1925 American University Rankings

In 1925 Raymond Hughes, the president of Iowa State College, conducted "A Study of the Graduate Schools of America" for the Association of American Colleges. He ranked graduate programs in 24 subjects by surveying faculty. Others quickly turned his departmental rankings into overall institutional rankings based on how many top-rated departments a school had.

Overall Ranking 1925:
1) University of Chicago
2) Harvard
3) Columbia
4) Yale
5) Wisconsin
6) Princeton
7) Johns Hopkins
8) Michigan
9) California (Berkeley)
10) Cornell
11) Illinois
12) Pennsylvania
13) Minnesota
14) Stanford
15) Ohio State
16) Iowa
17) Bryn Mawr
18) Caltech
19) MIT
20)  Northwestern

Source:
http://www.worldcat.org/title/study-of-the-graduate-schools-of-america/oclc/05110051