The history of Colby College, Part 35

Author: Colby College
Publication date: 1963
Publisher: Waterville, Colby College Press
Number of Pages: 716

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The religious affiliation of the College was discussed frankly. Everybody knew that it had been founded and fostered by the Baptists, and now its Baptist president was appealing for funds to local citizens of all religious faiths. Mayor Redington recalled a time when college and town were at enmity, and religious differences had been one cause of dissension. A professor at the College had referred to the "Holy Catholic Church," and was ousted from his job. Professor Edward Hall, who had been on the college staff for thirty years, explained that no religious discrimination had ever been shown at Colby. He stated that the College had $100,000 of scholarship funds, and never a word was asked about the religious beliefs of students who received the benefits. Mayor Redington paid tribute to President Butler's religious liberality. "A college president liberal enough to preach in a Universalist pulpit and democratic enough to wear a slouch hat ought to have everything he wants, and I am in favor of giving him this much needed building."

It would make a fitting sequel if it could be recorded that Waterville raised the money for a women's dormitory, but such was not the case. Times were still hard; not yet had the nation recovered from the Panic of 1893. The best the Trustees could do, with Rev. C. E. Owen out in the field as a solicitor, was to get a little money toward a chemistry building and a slight increase in the endowment. To Butler's successor was left the task of getting the funds that finally gave the College its commodious residence for women, Foss Hall.

Under President Butler's leadership, the Trustees were determined to im- prove the entire situation of the college finances. Their Finance Committee was quite fed up with the annual deficits which continued to eat deeply into the invested funds. In 1896 that committee reported:

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While we seek not to be pessimistic, we cannot conceal our alarm. A deficit of $7000 in the last year is enough in itself to cause great ap- prehension. When we reflect that it is likely to be duplicated in the present year, it becomes extremely serious. Have we any moral right to use the principal of funds entrusted to us on the condition that we should use only the income? Not only does it cause our resources to shrink, but our moral nature as well to be submerged. Our only plea is one of necessity. We have no plan to offer other than to keep re- peating the platitude that we must increase our resources or curtail our expenses. To turn back at the present moment would be disastrous, while to reach out with one hand for greater advances and not reach out with the other hand for greater resources would be unwise and foolish. The Treasurer's report shows that $150,000 of the face value of our investments is not paying any interest. What part of this large sum will eventually be wholly lost it is now impossible to say, but at present no part of it can be considered surely safe. We must at once put on a vigorous campaign for increased resources.

The Trustees responded to the urgent plea of their Finance Committee by requesting the President "to devote as much time as possible in an attempt to in- terest persons of influence and means in the College," and by appointing a com- mittee "to put on a campaign, employ agents, cooperate with the alumni in their efforts to secure a chemistry building, encourage the women in their efforts to secure funds for a dormitory, and seek measures to unify all endeavors to raise money for the College."

The committee worked out a unified campaign for their projects: the chem- istry building, the women's dormitory, and increase in the general funds. Donors could give to the campaign as a whole, with each gift to be divided among the three projects, or a gift could be designated for any one of them.

The campaign did not go well. Money came in slowly, with the result that for the college year of 1897-98 another deficit was faced. To help meet that gloomy situation the Trustees voted that the salaries of all professors who received more than $1800 should be reduced to that figure. The Board also voted that "the Prudential Committee state to Professor Hall the financial condition of the Col- lege, and ask him to perform his additional duties for that committee without com- pensation; and also to serve as the purchasing agent of the College without pay."

Thanks to a gift by Charles W. Kingsley of Cambridge, Massachusetts, the Trustees were able to decide, at a special meeting on February 17, 1898, to proceed at once to erect a chemical laboratory at an expense of $30,000. For its day, Chemical Hall, opened in 1899, was a splendid building, with the best equipment for undergraduate courses in chemistry to be found in any small col- lege. It provided a large lecture room with permanent seats, a spacious room for experiments in general chemistry, separate laboratories for qualitative analysis, quantitative analysis, organic, and physical divisions of the science-all on the first floor or in the basement. On the second floor were four classrooms, the President's office, and a faculty room. The latter was not a lounge, but a room with a long table, around which the faculty gathered for its weekly meeting. When the faculty outgrew the room and the College decided to employ a full-time registrar, it was made his office, and still later was divided into two offices for the Registrar and the Dean of Men.

