[7][8] In 1918, at the behest of then-college president Frederick Sutter, the college moved to the 38-acre (15 ha) former Cunard estate on Grymes Hill, Staten Island.

The college now occupies 105 acres (42 ha) on the hill and has commanding views of the New York Harbor, the Verrazzano Bridge, Downtown Brooklyn, and Lower Manhattan.

From 1956 through the late 1960s, Wagner College was the home of the New York City Writers Conference, which brought some of the leading lights of the literary world to campus each summer.

Instructors included Saul Bellow, Robert Lowell, Edward Albee, Kay Boyle and Kenneth Koch.

From 1961 to 1963, while English professor Willard Maas directed the conference, it served as a training ground for poets of the New York School.

[10] The Stanley Drama Award, which began as a prize given at the conclusion of the NYC Writers Conference, has provided encouragement for several notable playwrights, including: Terrence McNally for This Side of the Door (1962), an early version of "And Things that Go Bump in the Night"; Adrienne Kennedy for Funnyhouse of a Negro (1963); Lonne Elder III for an early version of Ceremonies in Dark Old Men (1965), and Jonathan Larson in 1993 for an early version of Rent.

Two cottages built in the early 1920s provide administrative space for the college's Public Safety and Lifelong Learning offices.

The Horrmann Library (1961) contains over 200,000 volumes and holds the collection and personal papers of poet Edwin Markham.

And in 2002, a pair of Prairie Style cottages constructed around 1905 were refurbished and joined by a bridge building into Pape Admissions House.

Walt Hameline, in 38 years (1982–present) as the director of athletics and 34 years as head football coach at Wagner (1981–2014), won the school's only National Championship with a 19–3 victory over the University of Dayton in the 1987 NCAA Division III Championship game (also known as the 1987 Stagg Bowl).