In addition to the Fox Plan, Harvard President Derek Bok and Radcliffe President Matina Horner signed an agreement that gave Harvard full responsibility for managing undergraduate education at Radcliffe.

The movement toward a women’s studies concentration also gained steam in 1977. Members of the women’s student group leading the charge petitioned the Faculty council throughout the year.

Perhaps the growing number of women in the undergraduate community at Harvard influenced the change. The incoming freshman class in 1977 boasted the lowest-ever male to female ratio: approximately 1.89 to 1.

Outside the Yard

At the same time that Harvard experienced ideological detente in 1977 and embarked on important policy initiatives, the Boston community beyond Johnson Gate proved far less corrigible.

Two crimes rocked the Harvard community in 1977.

The most shocking event of the year was the murder of Andrew P. Puopolo ’77, a member of the Harvard football team, who was stabbed to death after the team visited Boston’s red light district during their season-ending celebration.

He was killed in an area of Boston commonly referred to as the Combat Zone when he chased after prostitutes who had stolen a friend’s wallet and was fatally attacked by their pimps.

In January of 1977, three teenaged youths harassed and then assaulted a student taking a self-paced math exam in Science Center B.

One alumni says students knew never to walk through Cambridge Common alone after dark.

To help keep peace on the streets, students participated in a student security patrol under the control of the Harvard University Police Department, which was criticized in 1977 for hesitating to hire more professional officers.

Since the late ’70s, the Boston and Cambridge communities have seen crime rates drop dramatically.

But while 1977’s most visible and horrible moment occurred in the Combat Zone of Boston, the significance of 1977 for Harvard at large lies within the changing ideological interests of that year’s undergraduates.

College issues, such as the Fox Plan and the serving of hot breakfasts, grabbed student attention as the “Eggshell Alliance” became the new face of the ever-fading radicalism.

—Staff writer William M. Rasmussen can be reached at wrasmuss@fas.harvard.edu.