This Day in History is a recurring feature looking back at the history and highlights of The Tangerine throughout the years.

By this time next year, The Tangerine will be celebrating 75 years of bringing local, national and international news to the Utica College community. While much has changed within the last 75 years, the importance of student-ran journalism has remained.

Before The Tangerine, the college’s newspaper began as The Utica College News, with its first issue dated Nov. 6, 1946. The cover story featured the first Dean of Utica College of Syracuse University Dr. Winton Tolles speaking at the convocation address on the college’s opening on Sept. 30, 1946.

“This will be a college which will try to teach you to think clearly, scientifically, dispassionately,” Tolles said. “This will be a college which will try to help you develop a philosophy, to learn to differentiate the good from the bad, the true from the false, the genuine from the artificial.”

Tolles left his position as Dean a year later and was replaced by Ralph F. Strebel, the namesake for the Ralph F. Strebel Student Center.

Another article from the first issue of The Utica College News showed that there were students from other states and countries enrolled in its first academic year.

“In addition to the students from Canada, states outside of New York represented in the student body include Massachusetts, Connecticut, New Jersey, West Virginia, Pennsylvania, and the District of Columbia. The student coming the farthest distance is William C. Laing from Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.”

Utica College initiated plans of expansion from its very beginning. The Utica College News showed the college expanding and planning for the future.

“The purchase of a two-story building at the corner of Plant and Hart Streets consists of the latest expansion of Utica College. The building, the former Gibson home, is in the immediate vicinity of the college facilities, but due to its dilapidated state, will have to undergo extensive renovations.”

The building was planned to be used for classrooms, student activity rooms and faculty offices. This was during a time when Utica College was located in Oneida Square in downtown Utica. The article goes on to reveal plans for relocation to what would be Utica College’s current home.

“Dean Tolles revealed future plans, which calls for a permanent site for the college, somewhere on the outskirts of the city.”