GEORGE L. KIBBEE WRITES APPRECIATION OF PROF. HUSBAND

The following editorial by George L. Kibbee '19 (Hon.) of The Manchester Union, in appreciation of the late Richard W. Husband, Director of Personnel Research, at Dartmouth, will be of interest not only to the many alumni who knew Professor Husband personally but to the large number who have been interested in the important work which he was developing in Hanover and in . which he had placed and maintained Dartmouth in a leading position among the colleges of the country.

RICHARD W. HUSBAND

A noble spirit passed from amongst us yesterday when Professor Richard Wellington Husband died at Hanover, and it is only in thinking of his fine life, his beautiful character, his very great service for both the college and the state, and the quality of his friendship, that one can find partial relief from the heavy sorrow of bereavement.

And it is good to recall that his greatest service came in these last years—years that were full of the richest satisfactions for him. For almost three decades he was the Typical, high grade professor of Latin, first at Leland Stanford, then at Dartmouth, one of the very best in the country, by the way, but known chiefly in college circles. Then came the war, and Professor Husband threw himself into the home war work with energy such as none but his closest friends could have suspected in the quiet, urbane, scholarly gentleman so long known simply as a professor of Latin. He was appointed secretary of the New Hampshire Committee on Public Safety, and later historian of the state's war work. In both these capacities he did a prodigious amount of work of the very first quality. When it was over, Professor Husband was known and admired from one end of this state to the other as one of our chief war workers. He himself was the very soul of modesty about it all, but those of us who were close to him in those days know somewhat of the joy he had in being able to serve.

Then came his remarkable pioneering work in the field of personnel research at Dartmouth. The college undertook an experiment in adjusting the student to his possible life work. The idea was that of shortening the gap between graduation from a liberal arts college and vocation. In its beginnings this work consisted in a study of the individual fitness of students for various callings, and also of the various industries and businesses offering opportunities to college bred, but not technically trained, young men. This took Professor Husband out into pretty much the whole country. It was new work, and no name existed for the office he held. For a while he was officially known as associate dean. But the work grew swiftly and to unexpected dimensions. It developed into personnel research. It came to include the psychological tests and thus went on into the field of mental hygiene. The late Dr. Bancroft was doing the most satisfying work of his eminently useful life in association with Professor Husband, who had become director of. personnel research, and, it will be remembered, Dr. Bancroft died in Mr. Husband's office. And a sizable department has been built up that was doing things of incalculable value to the college, the community, and the individual student.

And how he enjoyed it! Last summer thepresent writer was with him in his office, examining reports, charts, tabulations, and listening to his illuminating account of what was being done, an account that was alive with the enthusiasm of a mature man who had kept all the gladness and driving power of youth. Without word of warning we shot this question to him, as we read about the effects upon mentality of slight physical disorders: "How does this revelation of the effect of the physical upon the mental and spiritual affect your religious faith?" He was taken off his guard, but the answer came back like a flash of light. "It strengthens it. What I see in that pile of reports is souls to be helped." The professor of Latin had become the helper of souls, and we think that the happiest years of his life were those in which he was thus engaged. The material and visible result of it all is a firmly built foundation for personnel research work at Dartmouth; the imponderable result is and is to be uncounted helped souls.

Much more might be said about his work for his denomination, his extensive connection with welfare undertakings, his survey work for industrial concerns, his beautiful home life, and other things of first-rate importance. But even as we try to write, it is the man himself and not his work about whom we are really thinking, the, enduring friend whose priceless friendship, being a matter of character, rose superior to profound differences of opinion.