Download Drama China A Dream Of Splendor Sub Indo

[Paula Yacovone]

Early in the morning of Friday, October 10, 1930, a dense fog hung over Rochester. Rain threatened. Buildings on the River Campus were almost invisible. Luckily, however, the sun pierced through the encircling gloom, ushering in three days of golden autumn weather, and that was well for the period witnessed the dedication of the new home of collegiate learning on Oak Hill--the climax and crown of generous giving, astute planning, hard work.

In point of fact, instruction had actually started a fortnight earlier. Two days before the first classes met--just when Adolf Hitler's brown-shirted Nazi contingent in the German Reichstag jumped from twelve to 107--undergraduates flocked to the River Campus and listened to a message by President Rhees welcoming them to the splendid new opportunities while college melodies played by Professor Slater pealed from the Library chime.

Prior to that, Bausch and Lomb Company employees, newspapermen, and other Rochester groups had inspected the Oak Hill resources. And later came parties of workers employed in the construction, the fund-raisers of 1924 (with George Eastman and George W. Todd present), and indeed anyone and everyone whose gifts had made the River Campus possible were welcomed. "Dad, come and see it," read an invitation to subscribers, who were reminded that "six years ago it was 'Dad, give for me...'"

The formal dedication of the new educational facilities and accompanying conferences were high points, of course. Vastly different in magnitude though the celebration was from the exercises at the opening of the original home of the U. of R., eighty years short of a month before, there was not a little similarity between the two epochal occasions. Months of meticulous planning, Trustee Edward G. Miner in the chair, preceded the 1930 festivity. Extensive publicity in the press, on the silver screen, and over the radio heralded what the New York Times was pleased to describe as "Rochester's New Glory."

By way of prelude, the Times carried a lengthy story on the beginnings and the execution of the River Campus idea. An editorial commented suggestively that many undertakings in the Flower City had a head start of a decade on comparable enterprises in Manhattan. It spoke of the fruitful collaboration of town and gown in creating "buildings of great beauty, of an architecture that historically belongs to the [Genesee] valley and that has classical memories..." As the Times editorial writer read the evidence, Rochester had "again shown what a city whose prevailing ambitions are qualitative rather than quantitative can do in the higher ranges of community life...." "The people generally" had united with wealthy citizens and U. of R. graduates to make possible the gladsome celebration. "Town and gown are one in their rejoicing." 1

Taking part in the dedicatory ceremonies were representatives from 170 academic institutions and learned societies, the Regents of the University of the State of New York, state, county, and city officials, guests who formally participated in the exercises, University trustees and administrative officers, faculties, graduates and undergraduates, and crowds of interested townsfolk. (College classes were suspended.) It was a brilliant academic procession that started the ceremonies off, winding its way from Rhees Library around the Quadrangle and down to the basketball court, or Palestra, in the Gymnasium. An Eastman School student orchestra furnished music. In the absence of ex-President David J. Hill, prevented by illness from presiding, Rhees assumed that role and gave the dedicatory address, dwelling on the reasons for the names attached to the several campus buildings, warmly praising Eastman for his munificence, and reminding the tightly-packed audience of the College for Women on the reconditioned Prince Street Campus.

The principal speaker of the morning, Ray L. Wilbur, Secretary of the Interior and president of Stanford University, took "Man's Advance through Education" as his subject. Peering well into the future, he foresaw a time when college underclassmen would be linked in some fashion to the public school system, while Juniors and Seniors would be absorbed in an authentically university environment.

Friday afternoon was given over to learned conferences in Strong Auditorium on the social studies, the humanities, and the natural sciences, with three distinguished scholars as spokesmen. William F. Ogburn, sociology, University of Chicago, recommended that the teaching of values should occupy a larger place in collegiate education; Irving Babbitt, French literature, Harvard University, pleaded movingly for a balanced intellectualism; and Hugh S. Taylor, chemistry, Princeton University, dwelt upon the shape of things to come in scientific research. At the evening gathering President Livingston Farrand of Cornell University advocated, under the title "The University's Obligation to the Community," that infinitely more attention should be devoted to the education of adults and Roland B. Woodward, Regent of the University of the State of New York, approaching the other side of the shield--"The Community's Obligation to the University," remarked upon the intimate linkage between industry, commerce, and higher learning.

