Eugene Francis Clark '01
EUGENE FRANCIS CLARK '01, editor of the MAGAZINE, secretary of the College, professor of German and respected and beloved friend of many generations of Dartmouth men, died Friday morning, February 21, of heart failure as physicians were about to operate to remove fluid from his left lung. The empyema had set in as a result of the serious type three pneumonia which he had successfully fought through a week of critical illness. It seemed that he was on the road to recovery. Although not declared out of danger he was daily gaining strength and showing improvement. Physicians waited a week until his condition should allow them to perform the operation to treat the complication which was not unexpected. At the beginning of the operation he suffered an acute cardiac failure. He passed away at 9:05 a. m.
Gene's death is a hard blow. Day by day the College and the entire community had followed his gallant fight against odds. Slowly he fought his way around the corner to the road back to health, to his family and his many friends. The quiet end, unexpected, and as a bolt from the blue, spread tragedy over Hanover and the great Dartmouth fellowship. It entered every faculty home, it stalked into the houses of those many townsmen whose affection and honest respect for Gene have earned him immortality in their hearts, it found its way to the long corridors of dormitories and to the knots of undergraduates on the street, in their rooms and before fraternity lounge fires. "Gene Clark is dead." It quickly flashed to the offices and homes of thirteen thousand sons of Dartmouth. And it came suddenly to his family, to his son.
Professor Clark was born in Portland, Maine, in 1879, the son of Francis E. and Harriet Abbott Clark. He was graduated from Dartmouth in 1901. He was awarded the A. M. degree here in 1905 and he received from Harvard the A. M. degree in 1908 and the Ph. D. degree in 1915. He returned to Hanover in 1908 as assistant professor of German and in 1919 he was elected to a full professorship and was at that time made secretary of the College. In 1912 he became editor of the ALUMNI MAGAZINE and has since directed that publication through its period of expansion and growth. His efforts brought it to a position of preeminence among college publications. As secretary of the Dartmouth Alumni Council, the General Association of the Alumni and the Dartmouth Secretaries Association Professor Clark was more closely allied with alumni activity of the College than any other man. Beginning as early as 1912 his work in developing the organization of alumni clubs throughout the country, in assisting class secretaries, and as the directing force in the Alumni Council and in many other ways has been of great importance to Dartmouth.
Throughout his career as a member of the Dartmouth faculty Professor Clark has been active in committee work of a diversified nature. He was for several years chairman of the Committee on Student Organizations, he has served twice on the Committee Advisory to the President, and he has been for many years a member of the Faculty Committee on the Outing Club. As a long-time advisor and supporter of the Outing Club he has had for many years a major share in the responsibility of guiding the D. O. C. in its development from its inception to its present position of leadership among outdoor clubs in the country. As both a faculty and alumni representative on the Dartmouth Christian Association Council Professor Clark has given the benefit of his experience and counsel to this undergraduate organization. It would be difficult to name an organization connected in any way with the undergraduate or alumni life of the College with which he has not been associated and which he has not helped in some way. Professor Clark was a member and the alumni advisor of the Psi Upsilon fraternity. He was active in promoting the welfare of the town and served as a member of the school board for several years.
At the time of his confinement to Dick's House February 5, Mr. Clark was engaged in completing a biography of his father, the Rev. Francis E. Clark, founder of the Christian Endeavor movement.
He is survived by a son, Alden Haskell, a student at Tabor Academy, by his mother, Mrs. F. E. Clark of Newton, Mass., by a sister, Mrs. William Chase also of Newton, and by two brothers, Sidney, who is living in Brussells, Belgium, and Harold, of Rumson, N. J. Professor Clark married Martha G. Haskell in 1906. Mrs. Clark died in March, 1922.
Funeral services were held in the White Church, Monday, February 24. Dr. Daniel Alfred Poling of New York, president of the International Society of Christian Endeavor, delivered the eulogy. The service was conducted by the Rev. William Spence, minister of the Church of Christ at Dartmouth College. The bearers were David S. Austin of the class of 1904, Dean E. Gordon Bill, Prof. Nathaniel L. Goodrich, librarian of the College, Edgar H. Hunter of the class of 1901, Dr. Frederic P. Lord of the class of 1898, and Prof. Francis J. A. Neef. The honorary bearers were President Ernest Martin Hopkins, Dean William R. Gray and John R. McLane, members of the board of trustees, Prof. Charles Darwin Adams, Halsey C. Edgerton, treasurer of the College, Allan L. Priddy, vicepresident of the Alumni Council, Clarence G. McDavitt, president of the General Alumni Association, Prof. Nathaniel G. Burleigh, president of the Secretaries' Association, and Prof. Leland Griggs, long-time member of the faculty committee on the Outing Club.
