Overview On May 31, 1877, at the behest of President Daniel Coit Gilman, Basil Gildersleeve, the first full professor of the Johns Hopkins University, organized the Johns Hopkins Philological Association, for the purpose of "that mutual and informal interchange of opinion ... which is so confessedly essential to the development of the true scholar." The records of the Johns Hopkins Philological Association consist of five bound volumes documenting early seminars and meetings of the department, as well...