Chemical Hall not only increased greatly the opportunities for science at Colby, it also relieved the general classroom congestion at Recitation Hall. Very

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soon the two southern classrooms became known as the English and the Latin rooms; the northwest room was the Mathematics room, while the smaller northeast room behind the President's office held for several years the French classes con- ducted by Professor Hedman.

When the Trustees assembled in annual meeting in 1898, the Finance Com- mittee was by no means content with the situation despite the fact that Chemical Hall was on its way to completion. Their report said:

The experience of the past year only confirms us in the opinion we gave a year ago that it was not wise nor businesslike to bank so largely on the future, or to expend large sums before they are collected. The Board decided otherwise and we yielded as gracefully as possible. Since the Board is apparently unwilling to reduce expenditures further, we can only report that prospective expenses for next year amount to $40,400, while we can estimate only $32,500 of income. If this situa- tion continues, the end is bankruptcy.

President Butler refused to become a follower of the gloomy Cassandras. He insisted that new funds could be found, and indeed substantial money did come in before the close of his administration in 1901. It was a long time, however, before Colby College would ever operate for two consecutive years in the black. But, as subsequent chapters will record, the day finally did come when the Trustees were able not only to get enormously increased endowment, but also to restore to the invested funds every penny that had been used to pay the annual deficits of many years.

While anxious to save money wherever possible, the Prudential Committee took the long-headed view that the College must be alert to acquire adjacent property as opportunity arose. In 1896 they recommended:

It seems desirable that the College should become possessed of prop- erty on the east side of College Avenue, from the Bunker house up to the college campus. The houses within that territory do not often come on the market. If the College had not bought the Dr. Boutelle home- stead when it did, it probably would have no other chance to acquire it for the next quarter of a century. We can now purchase the Bunker house for $8000. We ask the Trustees whether it shall be so pur- chased and whether we shall sell the Palmer house on the west side of the Avenue, the young ladies in the Palmer house to be transferred to the Bunker house. The Bunker house could be retained in that way until a ladies' dormitory is built, and then it could be taken by one of the fraternities as a chapter house. If a system of chapter houses is to be established, it would be well to have them in a row on the east side of the Avenue. If the Palmer house is sold, the College will then own no real estate on the West side of the Avenue except the lot on which it is intended to build the Ladies' Hall.

In retrospect it matters not that the Trustees did not follow the advice of their Prudential Committee. In fact, they eventually acquired more property on the west than on the east side of College Avenue. The point to be remembered is that they were alert to the need of property along the Avenue as it became available.

For some time previous to the coming of President Butler there had been increasing demand for what was called "a course without Greek." That meant

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that Colby should introduce a course culminating in a degree for which Greek should not be required either for admission or for graduation. To the die-hards of the conventional curriculum such a departure was unthinkable. Not to know Greek was to die in ignorance. Proficiency in Greek and Latin was the mark of a gentleman and a scholar. It should be noted that, as late as 1897, there was no suggestion that Latin be abandoned, either for admission or for gradua- tion. Latin was taken for granted, but Greek had had its day as a vested in- terest.

Four times between 1893 and 1897 the Trustees refused to establish a "course without Greek." At last, in 1897, they gave in. To meet the situation they established the degree of Bachelor of Philosophy. Students ignorant of the tongue of Socrates and Aristotle must not have the revered degree of Bachelor of Arts, but a lesser mark of distinction. For a time that inferior designation, Ph. B., was stamped on the graduates of many colleges, but it gradually fell into disrepute, and after a few years it disappeared at Colby.

For the "course without Greek leading to the degree of Ph. B." the Board set up the following provisions:

In place of three years of Greek now required for entrance, there shall be substituted two years of French, one of German, and one of Ele- mentary Physiology, for candidates for the Ph. B. degree. No candi- date for this course is to be received on certificate, entrance examina- tions being required in every case.

