AUB's 125th anniversary celebrations in 1992 coincided with the beginnings of Lebanon's return to peace after sixteen years of civil war, throughout which AUB continued to function. This book is a special anniversary tribute to the founders of the university, originally the Syrian Protestant College, who laid the foundations on which the college could grow and develop into one of the leading institutions of higher education in the Middle East. The book documents seven of the original faculty: Daniel Bliss, the first president; David Stuart Dodge; Edwin R. Lewis; Harvey Porter; George E. Post; Cornelius Van Dyck; and John Wortabet. Sections in English and Arabic include speeches, official papers, letters, and articles – some contemporary, others more recent – that demonstrate the values and principles these founding fathers sought to put into practice.
The publication is the cumulation of a project by AUB's Neighborhood Initiative that identified and located 46 streets in Beirut that carry AUB-related names emphasizing the shared history between the university and the city. The goal of the project is to bring awareness to the connections between people and place through the actual names of Beirut’s streets and to those in whose honor they are named. The booklet is original published by AUB’s Office of Communications as a bilingual edition and includes a pull-out map of Ras Beirut highlighting the 28 AUB-related streets in the neighborhood.