USA > Maine > Kennebec County > Waterville > The history of Colby College > Part 46
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Teachers teach more by what they are than by what they know, and what they are depends on their ideals, and their ideals depend upon their associates. The most skilful teacher is a good student of human nature. Remember always to emphasize the human element; it awakens interest.
One day when a girl asked Dr. Taylor what she should do when a pupil asked her a question she could not answer, he replied, 'If you get caught, admit it, but don't get caught.'
Don't stick to the textbook. Be original, and see how surprised your class will be.
Don't neglect the bright pupil. The dull pupil always gets more than his share of time.
The teacher must have some superiority. This may be in knowledge, force, personality, or even dress.
We need teachers who can take the conceit out of us.
Clarence Hayward White had been called in 1902 to the professorship of Greek, held so ably by John B. Foster from 1858 to 1893, and by Clarence B.
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Stetson in the subsequent nine years. For more than a third of a century Pro- fessor White taught not only the classes in Greek, but also, as enrollment in the classical languages decreased, such other subjects as art, literature, ancient his- tory, and English composition. Quite in contrast with the reserved, ultra-dignified Taylor, White was the jovial extrovert, on a friendly footing with the many stu- dents who adored him. Because of his bristling beard he was labeled by Presi- dent Johnson as the only member of the faculty who looked like a college pro- fessor. He was a superb teacher, inspiring students to go beyond the drudgery of translation into literary appreciation. To read the Odyssey under White was an unforgettable experience. After his retirement in 1934, returning alumni flocked to his home to pay their respects to their favorite professor.
At the close of the First World War, through no fault of his own, White came near to losing his connection with Colby. The demand for courses in Greek had dropped so low that in June, 1918, the Trustees voted that the De- partment of Greek be abolished at the end of the ensuing college year. That action occasioned such remonstrance from indignant alumni that, in April, 1919, the Board voted to extend the date of implementation for a year, until July 1, 1920. They agreed that reasonable notice had not been given to Professor White. At the June meeting of the Board, President Roberts asked that the vote of abolition be completely rescinded. As a result a committee headed by Rex Dodge was appointed to reconsider the matter and report at the fall meeting. As a result of the committee's recommendation, the Board voted in November, 1919: "In view of the changed conditions, the vote of June 15, 1918, to abolish the Department of Greek, which action was based on uncertainties brought on by war conditions, is now rescinded." Fortunately for Colby, Clarence White remained on the faculty and to this day the teaching of Greek at the College has never ceased.
Except for new presidents, most men joining the Colby faculty between 1890 and 1920 came in initial rank below that of full professor, though several of them received rapid promotion to the top grade-White was a significant exception. In the trustee records of June 23, 1902, we find these words: "Clar- ence H. White of Carleton College, Minnesota, elected Professor of Greek at a salary of $1600." White had graduated from Amherst in 1886 with Phi Beta Kappa honors. He received the master's degree from Amherst in 1902 and was honored by Colby with the degree of Doctor of Letters in 1929.
Above all others on the faculty, White was renowned for his keen wit, es- pecially his puns and epigrams. One morning, when the professor entered his classroom on the top floor of Recitation Hall, he found on the desk a handsaw, left by the janitor. Said White to the assembled class, "I see Fred Short wants us to have a cut this morning." Once when a student, whom the professor knew as constant user of a translation, made a stumbling rendition of the incident of the Trojan horse, White advised him: "You've done poor justice to Homer's horse. I suspect your own nag needs feeding, hey?" "Cutting classes," he announced, "is like the lion in the den with Daniel. There is no profit in it."
For many years Clarence White was secretary of the faculty, and there is no better way to reveal the liveliness of his mind and his rollicking humor than to quote verbatim from some of his records.
The faculty then donned the robes of the Dean's office and spent its customary half hour in police work.
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Mr. A. C. was voted out of a course in history because of inadequate cerebration.
With a pious glow of enthusiasm, it was voted not to grant student peti- tions for holidays on the two days following Thanksgiving.
After presenting a brave front to the photographer, in the interests of Colby's financial campaign, the faculty commenced its weekly session.
