A non-profit organization seeks to have University of Minnesota leaders re-examine the naming of the building on the Twin Cities campus that houses the U’s Jewish Studies department, claiming Nicholson Hall is named for a man who illegally surveilled students in the 1930s and associated with known anti-Semites.
In a letter to the university president, Joan Gabel, sophomore political science major and Jewish on Campus member John Grossman writes:
We are glad that the All-University Honors Committee decided to review the names of two buildings on the University of Minnesota’s Twin Cities campus this past fall. However, we would like to express our immense disappointment that Nicholson Hall, despite also meeting the 75-year threshold for renaming, was not included in the first round of renamings despite Edward E. Nicholson’s egregious misconduct as Dean of Student Affairs.
A key aspect of Nicholson’s tenure as Dean of Student Affairs was his political surveillance of the Minnesota student body. Notably, Nicholson worked with the former congressman Ray P. Chase to help crack down on leftist activism at the U. Nicholson provided Chase with the names of student activists who held unfavorable political positions, many of whom were Jewish, and worked in tandem with Chase to limit which students could be politically active on campus and which ideals could be freely debated.
Grossman told WCCO Radio he’s hoping the U can start the process of examining Nicholson’s history and opening up a broader examination of how all students are treated.
“The ultimate goal is to build a supportive environment for Jewish students at the University of Minnesota,” said Grossman. “We’ve seen a rise in anti-Semitism in the United States in general, but on college campuses as well.”
A spokesperson for the U issued a statement explaining the process for examining the names of buildings older than 75 years:
The University has a clear policy on namings and renamings, which includes a process by which formal requests to revoke a naming or rename a building can be submitted for consideration. This year, we also began a process outlined in this policy that will, over time, consider the namings of all University buildings 75 years or older. We are able to consider four buildings each year and began with the four oldest for the 2022-23 academic year: Folwell and Sanford (Twin Cities), Kiehle (Crookston) and Spooner (Morris).
Grossman said he hopes his and the group’s efforts pave the way for improvement on a broader scale.
“(We want the U to) go in and say, ‘Here are the roots of anti-Semitism on college campuses, here are ways we can evaluate the history of anti-Semitism,’ and sort of build that supportive campus environment from the ground up,” he said.