"Adult Education--A Crying Need of Our Common Civilization" served as a guideline from which on Saturday morning Lawrence P. Jacks, principal of Manchester College, Oxford University, delivered one of the most memorable and incisive utterances the Strong Auditorium would hear for decades to come. "As Aristotle pointed out long ago," he reminded the knowing ones, "the good life is a very difficult affair, and will always remain so...The drama of the good life cannot be acted by pressing a scientific button.... You need great actors." With prose of quiet eloquence, Jacks appealed vigorously for the education of the whole individual and the ultimate unity of all mankind. At a more specialized and vocation-oriented afternoon session, Professor Walter F. Dearborn of Harvard addressed himself to the "Relations of Mental and Physical Growth in School Children." Lesser conferences of a technical nature convened in the basement of Strong.

On Saturday the River Campus became a Mecca for Rochester graduates at the first autumn gathering of alumni ever held. Converging on the Alumni Gymnasium, they heard an address dedicating that structure by Trustee Joseph T. Alling, 1876, and lustily applauded six stalwarts who in 1889 had played on the pioneer U. of R. football team. Thence to the Stadium, which was dedicated between the halves, where the football opponent, Wesleyan, inconsiderately repeated its performance at the opening of the Culver Field thirteen years earlier by winning the game. The Connecticut institution could not match, however, a wonderful bibliophilic exhibition in the Rhees Library, which depicted the evolution of bookmaking from gorgeously illuminated medieval manuscripts to the finest productions of contemporary printing craftsmanship. Hard by were choice first editions, autographs of esteemed authors, and original drawings.

On Sunday, the 12th, the great occasion closed with a concert by the Rochester Civic Orchestra, a sermon by the Reverend James G. Gilkey of Springfield, Massachusetts, and a festival of hymns on the Hopeman Memorial Chime with Professor Slater as bellman. To their dying day, few if indeed any who were present would forget the smooth and exhilarating inauguration of "Rochester's New Glory." 2

II

After the poetry came the prose of the every day administrative and academic round. It was the time of the Great Depression, the years of the locusts as everyone was aware from rising in the morning until slumber at night. Buoyant optimism which had reigned while the River Campus construction was underway collapsed into dark despair. United States unemployment statistics increased from around 3,000,000 at the outset of 1930 to above 7,000,000 at the end (and would go up by at least 5,000,000 more), entailing misery and suffering beyond computation. This tragic situation furnished the theme for Rhees' baccalaureate message of 1931 in which he asserted that a civilization worthy of the name must recognize the right of every man to a job and the right to self-respect in his work.

On the academic front, Rhees was able to report that the year of transition and adjustment to separate colleges had been brought off without untoward confusion. It was clearly evident that the elderly leader wished to lay down the onerous burdens of his office; indeed, he formally presented his resignation to the trustees in 1930, but they unanimously requested that he should carry on as long as he was willing and able. He predicated his acquiescence on an assurance that steps would be taken promptly to find a successor, yet nothing in fact was done. Three years more and the resignation was renewed and then reluctantly accepted.