Professor White was an enthusiastic Kiwanian and greatly enjoyed that asso- ciation with the business and professional men of the city. He was a devoted Congregationalist and served for many years as deacon of the Waterville church. Mrs. White had the distinction of being the first faculty wife ever to hold official status on the Colby faculty. As has been previously mentioned, she taught Colby's first courses in music.
Clarence Hayward White died at his home on Burleigh Street in April, 1958, at the advanced age of ninety-four.
Henry E. Trefethen was a native of the Franklin County town of Wilton. Pre- paring for college at Kents Hill, Trefethen entered Wesleyan in 1878, receiving his A. B. degree in 1882 and his A. M. in 1885. At once he returned to his old pre- paratory school, Kents Hill, where he taught for nearly thirty years until he was called to Colby in 1911 as instructor in mathematics and astronomy. He was made assistant professor in 1913 and associate in 1923. When he first came to Colby he lived in Hersey House, the old building on the edge of the athletic field that had formerly housed the Men's Commons, and that was later removed to make way for the Woodman Stadium. From 1921 to 1924 he served as college registrar, keeping the records in the front room of the home which he had purchased on West Court. In the fall of 1930 he began to have pain which his physician diagnosed as angina pectoris. Nevertheless he kept doggedly at his teaching and literally died in harness on November 3, 1930, only a few hours after at- tending his last class.
For more than forty years Professor Trefethen was a regular contributor to the Maine Farmer's Almanac and for fourteen years was its editor. It was Clarence White who wrote in the faculty records this deserved tribute to his col- league and friend. "Professor Trefethen was a representative of the 'old school' type of scholar and teacher, with a truly liberal education. He combined classical culture with scientific acumen. Though his title subject was astronomy, he was equally at home in the teaching of Latin. He will long be remembered by stu- dents as a painstaking and thorough teacher, always eminently fair and just, and as a sympathetic and helpful friend. By his colleagues he will be remembered as a man of strong convictions, unwavering fidelity, and an ardent Christian.
From the time of George Washington Keely, Colby had been fortunate in a succession of famous teachers of geology. By 1920, when Professor Little de- cided to join the faculty at Clark, the Colby department was receiving the en- thusiastic and constant attention of the head of the U. S. Geological Survey, George Otis Smith of the Class of 1893. Long before he became chairman of the Board of Trustees in 1934, Smith had used his substantial influence to see that geological studies received prominent attention at Colby. That a small and rather provincial college successfully maintained that department, which the Trus- tees had tried to abolish in 1900, was due in large measure to the watchful care of George Otis Smith.
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As a successor to the resigning Little, Smith called President Roberts' at- tention to a young man whose work for the Survey had met with the director's approval. Edward H. Perkins had graduated from Wesleyan in 1912, and be- tween work in the classroom and in the field had earned his Ph.D. at Yale in 1919. He was teaching at Western Ontario University when President Roberts in- vited him to Colby. Coming as associate professor in 1920, he was promoted to a full professorship in 1926, and in 1929 was made State Geologist.
Perkins was a productive scholar, whose scientific papers may be found in American Journal of Science, Maine Naturalist, Journal of Geology. He was the author of Glacial Geology of Maine and The Natural History of Maine Minerals. His knowledge of birds was almost as thorough as his knowledge of rocks, and he was a very active member of the Audubon Society. Every summer of his professional life he spent in geological investigation in the field. He was an inveterate lover of the out-of-doors and was at his best when seated at the campfire, far from the conventions of society.
After his death in 1936, Professor Perkins' widow, Mildred Wood Perkins, directed the supply and mimeograph service at Colby until her own death in 1956. In honor of husband and wife the College dedicated in 1958 the Perkins Arboretum, a wild life sanctuary on the northeast end of the Mayflower Hill site.
George Freeman Parmenter had no easy task when he came to Colby in 1903 to take the position in chemistry so long held by Professor Elder. "Parmy" often told how he was selected. Instead of an interview with the President, who was then Charles Lincoln White, the young man fresh from graduate school was sent to Portland for an interview with the chairman of the Trustees, Judge Per- cival Bonney. The judge gave the young chemist a rough grueling, but decided that the candidate would do. "You'll never be a real teacher like Elder," he pronounced, "but we can use you for a while." That while turned out to be 44 years, one of the longest records of service ever made by a member of the Colby faculty.
