Milestones - 1965 to 2010
1965
- First class enrolls
- Cowell College and University Library open
1967
- First computer science faculty member is David Huffman, whose coding scheme formed the basis of MP3 and JPEG compression
- The Chadwick Garden, considered by many as the birthplace of the organic farming movement, was established
1968
- Archive of renowned sci-fi author Robert Heinlein donated to Library
1970
- One of the nation's first environmental studies programs launched
1972
- Institute of Marine Sciences established
1975
- Formation of the Santa Cruz Predatory Bird Research Group, which rescued the endangered peregrine falcon from extinction
1982
- Shakespeare Santa Cruz debuts
1984
- Alumna astronaut Kathryn Sullivan is the first American woman to "walk in space"
1985
- Baskin Visual Arts opens
1986
- Banana slug named campus mascot
1988
- UCSC becomes manager of the UC Observatories
1991
- Division of Arts established
1992
- First Ph.D. in international economics awarded
1997
- Jack Baskin School of Engineering established
2000
- UCSC researchers are first to map and publish the human genome
- Seymour Marine Discovery Center opens
2006
- New major in computer game design launched
2008
- UCSC's Special Collections receives Grateful Dead archive.
2010
- Humanities lecturer Gary Young named first-ever Poet Laureate of Santa Cruz County
- Using the Hubble Space Telescope as their "time machine," UCSC astronomers survey galaxies over 500 million years old