Evelynn Hammonds Named Dean of Harvard College

Evelynn Hammonds, the Barbara Gutmann Rosenkrantz Professor of the History of Science, professor of African-American studies, and senior vice provost for faculty development and diversity, has been named dean of Harvard College. She is the first woman and the first African American to be named dean of the undergraduate college.

A graduate of Spelman College where she majored in physics, Dean Hammonds holds a second bachelor’s degree in chemical engineering from Georgia Tech. Hammonds also has a master’s degree in physics from MIT and a Ph.D. in the history of science from Harvard University. Hammonds joined the Harvard faculty in 2002. Previously she was the founding director of the Center for the Study of Diversity in Science, Technology and Medicine at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Hammonds is the author of Childhood’s Deadly Scourge: The Campaign to Control Diphtheria in New York City, 1880-1930. She is currently at work on a book entitled The Logic of Difference: A History of Race in Science and Medicine in the United States.