Parmenter had graduated from Massachusetts Agricultural College (now the University of Massachusetts) in 1900, had taken the master's degree at Brown in 1902 and the Ph.D. in 1903. Except for his work as a graduate assistant, the appointment at Colby was his first teaching experience. After a single year as associate professor, his work was so outstanding that in 1904 he was made Merrill Professor of Chemistry. He was a member of the American Chemical Society, the American Association for the Advancement of Science, and the honorary scientific society of Sigma Xi.
Parmenter was an exacting but inspiring teacher. For many years he sent a steady stream of Colby graduates to the leading universities for graduate study in chemistry. All over the land today, in prominent positions in industry, are chemists who received their initial training from George Parmenter. No better picture of him, both as professor and as man, was ever given than that written by his former pupil and member of the Colby Trustees, Professor Frederick Pottle of Yale. Here are a few extracts from Professor Pottle's tribute.
Parmenter possessed the unusual virtue of first, last and always teach- ing his subject. He was not without wit, and he could on occasion put on a good show; but his aim was to teach chemistry, and he did teach chemistry. Nobody at Colby in my day equalled Parmenter in vigor and massiveness. A man who majored in chemistry really learned chemistry. Parmenter possessed professional sense in a degree almost
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unparalleled at Colby in my day. Everyone who completed the major with good grades was equipped to enter the best graduate schools. He assumed that his major students had a professional interest in chemistry, and he did not hesitate to demand professional standards. Other Colby teachers might tell you it would be wise to take certain courses outside the major department, but few ever made you do it. There was none of that nonsense in the chemistry major. Nobody was invited to major in the subject, but any man who did committed himself to two years of German, to advanced physics and to advanced mathematics.2
For many years Parmenter was chairman of the faculty committee on ath- letics. He regarded that difficult assignment as not that of a faculty censor of sports, but as an unbiased interpreter of student opinions to the faculty and of faculty opinions to the students. When he believed the student position was right, as he frequently did in respect to athletic schedules, he would fight for that position against any objecting colleague. More than once his diplomatic handling of a ticklish situation prevented student revolt, especially when he had to carry out any faculty decree that met with loud student disapproval. Es- pecially distasteful was his duty as bearer of bad tidings, for it was he who had to inform an ineligible student that the fellow couldn't play in next week's game. Not until the coming of President Johnson did the faculty abolish the cumber- some and often unfair eligibility rules that could put a player off a team in mid- season and put him back on it on just as short notice.
After his retirement in 1947, George Parmenter lived quietly at his home on Sheldon Place, where he died on October 22, 1955.
One colleague of Parmenter's surpassed by one year the length of service of the chemistry professor. Webster Chester came to Colby in the same year as Parmenter, 1903, but his retirement a year later than his fellow scientist's gave him 45 years on the Colby staff.
Graduating from Colgate in 1900, Chester taught for two years at Colby Academy in New London, New Hampshire, then spent a year in graduate study at Harvard. Like so many young instructors in those days, Chester was brought to Colby in a sort of jack-of-all trades capacity. He was to take on courses in the biological sciences, long neglected by Professor Bayley, whose chief interest was geology; and he was expected to assist in other departments. In 1903 there was no department of biology at the College. So successful was Chester's work and so enthusiastic was the student response that in 1905 the Trustees voted, "In view of the importance and growth of the courses in biology, the Depart- ment of Biology is hereby created and Webster Chester is appointed Associate Professor of Biology." He obtained leave of absence during 1907-08 to com- plete work for his master's degree at Harvard, and in 1910 Colby made him a full professor.
Affectionately called "Bugsy," he was always the friendly even-tempered teacher who never let his devotion to his science interfere with his interest in students as human beings. When he had been at Colby only a year, the 1904 Oracle said, "Since coming to us, Professor Chester has shown the greatest energy and interest, both in his department and in his students, and has already made his courses among the most popular and most valuable in the curriculum."
