The
University of Pennsylvania (commonly referred to as
Penn or
UPenn, although the former is the
preferred and recognized nickname of the University) is a private university in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania and a founding member of the Ivy League.In 1749, eager to create a college to educate future generations, Benjamin Franklin wrote and circulated a pamphlet titled "Proposals for
the Education of Youth in Pensilvania." Unlike the other four American Colonial colleges that existed at the time -- Harvard, William and Mary, Yale, and Princeton -- Franklin's new school would not focus on education for the clergy. He advocated an innovative
concept of higher education, one which would teach both the ornamental knowledge of the arts and the practical skills necessary
for making a living and doing public service. The proposed program of study became the nation's first modern liberal arts
curriculum.Ben Franklin assembled a board of trustees from among the leading citizens of the city, the first such non-sectarian board in
America, and looked about for the least costly way to build a campus.In 1740, a group of working class Philadelphians had decided to erect a great preaching
hall for the evangelist George Whitefield. It was the largest
building in the city, and it was also planned to serve as a charity school for "the instruction of poor children." The
fundraising, however, for both the building and the school had fallen short and the plans for both chapel and school were
suspended. Franklin saw an opportunity to open his Academy quickly and inexpensively and in 1751 the Academy, using the great hall at 4th and Arch Streets, took in its first students. A charity school also was
opened in accordance with the intentions of the original "New Building" donors.The University cites the earlier date as its founding, which enables it to claim to be older than its athletic archrival
Princeton. However it is the fifth-oldest college and oldest university in the United States.It holds the latter claim by the virtue of the establishment of its medical school, the first in the American colonies, in
1765. Penn has continued that innovative tradition with the founding of the first
university teaching hospital in 1874; the creation of the Wharton School, the world's first
collegiate school of business, in 1881; the construction of Houston Hall, the first
American student union building, in 1896; and the building of ENIAC, the world's first electronic, large-scale, general-purpose digital computer in 1946.