The combined effects of the Great Depression and World War II resulted in a 14-year building hiatus at Princeton (1933-1947). Due largely to increased government funding for laboratory buildings, a major and rapid campus expansion occurred in the 1960s that pushed the campus boundary farther to the south and located major academic facilities east of Washington Road, including the engineering school.

By 1951 Collegiate Gothic was no longer the official architectural style "due to cost and other factors" and Princeton University, like Oxford, Cambridge and other American universities, pursued a more "contemporary" style. The township and borough of Princeton also experienced a building boom after World War II. In the decade from 1950 to 1960, the population of the township doubled. By the 1970s the area was heavily populated and many new streets were created.