In the first college year, candidates for the Ph. B. degree shall pursue three terms of Latin, Mathematics, and English, and one term each of Logic, Science, and French. In the sophomore year, they shall pursue two terms each of Latin, German, and English, and one term of His- tory. In the winter term they shall choose one subject from English, Mathematics, and History; in the spring term one from English, Mathe- matics, Botany, and Latin. In the junior and senior years the require- ments shall be the same as for the A. B. degree.

Worthy of note is the fact that at the three independent colleges in Maine --- Bates, Bowdoin, and Colby -- it was not recognition of the sciences, but the overemphasis upon the classics, which gave impetus to the teaching of modern foreign languages in the Maine secondary schools. Sincere feeling that too much time was being spent on Latin and Greek led to persistent demand that less attention be paid to the latter, until the question had to be faced: why de- mand it at all? Abandonment of Greek as an entrance requirement paved the way for the high schools to offer recognized work in French and German in place of the second classical language. It would be many years before Latin would be subjected to a similar but less victorious attack.

While the new course toward the Ph. B. degree was increasing the need for modern language study, the Trustees, in their eagerness to make financial re- trenchment, came very near to taking reactionary and lamentable action. Some- one suggested that one way to save money would be to restrict the modern lan- guage offerings to what one man could teach. Let the relatively low paid John Hedman do all that teaching and release the more expensive Dr. Marquardt. After the lapse of sixty years, it is impossible to tell whether there was more behind this suggestion than appears in the cold records. Professor Marquardt was by no means a gentle soul; his verbal explosions had become proverbial.

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Perhaps he got in someone's hair-someone in the upper echelons. It is equally possible that no personal animus was involved, that indeed the only motive was to save money.

At the annual meeting in 1897, the Trustees voted that "Professor Mar- quardt's connection with this college as instructor shall be terminated January 1, 1898, and that the President is authorized to accept his resignation if it is of- fered before that date." By the time of the mid-winter meeting in February, 1898, when Marquardt had already been continued beyond the January first deadline, it was voted, "The sense of the Board is that Professor Marquardt should be continued another year."

In June, 1898, the Board voted that "Dr. Marquardt, Mr. Hedman, and Mr. Hitchings be continued in their present offices for another year." That was the last ever heard of the matter. In 1899 Dr. Marquardt was not reelected; he just stayed on. As salaries were voted, his name was annually included with all the other professors, and by the time President Butler's administration closed, everyone had forgotten that Colby came near to losing the now fondly remembered "Dutchy."

In the middle of the twentieth century, when one often hears the remark that the best knowledge and the worst teaching, at any rung of the educational ladder, can be found in the colleges, it is worth noting that as long ago as 1896 the Colby Trustees were aware that a professor ought to know how as well as what to teach. Their Examining Committee recommended:

When a young man is employed as an instructor, he should be appointed a year in advance, and on the condition that he spend the intervening year in the study of the theory of education and educational methods. We cannot afford to educate our professors by the expensive method of abusing the students on account of the ignorance and incompetency of those who have given no attention to professional study of pedagogy.

That same Examining Committee did, however, have a good word to say for much of the instruction which they observed at Colby.

We noted a genial, kindly sympathy between professors and students. The professors generally did not hesitate to enliven the recitations by a mild introduction of the ludicrous on proper occasions. This seemed a decided improvement on old times. Occurring under the influence of scholarly professors, it is not likely to develop into crudeness and coarseness. We believe the education given to students at Colby today is superior to that of former times.

On June 27, 1898, the Trustees voted to petition the Maine Legislature for a change in the name of the institution from Colby University to Colby College. That action was taken at the urgent request of President Butler, whose con- nection with one of America's leading universities enabled him to see how far from a real university Colby then was or was ever likely to be. It is chiefly to Nathaniel Butler, Jr., that the modern big family of Colby men and women owes the wise decision of 1898 to declare this college solely an undergraduate college of liberal arts. To that decision, from which, despite repeated temptation, devia- tion has not been made, Colby owes much of its present distinction. The Legis- lature granted the petition, and on January 25, 1899, the institution obtained the

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name by which it has now been known for more than sixty years-Colby Col- lege. (See Appendix O.)

