Nathaniel Saltonstall becomes the first director of the Institute of Contemporary Art.

He is succeeded by James Plaut (1939), Thomas Messer (1956), Sue Bailey Thurman (1962), Andrew Hyde (1968), Sydney Rockefeller (1974), Gabriella Jeppson (1975), Stephen Prokopoff (1978), David Ross (1982), Milena Kalinovska (1991), Jill Medvedow (1998), and Nora Burnett Abrams (2024).