black named to the Faculty of Arts and Sciences. Bunche expects to do teaching and research in international relations, international law, and colonial administration. But U.N. duties prevent him from teaching a single class. He resigns in 1952.

From the Harvard Historical Calendar, a database compiled by Marvin Hightower