In the fall of 1896 was appointed the first Dean of Women. Originally no special attention had been given to the girls, the President being directly re- sponsible for their welfare. With the opening of Ladies' Hall a woman had been placed in charge as resident matron, but she had no academic qualifications. When Palmer House was added as a second dormitory for women, a preceptress or sort of head matron was named, and we have already noted that she was given authority over excuses and other matters connected with the academic work. Be- lieving that the time had come for a qualified Dean of Women, President Butler secured the appointment of Mary Anna Sawtelle, who in addition to being Dean of Women was also designated as Associate Professor of French in the Women's College. In his annual report in 1897, President Butler said:

The appointment of Miss Sawtelle to be the Dean of the Women's Col- lege has been followed by the best results. There has been a sharper differentiation of the two colleges, to the distinct advantage of each. This differentiation was begun, as you know, by your adoption of Presi- dent Small's plan of coordination. To the superficial observer it is not at once apparent in what respect coordination differs from coeducation. That point is made clear in the report of the Dean. I am satisfied that a still wider differentiation is desirable. As the women undergraduates and the alumnae become more numerous, the interests which each has apart from the other become more noticeable. This wholesome distinc- tion has been emphasized by the administration of our efficient Dean, and the special interests of the Women's College will be greatly pro- moted by the erection of the Women's Hall.

In her own report, Dean Sawtelle explained how the system at Colby ac- tually worked.

The method of affiliation of the two colleges of Colby University re- sembles that of Radcliffe to Harvard, or of Barnard to Columbia. It is coordination so far as competition is concerned, men and women never competing for prizes or rank. It is coordination in that the students of the two colleges do not meet in the classroom except in the elective work of junior and senior years. Library, laboratory, and gymnasium privileges are open to all on equal terms, and the same degree is con- ferred upon all graduates.

Although quite different from the three great wars in effect upon the Col- lege, the Spanish-American War of 1898 did not pass unrecognized at Colby. No sooner had war been declared than President Butler announced that to any senior who regarded it as his duty to enlist the diploma would be granted with- out the formalities of examinations or graduation, and that members of lower classes who left college for the service would have their absences excused. When it came time for the President to issue his annual report in June, the prospect was for a short war. Hence President Butler said:

We have been satisfied that thus far actual enlistment of our students has been unnecessary and would have been premature. This may cease to be true any day, but to date any general movement that would draw away a considerable number of our students into camp would be a de-

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plorable mistake. These young men are not yet needed. The best service that college men can render to their country at present is to watch events, keep intelligently informed, avail themselves of every means of forming right opinion, and meanwhile keep about the work immediately in hand, namely the development of trained intelligence and personal power. America expects every man to do his duty, and for most of us it is true that duty confronts us just where we are.1

In 1898 Colby was considered to be primarily a college for Maine students. To be sure, it had always had a number of students from Massachusetts and a scattering few from other states. When another quarter of a century has elapsed, not even a majority of the students would hold residence in Maine, and within half a century Colby would have achieved the reputation of a national rather than a provincial college. But so intrenched was the provincial aspect of all the smaller colleges in the nation, sixty years ago, that even as widely experienced an educator as Nathaniel Butler, Jr., looked upon Colby as distinctly a Maine college. In his report to the Trustees in 1897 he wrote:

Our college is serving only a very small percentage of those who should be under her influence. The proportion of young men and women in Maine who seek a college education is lamentably small. There are in Maine many hundreds of young people who should, but do not, pass on to college. I would not lower the entrance requirements. By all means let us keep them as exacting as ever. But the colleges of Maine have their own peculiar field. They ought to serve that field as com- pletely as the colleges of other regions serve theirs. As far and as fast as we can, we should adapt our entrance requirements and our courses of study so as to attract not only the admirable class who already come to us, but also a large number of young men and women whose char- acter, abilities and training are equal, though not always identical, with those now in our classes. To do this we do not need to give up Colby's aim to be a college of liberal arts. Within the concept of the liberal arts there is room for difference.2

