Famous City College Alumni

Ten graduates of City College have won the Nobel Prize

Dr. Julius Axelrod

Class of 1933; Medicine 1970 – Died December 29, 2004

Julius Axelrod was born on May 30th, 1912, in New York City. He obtained his B. Sc. in 1933 at the College of the City of New York, M. A. in 1941 at New York University, and Ph. D. in 1955 from the George Washington University.

Julius Axelrod died on December 29, 2004.

Julius Axelrod
Robert Hofstadter

Dr. Robert Hofstadter

Class of 1935; Physics 1961 – Died Nov. 17, 1990

Robert Hofstadter, Professor of Physics at Stanford University, was born in New York, N.Y., of parents Louis Hofstadter and Henrietta Koenigsberg, on February 5, 1915.

Hofstadter attended elementary and high schools in New York City, and was graduated in 1935 from the College of the City of New York with the B.S. degree, magna cum laude.

He went to graduate school at Princeton University where he studied physics from 1935 - 1938, and received both the M.A. and Ph.D. degrees in 1938 from that institution.

Dr. Jerome Karle

Class of 1937; Chemistry 1985 – Died June 6, 2013

Jerome Karle was born in New York City in 1918. A graduate of the New York City public school system, he entered the City College of New York in 1933 and upon graduation studied biology at Harvard University where he received a master's degree, in 1938. He earned a Ph.D. degree from the University of Michigan in 1944.

Jerome Karle
Herbert Hauptman

Dr. Herbert A. Hauptman

Class of 1937; Chemistry 1985 - Died Oct. 23, 2011

Herbert Hauptman was born in New York City on February 14, 1917. He graduated from the City College of New York (1937) with a B.S. degree in mathematics and received an M.A. degree in mathematics from Columbia University (1939) and his Ph.D. from the   University of Maryland in 1955.

Dr. Arthur Kornberg

Class of 1937; Medicine 1959 – Died Oct. 26, 2007

Arthur Kornberg was born in Brooklyn, New York, on 3rd March, 1918. He was educated at City College, New York, where he took his B.Sc. degree in 1937, and the University of Rochester, obtaining the M.D. in 1941. He returned to City College in 1960, for LL.D., and Rochester University in 1962, to take D.Sc.

Arthur Kornberg
Kenneth Arrow

Dr. Kenneth Arrow

Class of 1940; Economics 1972 – Died Feb. 21, 2017,

Kenneth Arrow was born in New York City on August 23, 1921. He graduated from CCNY in 1940 with the degree Bachelor of Science in Social Science but a major in Mathematics. He entered Columbia University for graduate study and received both his M.A. degree (1941) and Ph.D. from there.

Dr. Leon M. Lederman

Class of 1943; Physics 1988 – Died Oct. 3, 2018

Leon Lederman was born in New York on July 15, 1922.  He graduated from City College in 1943 and entered the Graduate School of Physics at Columbia University in 1946.  He received his Ph.D. from there in 1951.

Leon Lederman
Arno Penzias

Dr. Arno A. Penzias

Class of 1954; Physics 1978  

Arno Penzias was born in Munich, Germany, in 1933. He arrived in New York with his family in January 1940. He earned a B.Sc degree in physics from City College (1954) and received both his M.A. (1958) and Ph.D. (1962) from Columbia University.

Dr. Robert J. Aumann

Class of 1950; Economics 2005

Robert Aumann was born in Frankfurt-on-the-Main, Germany, in 1930. He graduated from City College in 1950 with a B.Sc degree in mathematics and received his S.M. (1952) and Ph.D. (1955) from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He has been on the faculty of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem Mathematics Department since 1956.

Robert Aumann
John O’Keefe

Dr. John O'Keefe

Class of 1963; Physiology or Medicine 2014

John O'Keefe was born in New York on Nov. 18, 1939 to Irish immigrant parents. He graduated from CCNY in 1963 with a BA in psychology. He went on to study at McGill University in Montreal, Canada, earning an MA degree in 1964 and a PhD degree in Psychology in 1967.

Last Updated: 03/09/2022 10:41