Article

NINE HONORARY DEGREES AWARDED

October 1933
Article
NINE HONORARY DEGREES AWARDED
October 1933

President Hopkins cited nine prominent citizens of this country and Canada in bestowing Dartmouth's highest honors during the Commencement exercises in the Bema June 20. The characterizations he used follow:

DOCTOR OF PEDAGOGY

Charles Watson Newhall Fairbault, Minnesota

Headmaster of the Shattuck School

Graduate of Johns Hopkins in 1893. It is a matter of general understanding in American colleges how indispensable to their own high attainment is the thoroughness of training of the important preparatory schools of the country. To the administrative heads and to the masters of such schools, the colleges owe a common debt. For forty years you have served Shattuck School, as teacher in Mathematics for twenty-three and as Headmaster for seventeen. Under your skilled instruction hundreds laid the substantial foundation for distinctive work in later life; under your efficient leadership a school already great, among the oldest of church schools, has become greater, and the percentage of boys continuing their education into college grades has become largely increased. In recognition of the influence in the Headmastership which is yours, and in endorsement of the prestige and repute which have been awarded you in school circles of the Northwest, and in acknowledgment of the quality of school graduates numbered through successive generations in Dartmouth enrollment, I confer upon you the honorary degree of Doctor of Pedagogy.

Fletcher Harper Swift

Berkeley, CaliforniaProfessor of Education in the University of California

Graduate of Dartmouth in 1898. Authority on the theory of educational method and on the facts of educational practice; no itemization is possible, within the limits of time available, of your manifold accomplishments. Through the years of your professional career you have been identified with important appointments in many of the foremost universities of this country; as lecturer and adviser, you have been associated with many another; as investigator, you have studied the school systems of various states and those of foreign countries. You have been an expert consultant in the Federal Office of Education and elsewhere on public school finance; you have written illuminatingly in general discussions and in formal reports upon subjects within your field; you have made yourself an intelligent apostle of change as essential to progress, when this was deemed desirable, while at the same time you have never failed to recognize the existing values in established procedures. In acknowledgment of your versatile talents and your scholarly attainments, I confer upon you the honorary degree of Doctor of Pedagogy.

DOCTOR OF MUSIC

Walter Johannes Damrosch New York CityMusician

In reverse analogy to the case of Amos the herdsman, who declared he was no prophet, neither was he a prophet's son, you are a distinguished musician and the son of a distinguished musician. Moreover, as was your father, you are a pioneer within your field. The zeal which was his for the dissemination of musical culture in the United States, you have nurtured and enhanced, to elevation of the public taste. Conductor of great orchestras and of great operas, and as well producer and composer; in later years unceasingly you have evidenced your solicitude for the development of musical appreciation, particularly among the youth of the land. To your other talents you have added that of a great educational leader, capable of interesting, stimulating, and instructing millions in your classes. Upon you for many accomplishments, but upon you especially in your capacity as a great teacher, I confer the honorary degree of Doctor of Music.

DOCTOR OF SCIENCE

Charles Sherman Little Thiells, New YorkOrganizer and Superintendent ofLetchworth Village

Graduate of Dartmouth in 1891. Outstanding leader in the betterment of conditions for handicapped groups of humanity; reticent in expression of the creative instinct which is yours and diffident in the presence of appreciation of this; humble in spirit, but forceful in action; with no thought of seeking for it, you have won public confidence and the respect and esteem of professional associates. Reared in the rugged school where successful achievement was contingent upon long hours and arduous toil, you have been an exponent of the Apostle's injunction to endure hardness. Distinguished in the years of your athletic career for sportsmanship in games, you have applied this principle to conditions of life. You have made unfortunates of lesser privilege and those of undeveloped minds your special responsibility; you have taught society to understand the needs of these and to make provision for them; and always in care of them you have proved yourself a master in planning and a genius in administration. I confer upon you the honorary degree of Doctor of Science.