Despite the firm decision that Colby should remain a college of liberal arts, suggestions were constantly being made for expansion. The Trustees looked with some concern on what already seemed an excessive proliferation of subject of- ferings, although the number of those offerings was very modest compared with what it would be a half-century later. Whenever, in those earlier days, the trustee records used the term "courses," it meant the total curriculum culminating in a given degree. Such courses were then two in number: the old classical course leading to the A. B. and the new "course without Greek" leading to the Ph. B. In 1899 the Trustees passed the following vote:

So far as the courses are concerned, it is the sense of this Board that our present system, as recently adopted, affords an excellent curriculum, and that we must bear in mind the necessary limitations caused by limited number of faculty. Furthermore, we do not think it any part of our duty to attempt to do the work of the law school or the medical school, and we would hesitate to recommend the adoption of elective courses pre- liminary to graduate courses in those schools.

In 1900 the maximum salary of a Colby professor still remained at $1800. Eight men received that amount: Hall, Elder, Taylor, Warren, Bartley, Stetson,

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Black, and Roberts. Marquardt was paid $1500, and Gordon Hull, the new As- sociate Professor of Physics, got $1400. Dr. Pepper, for part-time teaching, re- ceived $1300. Miss Mathews was paid $850 and board; and Angus Frew, the Instructor in Gymnastics, got $700. While John Hedman was in Europe, his sub- stitute was paid $500 for the full year's teaching, a hundred dollars less than was paid Percival Bonney for his part-time services as Treasurer of the College.

In 1889, for the first time, the Trustees set up an investment committee, independent of its long standing Committee on Finance. That committee, headed by Gardner Colby's son, Joseph Lincoln Colby, was charged with the responsi- bility of investing all permanent funds of the corporation, to advise upon the sale of securities when deemed necessary, and to have general charge and over- sight of all securities belonging to the corporation. The Trustees considered such a committee necessary because of what had been happening to some of the investments. No less than $20,000 of bonds of the Globe Company had just been charged off as worthless, and at least $50,000 of other securities were con- sidered in danger, as they had paid no dividends for several years. It was hoped that more careful oversight by a special committee would lead to more prudent investment.

By 1900 the need of additional rooms for women had become so pressing that, in addition to filling Ladies' Hall and Palmer House, the house formerly occupied by Professor Mathews on Appleton Street was leased as a women's dormitory, with the occupants being fed at Ladies' Hall.

One difficulty that confronted the Butler administration was the inability to replace leading scholars who left the faculty with men of equal promise. This was especially true in respect to Physics. Gordon Hull, who was Rogers' imme- diate successor, stayed only two years; William Drisko lasted but one year; and the next man, Clark Wells Chamberlain, left before his first year was finished. It would be many years before the Department of Physics would even approach the reputation it had enjoyed under Rogers.

Shailer Mathews resigned as Professor of History in 1894, and went on to a distinguished career as Dean of the Divinity School of the University of Chicago. He was immediately succeeded by J. William Black, who remained at Colby for 30 years, until he went to Union College in 1924. Dr. Black was a competent teacher and the best classroom lecturer on the faculty. He rendered long, faith- ful service to Colby, but he was not the productive scholar that both of his prede- cessors, Small and Mathews, had been. History continued to be well taught at Colby, but the department did not regain its former distinction until the coming of Dr. William J. Wilkinson in 1924. The situation in modern foreign lan- guages was also allowed to drift. To be sure, the brilliant, foreign trained scholar, Edward W. Hall, was still on the faculty, but had given up his teaching of French and German. Two young men, Anton Marquardt and John Hedman, were com- ing along well, but neither had the taste for writing that frequently enabled Pro- fessor Hall to be in print in one or another of the professional journals. What was happening at Colby during the 1890's, without anyone so intending, was that it was becoming more provincial rather than less so. When President Butler him- self resigned, to return to Chicago, in 1901, there was left on the faculty scarcely a man who was known to men in his field in the great universities or who was ever heard at meetings of the learned societies. The one outstanding exception was Professor Bayley, but even he never attained quite the fame enjoyed by Charles Hamlin and William Rogers.

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The history of Colby College, Part 35

Author: Colby College Publication date: 1963 Publisher: Waterville, Colby College Press Number of Pages: 716

Author: Colby College
Publication date: 1963
Publisher: Waterville, Colby College Press
Number of Pages: 716