John E. Sawyer ‘39 (1917-1995) was the 11th President of Williams College. During his tenure from 1961-1973, Sawyer oversaw monumental shifts in the Williams Community from the abolition of fraternities, the beginning of coeducation, and tumultuous periods of on-campus student activism and unrest, most notably in protest over the Vietnam War and racial injustice. Collected here are the responses of Sawyer and his administration to the most prominent of these incidents, the Hopkins Occupation, before, during, and after the protest. They retell an official narrative of “miscommunication” and reconciliation between the College administration and the Williams Afro-American Society (WAAS) protestors.

 

                From April 4-9, 1969, 34 WAAS members led by Preston K. Washington occupied Hopkins Hall in response to administrative inaction on 15 demands the group delivered weeks prior to President Sawyer. The incident, which came to be known as the Hopkins Occupation, was not merely a confrontation over WAAS’ ultimatum, but the culmination of decades of rampant systemic racism against the inadequately supported minority of BlackWilliams students. WAAS’ demands stipulated campus and curricular improvements for Black students including affinity housing and cultural centers, African and Afro-American studies programming, Black faculty hires, and increased affirmative action campaigns to increase and better support Black students at the College. Despite conceding to only 12 out of the 15 demands, in addition to equivocating on the student participation in creating an Africana studies program, program funding, and affinity housing allocations, Sawyer’s documents demonstrate how the College administration retold a reconciliatory resolution to WAAS’ occupation.