The Harvard Century tells the story of how Harvard, America’s oldest and foremost institution of higher learning, has become synonymous with the nation, their goals and standards reflecting each other, each setting the other’s agenda. It is also a colorful and intimate narrative of the individual achievements of its leaders and of the intense power struggles that have shaped Harvard as it pioneered in setting the priorities that have served as exemplars for the nation’s educational establishment.

"Mr. Smith fulfills his intentions with as readable an account of Harvard as we are likely to need for a while." - New York Times Book Review

"We appear to be at a turning point in the evolution of colleges and universities in America. As in earlier periods of our history, the institutions of higher education are changing in response to the knowledge needs of society… In reading Richard Norton Smith’s The Harvard Century one revisits those forces and personalities shaping our major universities during the decisive decades of their development as the centers for scientific research." - Change