In an age in which the President of the United States can sell time-shares in the White House, is nothing sacred?

No. And neither is the Crimson and Ivy Yard immune to this age of ribbon-cutting and commemorative plaques for large contributors.

Just in recent times, Harvard students have seen the sacred North House become Pho-Ho and their beloved butter-covered Union become the Barker Center for Humanities.

But what is the logical next step in this madness? Nothing short of renaming the University.

In an intensive 96-hour investigation, The Crimson has attempted to determine how much. How much money would it take to rename Harvard University?

How We Got Here

The best place to start in such hard-hitting analysis is with John Harvard's original donation.

According to University Archives, Harvard University was named for John Harvard in 1638, after he bequeathed half of his estate and a 400-volume library to the College.

At the time, the bequest was valued at 800 pounds by Mass. Gov. John Winthrop, according to University archives. How many cows that bought you, I am not sure. But consulting the British Consumer Price Index (a measure of the nation's inflation) from 1650 to 1990, we find that the gift is comparable to 200,000 pounds, or about $360,000. That's not a lot.

It may be more accurate, however, to look at what portion of the College's endowment Harvard donated. With an endowment of only 400 pounds at the time, Harvard's gift nearly tripled the College's net worth.

Doing little more than extrapolating to the current-day and applying an advanced econometric formula, we determine that tripling our $9.1 billion endowment would mean that adding another measly donation of $18.2 billion could get the University named after you. Interesting.

History, Myths and Legends

The Crimson Investigative Committee on Historical Perspective and Analysis (CICHPA) has uncovered information regarding the renaming of another university which cuts right to the heart of this serious matter.

In the winter of 1924, James B. Duke offered $6,000,000 to Trinity College if it would rename itself. Trinity accepted the offer, and we know it today as Duke University, which was ranked sixth by U.S. News and World Report in its annual ranking of colleges this year. Intriguing.

Legend states that Duke offered the gift to Princeton University if its trustees would agree to change the school's name. They refused this offer, but Trinity accepted.