Like Parmenter, Chester inspired many students to go on for graduate work. He was very proud of the international fame won by Robert Bowen, 1914, and was greatly saddened by that prominent zoologist's early death. He watched with admiration the increasing fame of the world's foremost expert on earth-
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worms, Gordon Gates, 1919. He was especially proud of women graduates who gained distinction in biology, such as Donnie Getchell, 1924, at Hunter College, and Jane Belcher, 1932, at Sweet Briar. One of America's foremost anatomists, Leslie B. Arey, 1912, of Northwestern University, voiced what many others could also say of Chester: "Webster Chester-an inspiring leader, scholarly scientist, and true friend of youth, who laid my biological foundation, tendered encouragement and help in meeting early difficulties, and pointed the way to greater opportunities."
When Chester came to Colby he found the biological equipment limited to seven dilapidated microscopes. He found that if he wanted anything like ade- quate laboratories, he would have to importune both president and trustees year after year; and he would have to be carpenter, mechanic, electrician and plumber. So scant were the funds to provide biological specimens, that as late as 1913, one of his best students, Rafe Hatt, who later became head of the great hospital for crippled children at Springfield, Massachusetts, was accused of raiding the neighborhood for cats to supply the Chester laboratories. The accusation was slanderous, but seemed credible because of the notoriously small appropriation available. Patiently, but insistently, Chester pressed for better equipment. Some- times he got only a hundred dollars, seldom more than three hundred. He made the most effective use of his laboratory fees, and long before the time came to move his department to Mayflower Hill, he had a splendid, workable department. It was under his skillful direction that Coburn Hall was rebuilt, after the fire. In 1948 Colby conferred upon him the honorary degree of Doctor of Science.
Chester's contribution to the College was by no means restricted to his department. Under President White he served as advisor to non-athletic or- ganizations, and when Professor Little left Colby for Clark, Chester took over the troublesome and exacting task of excuse officer. He was chiefly responsible for an improved system of attendance regulations, although he was always the first to admit that no system could last more than five or six years, and in his long tenure on the faculty he saw at least a dozen major changes in the at- tendance rules.
Professor Chester rendered long and outstanding service as chairman of the Committee on Standing of Students. In that capacity he had to bear the brunt of the committee's decisions to dismiss delinquent boys and girls. Though, after 1930, it became the duty of the deans of men and women to deal directly with dismissed students and their parents, the affected families frequently ap- pealed to the committee chairman; in fact they hounded him not only at his office, but also at his home. Whenever Chester felt that a case deserved rehearing, he saw that the student got it; but never did he attempt to overrule the com- mittee. In all the difficult cases his sense of justice was paramount.
In the 1930's Chester took an interest in local politics and served two terms as alderman from Waterville's Ward Four. His ties to Colby and to Waterville were increased by his marriage to Edith Watkins, Colby 1904, and by seeing their daughter, Rebecca Chester Larsen, become a member of the Colby faculty in the indispensable capacity of College Recorder.
Retiring in 1948, along with Professor Chester, was Thomas Bryce Ash- craft, professor of mathematics. That department had enjoyed a long and honor- able history. In the early years it had been the Department of Mathematics and Natural Philosophy, and had been conducted successively by Avery Briggs, George Washington Keely, Kendall Brooks, and Moses Lyford. In 1875 a sepa-
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rate department of mathematics had been established under Laban Warren, who had been succeeded in 1903 by Hugh Ross Hatch.
Hatch was the last of Colby's many minister-mathematicians. A graduate of Colby in 1890, he had taken the B.D. degree at Newton in 1893, and had been pastor at Wolfeboro, N. H., before he joined the Colby faculty. His death in 1909 caused a vacancy that was not permanently filled until the coming of Ash- craft in 1911.
A graduate of Wake Forest College, North Carolina, in 1906, Thomas B. Ashcraft had come directly to Colby upon completion of his doctorate at Johns Hopkins in 1911. Starting as associate professor, he was promoted to a full professorship in 1913. He soon built the department of mathematics to a status that called for two assistants. Like other professors in allied fields, he sent his best students on to the graduate schools and, on his retirement, it was one of those students, Wilfred Combellack, 1937, who succeeded him as chairman of the department. Another student, Marston Morse, 1914, won international fame as a mathematician and was an associate of Einstein at Princeton.