The search for a new president ran on for eighteen months. Edward G. Miner headed a trustee committee charged with screening candidates and making a nomination to the corporation. It was a decidedly novel experience for the trustees, since Joseph T. Alling was the only member who had a seat on the Board when the quest that resulted in the selection of Rhees had taken place. Proposals for consultation on candidates with the University faculties as a group or for a faculty committee were turned aside. Rhees learned that at the Johns Hopkins a candidate for the presidency unanimously recommended by a faculty committee had not proved acceptable to the trustees; he was advised that the proper instrument for choosing a president would be a joint trustee-faculty committee, each member having equal voting power. His correspondent reasoned that whereas trustees were more apt to emphasize public reputation, scholars desired educational leadership, lively appreciation of the importance of research, and personal integrity. Whether Rhees passed this piece of counsel along to the trustee committee is unknown; in any event, the opinions of administrative officers and individual professors were solicited and anyone--faculties, alumni, and Rochester citizens--was welcome to submit suggestions to the nominating group for consideration. 3

For the guidance of the trustee committee, a wide-ranging memorandum, drafted by Rhees, underscored the traits and talents desirable in the next president of the University. Under the heading "native endowment" were cited "practically perfect health and unusual energy, horse sense, strength of character, attractive personality" and in the forty to fifty year age range. Qualities "acquired by education and experience" embraced "outstanding ability as an educator, interest in the culture of spiritual life and the aims and ideals of a small college, a good speaker and with some experience in undergraduate and graduate teaching." Among the essential attributes listed as "presidential potentialities" were "executive ability, progressive (though not the first to try curricular novelties), keenly interested in community and civic affairs;" a man having promise of "a brilliant future" was preferable to one with "an accomplished past."

Then, too, the new chief executive should be "interested in education rather than in training "--though an appreciation of the importance of science was essential. Moreover, he should like young people and be able to communicate effectively with them. He should be an individual known for tactfulness and leadership and, not least, he should have a wife, possessed of "characteristics in keeping with the demands and dignity of her husband's office." Rhees felt it would be a mistake to limit the candidates to graduates of the U. of R. Even so, the bill of particulars that he devised was extremely comprehensive--and formidable. 4

From first to last, approximately one hundred individuals came under scrutiny by the trustee committee at meeting after meeting. Only fragmentary accounts of the discussions are available--evaluations of specific individuals apparently were not set down on paper. Presidents and deans of colleges, a preparatory school headmaster, several professors (two at least on the U. of R. faculty), Raymond N. Ball, an ex-West Point commandant, a professional diplomat, and others passed in review, and quite a few of them came to Rochester for consultations. When Robert A. Millikan, Nobel Prize physicist, gave a lecture at the University, the city press jumped to the erroneous conclusion that he was under consideration for the executive chair.

From the first set of possibilities, the trustee committee recommended Professor Joel H. Hildebrand of the University of California at Berkeley for the presidency, and Rhees "on his own initiative" strongly urged him to accept. A distinguished, fifty-two year old chemist with marginal experience as an academic administrator, Hildebrand visited Rochester, conferred with trustees, and was entertained by relatives. However, he decided "in favor of his chosen lifework as teacher and scientist;" additionally, he much preferred the climate of the Golden State, and he much disliked the prospect of living in the elaborate Eastman House, remote from the students. No manner of persuasion could induce Hildebrand to change his mind. To the unfeigned surprise of the U. of R. authorities the New York Times carried a report about three candidates whom the trustees allegedly had in mind, though none of them is named in the meager University records. 5

III

Over their breakfast coffee on January 3, 1935, Rochesterians read in banner headlines, "Yale Scholar, 33, named U. R. Head." Press accounts of the day and editorial commentary revealed in no little detail the unusual record of Alan Chester Valentine. A Long Islander in origin, Valentine had been reared (as he put it) on "desiccated puritanism," trained at home and at a little private school in "the values of Emerson and Horatio Alger." In 1921 he graduated from Swarthmore College, identified with the Hicksite wing of the Society of Friends, to which the newly-chosen president belonged. The election of a Quaker meant, of course, a radical departure from the Rochester tradition that a Baptist must preside over the University.

