the college was established in 1769 by congregational minister eleazar wheelock who wanted to use the college to christianize the native americans. in 2004, booz allen hamilton selected dartmouth college as a model of institutional endurance "whose record of endurance has had implications and benefits for all american organizations, both academic and commercial," citing "trustees of dartmouth college v. woodward" and dartmouth's successful self-reinvention in the late 1800s. dartmouth alumni, from daniel webster to the many donors in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, have been famously involved in their college.