"Fair Harvard" is the alma mater of

Harvard University Harvard University is a private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1636 as Harvard College and named for its first benefactor, the Puritan clergyman John Harvard, it is the oldest institution of high ...

. Written by

the Reverend The Reverend is an honorific style most often placed before the names of Christian clergy and ministers. There are sometimes differences in the way the style is used in different countries and church traditions. ''The Reverend'' is correctly ...

Samuel Gilman The Reverend Samuel Gilman (1791–1858) was an American clergyman and author. He was born at Gloucester, Massachusetts and graduated from Harvard University in 1811, and in 1819 was ordained pastor of the Unitarian church at Charleston, South ...

of the class of 1811 for the university's 200th anniversary in 1836, it bids the school an affectionate farewell. Of its four verses, the first and fourth are traditionally sung and the second and third omitted. The song is set to a traditional Irish air, best known in early 19th century America as " Believe Me, if All Those Endearing Young Charms", a popular song whose lyrics were written by the

Irish Irish may refer to: Common meanings * Someone or something of, from, or related to: ** Ireland, an island situated off the north-western coast of continental Europe ***Éire, Irish language name for the isle ** Northern Ireland, a constituent unit ...

poet

Thomas Moore Thomas Moore (28 May 1779 – 25 February 1852) was an Irish writer, poet, and lyricist celebrated for his ''Irish Melodies''. Their setting of English-language verse to old Irish tunes marked the transition in popular Irish culture from Irish ...

. The tune is occasionally wrongly credited to

Sir William Davenant Sir William Davenant (baptised 3 March 1606 – 7 April 1668), also spelled D'Avenant, was an English poet and playwright. Along with Thomas Killigrew, Davenant was one of the rare figures in English Renaissance theatre whose career spanned bot ...

, whose library may have been a source of the music for later publishers. (The tune is also a newer setting of "My Lodging Is In The Cold, Cold Ground".) Horatio Alger Jr., an 1852 graduate of Harvard's Divinity School, composed his "Harvard Odes" I-IV, and

Paul Laurence Dunbar Paul Laurence Dunbar (June 27, 1872 – February 9, 1906) was an American poet, novelist, and short story writer of the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Born in Dayton, Ohio, to parents who had been enslaved in Kentucky before the American C ...

originally wrote the lyrics of the " Tuskegee Song", to the tune. The song is referenced in

The Simpsons ''The Simpsons'' is an American animated sitcom created by Matt Groening for the Fox Broadcasting Company. The series is a satirical depiction of American life, epitomized by the Simpson family, which consists of Homer Simpson, Homer, Marge ...

episode “The Front”.

Original version

:Fair Harvard! Thy sons to thy Jubilee throng, :And with blessings surrender thee o'er :By these festival rites, from the age that is past, :To the age that is waiting before. :O relic and type of our ancestors' worth :That hast long kept their memory warm, :First flow'r of their wilderness! Star of their night! :Calm rising thro' change and thro' storm. :To thy bow'rs we were led in the bloom of our youth, :From the home of our infantile years, :When our fathers had warn'd, and our mothers had pray'd, :And our sisters had blest thro' their tears. :Thou then wert our parent, the nurse of our soul; :We were molded to manhood by thee, :Till freighted with treasure thoughts, friendships and hopes, :Thou didst launch us on Destiny's sea. :When as pilgrims we come to revisit thy halls, :To what kindlings the season gives birth! :Thy shades are more soothing, thy sunlight more dear, :Than descend on less privileged earth. :For the good and the great, in their beautiful prime, :Thro' thy precincts have musingly trod, :As they girded their spirits or deepen'd the streams :That make glad the fair city of God. :Farewell! be thy destinies onward and bright! :To thy children the lesson still give, :With freedom to think, and with patience to bear, :And for right ever bravely to live. :Let not moss-covered error moor thee at its side, :As the world on truth's current glides by :Be the herald of light, and the bearer of love, :Till the stock of the Puritans die.

1998 revision

The term "sons" was eliminated to make the song gender neutral. The first line was revised to read "...we join in thy jubilee throng" between 1997 and 1998. As a side effect of the change, the word ''throng'', a verb in the original lyrics, became a noun.

2017 revision

In 2017 Harvard announced it was running a contest to replace the last line of the song "Till the stock of the Puritans die". In early October 2017 semifinalist potential replacement lines were announced. The final replacement line was chosen as "Till the stars in the firmament die."

References

External links

Harvard University Band audio recording
{{authority control Harvard University American college songs Alma mater songs 1836 songs