affiliations with the nearby Clark Art Institute and the Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Art (MASS MoCA) along with a close relationship with Exeter College, Oxford. The college competes in the NCAA Division III New England Small College Athletic Conference as the Ephs.
== History ==
Colonel Ephraim Williams was an officer in the Massachusetts militia and a member of a prominent landowning family. Williams was killed at the Battle of Lake George on September 8, 1755. His will included a bequest to support and maintain a free school to be established in the town of West Hoosac, Massachusetts, provided the town change its name to Williamstown.
Members of the Williams family first attempted to found Queens College in Hatfield, Massachusetts, in 1762, but the charter was revoked within a year when Massachusetts Governor Francis Bernard succumbed to pressure from Harvard College, which opposed the creation of a second institution of higher learning in the colonial-era Province of Massachusetts Bay.
In 1765, …
