of Medicine, 8 members of the National Academy of Engineering, and 200 members of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. Over 170 Yale alumni have competed in the Olympic games and have won over 110 medals.
== History ==
=== Early history of Yale College ===
==== Origins ====
Yale traces its beginnings to "An Act for Liberty to Erect a Collegiate School", a would-be charter passed in New Haven by the General Court of the Colony of Connecticut on October 9, 1701. The Act aimed to establish an institution for the education of ministers and lay leaders. Soon after, a group of ten Congregational ministers, Samuel Andrew, Thomas Buckingham, Israel Chauncy, Samuel Mather (nephew of Increase Mather), Rev. James Noyes II (son of James Noyes), James Pierpont, Abraham Pierson, Noadiah Russell, Joseph Webb, and Timothy Woodbridge, all Harvard alumni, met in the study of Reverend Samuel Russell, in Branford, to donate books to form the school's library. The group, led by James Pierpont, is now known as "The Founders".
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