[6] In 1836, Bethuel C. Church, a Seventh Day Baptist, was asked to organize a college in Alfred and began teaching, receiving financial assistance from the Seventh Day Baptist Educational Society with resources, in part, from "Female Educational Societies" of local churches.

[6] From its founding as a select school, the institution received a charter as Alfred Academy from the New York State Board of Regents in 1842.

Alfred University has hosted guest lecturers, artists and musicians including Frederick Douglass, Ralph Waldo Emerson[11] and Ghostface Killah.

[12] In April 2000, Alfred University received national attention when freshman Eric Zuckerman orchestrated a campus visit from then–First Lady, Hillary Clinton, during her campaign for the United States Senate from New York.

[15] In 1971, the village of Alfred, where the university is located, became only the fourth municipality in the U.S. to ban employment discrimination based on sexuality.

[17] Amidst the dissolution of the AU Greek System, the Lambda Chi Alpha fraternity chapter at Alfred University led a successful effort to ban discrimination based on religion, age, disability, and sexual orientation in the constitution of the 210 chapter international fraternity in 2002.

[20][21] Alfred University's athletic teams became known as The Saxons in 1929, but did not institute an official mascot when the moniker was selected.

In 1940, two Kappa Psi Upsilon brothers, James Lippke and Walter Lawrence, developed a character named Lil Alf to be used on their fraternity house's signs during football games.

In his original design, Lil Alf was a knight in shining armor, simplified to a small cartoonish form in a 1948 redesign.

Lil Alf was not formally adopted as a campus mascot, with many sports teams complaining that he was "too cute and not fierce enough."

[24] Hot Dog Day, one of the largest yearly gatherings in Alfred, was first organized in 1972 by Mark O'Meara and Eric Vaughn as a way to bring the community together, raise money for local charities, and improve the reputations of campus Greek life.

The event usually features live music, a soapbox derby, vendors, and carnival games for local children.

It hosts equine classes, an intramural equestrian team, varsity and JV for both English and Western disciplines, clinics, and horse shows.

The College of Ceramics is functioning technically as a "holding entity" for the fiscal support of the state programs and the NYSCC mission.

[34] The School of Art and Design, technically a sub-unit of the College of Ceramics but autonomously run with its own dean, is further subdivided into divisions.

A visit to the school in 2009 led media historian Siegfried Zielinski to state that Alfred is "the center of alchemy for the 21st century.

[45] There are three main media organizations on campus; AUTV, the Fiat Lux newspaper, and the WALF 89.7FM radio station.

The student-run yearbook, the Kanakadea, ceased publication in 2014. Notable extracurricular clubs include the Student Activities Board, Forest People, and Art Force Five.

[49][50] In 1978, prior to Klein's death, student Chuck Stenzel died in a hazing-related incident at Alfred's Klan Alpine fraternity.

After Stenzel's death, his mother, Eileen Stevens, created a lobbying organization to increase awareness of hazing and promote anti-hazing laws, as documented in Hank Nuwer's book "Broken Pledges" and a later TV movie of the same name (in which Alfred was not named for legal reasons).

More than 50% of the task force were themselves members of a fraternity or sorority while in college, and 82% of the board of trustees are Alfred University alumni.