Among the small coeducational colleges of America, Swarthmore had no superior. As an undergraduate, Valentine stood out by reason of ability as a student leader, presiding over the student council and editing the newspaper and yearbook, by reason, too, of his scholastic attainments, shown by election to Phi Beta Kappa and by receiving the Ivy Award, the highest honor at Swarthmore, and by reason of his athletic prowess, conspicuously in football, for which he was mentioned in All-American ratings. During his first college summer vacation he had done his bit in the First World War as a shipyard worker and in officer training at Plattsburg; thereafter, he assisted in the S.A.T.C. at Swarthmore. A second undergraduate summer Valentine spent vagabonding around western Europe.

Following a stint of apprentice teaching in industrial geography combined with a year of graduate work at the University of Pennsylvania, where he received a master's degree, Valentine was picked as a Rhodes Scholar and studied for three years at Balliol College, Oxford. Coming to that venerable seat of learning as "a raw young Quaker rationalist," he acquired an enthusiastic liking for the institution, even though it was "the most class-conscious spot in the British Isles." Prepared at Oxford for an academic career, he left convinced that he would never grow into a first-class scholar and confused about "wisdom and ethics."

Retrospectively, Valentine decided that the most enduring rewards of the Oxford experience were the people he encountered and the opportunities to take part in games; alone among Americans he played Rugby three years for the Oxford varsity, and he was the second American ever to win a Rugby blue. Richly rewarding were holiday "safaris" on the Continent, where he customarily traveled, eyes and ears wide open, as a plebian "loner." During the Paris Olympic games of 1924 Valentine accumulated fresh athletic laurels as coach and player on a victorious American Rugby team. To his academic distinctions Oxford added an honorary B.A. and M.A.

For three years he worked for the Oxford University Press and during that time turned out respectable booklets for private reading courses on the English novel and on biography and autobiography. In 1928 he returned to Swarthmore as dean of men and assistant professor of English. Shortly before, he married Lucia Garrison Norton of a well-to-do New York family, Smith College alumna, and endowed with social graces and cultural tastes that fitted her well for the demanding and sensitive role of a university's first lady.

Yale University lured Valentine on to its staff in 1932 as master of Pierson College, professor in the history, arts, and letters department, and chairman of the board of admissions. While at New Haven he won the esteem of colleagues and undergraduates alike and he was given an honorary M.A. The mere recital of the cold facts discloses that Valentine's progression up the academic ladder had been nothing less than meteoric. Handsome he was, over six feet tall, rugged, green-eyed and brown of hair. In his makeup there was a lode of delightful humor and a streak of toughness that emerged from time to time.

One day Valentine observed that but for Trustee Edward G. Miner he would not have come Rochester. The two men met through acquaintances at North Haven, Maine, where the Valentines customarily spent their summer holidays. At the request of the trustee committee on the presidency, the Valentines visited Rochester, and by the autumn of 1934 negotiations had reached the stage at which the actively-interested Yale master submitted a lengthy and searching questionnaire to Rhees about the U. of R. The President in response furnished him with detailed information on the teaching force--numbers, range of salaries, retirement plans--on undergraduate scholarships and loans, residence hall accommodations, student government and athletic policies, on the condition of University finances, and on library resources. Annual reports of the President for the preceding five years supplemented the other data despatched to New Haven.

While Valentine digested these materials, the trustees seem to have debated at length among themselves on his candidacy, and at a meeting on December 15, 1934, a detailed memorandum on his qualifications was distributed and each trustee who had come to know Valentine offered his personal assessment of the man. In the end, the recommendation of the nominating committee that he should be invited to be the fourth chief executive of the University obtained unanimous approval. Except for his age and some essentially minor points, Valentine satisfied the wide-ranging blueprint for the presidency that Rhees had worked out a year and a half before. Professor Dexter Perkins and Raymond N. Ball hastened to New Haven to clear up any questions that Valentine still entertained and to urge his acceptance. At a final conference in Rochester, December 29, 1934, Valentine formally accepted the bid, and the public announcement of his coming followed shortly. Later, if not then, Valentine felt he had no particular fitness for the presidency, but that he was chosen because it was believed he possessed "sound training and some executive ability." 6

Addressing him as "my dear friend," Rhees expressed "his deep satisfaction and joy