DOCTOR OF LETTERS

Robert Frost South Shaftsbury, VermontPoet, and Professor of English in Amherst College

Born in California, bred in New England, graduated into the finest poetic tradition of America; transmuter of the cadences of simple speech into high beauty and memorable rhythm; steadfast thinker of quiet thought in a world of clamor; teacher, seeking always and only the plain face of truth; mature counselor, never forgetting the perplexities of the young; philosopher in an age of haste and skepticism, holding fast the enduring values of the human heart; poet of walls and birches, of mountain-side and farm, and always of life and love and God; beloved American, who needs no honors save as a sign of affection, upon you I confer the honorary degree of Doctor of Letters.

Leon Burr Richardson Hanover, New HampshireHistorian of Dartmouth College

Graduate of Dartmouth in the Class of 1900. Careful student and lucid narrator of the history of Dartmouth College; author of one of the most discriminating studies of the American liberal colleges made in recent years; scholarly associate of those engaged in culling from the mass of College manuscripts those of historical value and preserving them through publication; even greater significance attaches in a scholastic colony such as this to the teaching ability native to you. The loyalty to high ideals of general welfare, the ability and willingness to view life discerningly in areas far from your professional concern, and the indefatigable industry and breadth of culture which are yours are the essence of values priceless to the undergraduate college. Keen and vital contributor to the definiteness of College purpose and cooperative worker for the liberalizing of College policies, upon you I confer the honorary degree of Doctor of Letters.

DOCTOR OF LAWS

The Right Honorable Sir George Halsey Perley, K.C.M.G. Ottawa, Ontario, Canada

Member of the Canadian Parliament

Son of New Hampshire and graduate of Harvard College in the Class of 1878, you have devoted the strength of the sturdy stock from which you sprang to a lifetime of public service for the great Dominion which is our neighbor to the north. Appointed Minister without portfolio in 1911, Minister of Overseas Military Forces in 1916, a member of the first Imperial War Cabinet in 1917, and shortly thereafter appointed High Commissioner in London for Canada, where you served until 1922; now again in recent years you have served as Minister without portfolio, as Delegate to the League of Nations Assembly, and as a civilian reserve officer holding yourself subject to the Premier's call for skilled assistance as you have done in former times. It has been said that the links which bind together the British Commonwealth of Nations are supple as silk but strong as steel. You, Sir, have always been and are now one of those tested and proved links. Dartmouth honors herself and has pride in honoring you in admitting you to her fellowship through the honorary degree of Doctor of Laws.

Walter W. Stewart New York CityEconomist

Graduate in 1909 of the University of Missouri; expert in international finance; authority in the field of social science, by whose findings so much of modern life is governed; the responsibilities through successive years which have been assigned to you declare your distinction: Director of Statistics and Research for the Federal Reserve Board in Washington; Economic Adviser to the Bank of England; Conferee-atlarge as a special guest of the Bank of International Settlement; American representative to the Conference on International Indebtedness and Reparations at Basel. Meanwhile, in citation of these honors we do not here forget a service as great and an influence as important, when your high qualities as a teacher and the contagion of your personal influence were an inspiration to a host of men, winning them to a reverence for the qualities of scholarship which were yours. I confer upon you the honorary degree of Doctor of Laws.

Fred Arthur Howland Montpelier, Vermont

One-time Trustee of Dartmouth College

Graduate of this College in 1887 and for years wise counselor in her affairs; prominent amongst the foremost citizens of the neighboring state of Vermont, in which you have lived and worked; exemplifier in personal and official relationships of those stalwart qualities of mind and heart for long years held typical of the New England north-country; through extended periods of public service you have declined the allurement of political preferment, while holding yourself always subject to conscription for the arduous task or the emergency action in which your knowledge and skill have been indispensable for the public good. Strict in integrity, high in professional repute, and rich in the public confidence and in the quality of friendships which are yours, Dartmouth signifies her pride in your sonship by conferring upon you the honorary degree of Doctor of Laws.

Honored by College Fred A. Howland 'B7, of Montpelier, Vt., was awarded the honorary degree of Doctor of Laws in June.