Under the nickname of "Tubby," Ashcraft became better known to hun- dreds of male students outside rather than inside the classroom. For many years he was treasurer and purchasing agent of the Athletic Association. Not until well into the administration of President Johnson were athletics recognized as a college-conducted activity, to be budgeted like all other college operations. When Ashcraft arrived in 1911, he had been preceded by a number of other faculty treasurers of the student-conducted association, all of whom had rendered valu- able service. Nevertheless, when "Tubby" took the job he found the association $7,000 in debt. To its affairs he proceeded to devote his constant and pains- taking attention. He even stored athletic equipment in his barn on Pleasant Street, and kept a careful record of its issuance to players. No article of equip- ment, however small, could be purchased except on his order. As a result, when the financial affairs of the association were handed over to the College at the end of Ashcraft's treasurership, the deficit of $7,000 had been turned into a surplus of the same amount. For many years he and Parmenter together com- posed the entire faculty committee on athletics.
Concerning Ashcraft's work for the athletic association, the Alumnus said: "The office was not a mere job of accounting; it meant sorting out football shoes, getting them repaired, sending the sweating football uniforms to the cleaners after the team manager had gone home, lugging tons of equipment up to his barn attic and down again, seeing every travelling salesman of sporting goods, working with a stream of student managers of varying degrees of responsibility, taking in, counting and depositing the gate receipts, and settling innumerable dis- putes."3
Ashcraft was one of the few Colby teachers who ever had a profitable side- line. He became interested in real estate, and at the time of his retirement owned buildings on Winter and Pleasant Streets that housed more than twenty apart- ments. A few years later he sold it all and moved to his ancestral home in North Carolina. But the appeal of Waterville was so strong to him and his family that they continued to return to Waterville for the summer months of each year. Dr. Ashcraft died in North Carolina in 1960.
Although a full-time registrar had first come to Colby in the person of Malcolm Mower, that office did not assume its present significance until Elmer Warren took charge. The son of Ambrose Warren, 1899, but himself a graduate of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1926, Elmer had come to Colby in
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1928 as instructor in mathematics. He was promoted to assistant professor in 1930 and to associate professor in 1938, having meanwhile earned the degree of master of education at Boston University. In 1933 he succeeded Mower as registrar. He made that office much more than a place for recording student marks. It became a source of varied statistical information carefully compiled under his direction. He became interested in the placement of graduates, es- pecially in business positions, and he established Colby's first systematic place- ment service. He organized and conducted a course in statistics and persuaded his department to introduce a course in college mathematics at an elementary level, as special aid to students whose preparation in mathematics was inadequate. He asked for leave of absence during World War II and served in the Air Force with rank of major. He returned to the Colby faculty for two years following the war, then left teaching to take a very attractive position as personnel director for the National Insurance Company at Montpelier, Vermont. His assistant, Miss Frances Perkins, was appointed Recorder and continued in that office until marriage to Professor Richard Cary.
One of the most inspiring teachers, and certainly one of the most dynamic lecturers who ever held membership on the Colby faculty was William J. Wilkin- son, who succeeded J. William Black as professor of history in 1924. A graduate of the oldest of southern colleges, William and Mary in Virginia, he had taken his doctor's degree at Columbia, and had been a student of government under Woodrow Wilson at Princeton. Before he retired in 1947 he had received honorary degrees from Washington College, Wesleyan, and Colby.
Wilkinson's professional interest in history had come rather late. He had taken his master's degree at Columbia in 1907 in the field of classics, and for the ensuing ten years he was an instructor in Latin and Greek at William and Mary. During World War I he was educational director at Camp Hancock, then an instructor in the Army Educational Corps at Beaune, France. His in- terest having now turned to history and government, to which he had been first drawn before the War because of his work with Woodrow Wilson at Princeton, he was lecturer in history at Wesleyan from 1919 to 1923. The following year he spent at Columbia, completing the work for his Ph.D. degree in history. He then came to Colby as associate professor. So immediate and so profound was his impression upon students and the public that, after a single year, he was made full professor. Attracted to the University of Vermont by experience there in summer teaching, Wilkinson left Colby in 1928, but after one year in Burlington he was homesick for the Waterville surroundings and returned to his Colby position, not to leave it again until his retirement in 1947.
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