the curriculum and faculty were established. On January 28, 1930, President Floyd W. Nease appealed directly to the General Court of Massachusetts for degree-granting authority, defending ed his petition before the Joint Committee on Education and the state House and Senate. He cited financial records, campus improvement plans, and prominent community leaders; the bill passed in both houses and was signed by Governor Frank G. Allen on March 12, 1930. The news reached the college the following afternoon. The next year under President R. Wayne Gardner, the trustees reaffirmed that the college would remain "distinctly interdenominational and cosmopolitan in service." The college seal, designed by alumnus Harold G. Gardner and incorporating the college motto, Via, Veritas, Vita (Way, Truth and Life), was adopted by the trustees on the recommendation of the president and the student body in 1932. A college banner displayed the emblems of Verbum, Lux, Spiritus, Crux. The college had been chartered in 1918 with a school of music, President Gardner secured certification for the college as a teacher-training institution with the Massachusetts Department of Education in 1933. The college established a graduate program in theology starting in 1938. It was one of two Nazarene schools before 1945 to offer graduate courses. Evolutionary biology was taught in the classroom at least as early as 1937. On May 8, 1941, Governor Leverett Saltonstall approved Eastern Nazarene to grant Bachelor of Science degrees. By 1943 ENC had a cooperative degree program in engineering with Northeastern University. Under President Gideon B. Williamson on December 3, 1943, the Eastern Nazarene College gained accreditation from the New England Association of Colleges and Secondary Schools. It was the second Nazarene college to gain institutional accreditation. ENC was admitted to the Association of American Colleges in 1944, and an affiliation with Quincy City Hospital for nurses' training began in that same year. Eastern Nazarene was soon dubbed "Our Quincy's College" by the Quincy Patriot Ledger. It works to maintain good town and gown relations with the city. The Eastern Nazarene Academy closed after 1955. Starting in 1956, professors Timothy L. Smith and Charles W. Akers began to establish a community college for the city of Quincy. In 1964, the graduate course in theology was discontinued and replaced with a master's degree program in religion. The college archives were created in 1963. The first history of the college, spanning from 1900 to 1950, was published by