Dartmouth Awards Seven Honorary Degrees
Dartmouth's highest tribute, in the formof hondrary degrees, was paid to sevendistinguished men at the College's 182 ndCommencement exercises. Two of the recipients were Dartmouth graduates. Thehonorary Doctorate of Laws was conferredupon four men, representing government,the law and the press. Honorary Doctorates of Divinity, Letters, and HumaneLetters were also awarded.
Following are the citations read byPresident Dickey as he conferred the degrees:
AMOS NOYES BLANDIN JR. '18 Associate Justice,Supreme Court of New Hampshire Bath, New Hampshire
THE granite in you is so self-evident that no proof is needed to establish a New Hampshire heritage going back to the Revolution, not to speak of your graduation in 1918 as a "sturdy son of Dartmouth." It is a fine thing when the man and the job are well met, and never were two better met than you and the law. Graduated from Harvard Law School, seasoned by twenty years of general practice, for ten years you have graced the bench of New Hampshire courts as a judge whose devotion to the principles of law is matched only by his understanding of the human interests at stake in every trial and every argument. First as Justice and then Chief Justice of the Superior Court, and now as a Justice of the Supreme Court of the State, you have exercised judicial power with a consecrated sense of dedication and a saving sense of proportion. You have served Dartmouth in many ways, but in none more worthily than as one whose service to society in all literalness merits the title, Doctor of Laws.
RALPH EDWARD FLANDERS United States Senator from Vermont Springfield, Vermont
BORN a Vermonter, the eldest of nine, your life has added to the long-standing argument as to whether Vermont is place, party, or profession. Apprenticed to the machinist's trade at fifteen, schooled as an engineer by mail, on these beginnings you built one of the most useful American lives of our time. Inventor, author, business leader, and practitioner of economic development on many fronts, your early exposure to the cussedness of inanimate objects in the machine shop seems to have produced in you a natural antagonism to unsolved problems, whether animate or inanimate in origin. Today, as United States Senator from Vermont, you seem to us one who would sooner solve a problem than vote on it. For such public service above and beyond the call of poli- tical duty, Dartmouth is proud to award you, already the holder of her honorary degree of Master of Arts, her Doctorate of Laws.
FRANK PACE JR. Secretary of the Army Washington, D. C.
NATIVE of Little Rock, Princeton A.B., Harvard LL.B., tax prosecutor, officer for four years in the Air Transport Command, versatile public servant who for two years delivered the mails and unrelated matters for the Postmaster General, Director of the Budget, and Secretary of the Army at thirty-eight, if we may be permitted the expression, "That's some travellin' "—even for an Arkansas traveller. As Director of the Budget you Were that rare combination: a man who is the master both of magnitude and of detail. With an instinct for responsible democracy you presented a budget which could be understood by all citizens as well as by those who made it. Now as a principal agent of this Republic, you bear in awful balance the threefold burden of fighting one war, of avoiding a worse war, and all the while of preparing the Army and the Nation for duties that none but the aggressor can define. In recognition of the truth that these burdens are the common lot of all of us and in tribute to the quality of your public service, Dartmouth welcomes you into her honorary fellowship as Doctor of Laws.
ARTHUR HAYS SULZBERGERPublisher of The New York Times New York, New York
PUBLIC-MINDED citizen and wise counsellor, in the interest of unbiased reporting we acknowledge you to be a graduate and a trustee of Columbia, and with scrupulous regard for the fitness of the news we note that you are the father-in-law of a Dartmouth graduate. One hundred years ago a newspaper enterprise was begun which half a century later the genius of Adolph Ochs endowed with greatness. Today, thanks to the quality of its past and present leaPublicationise stands to the fore as the primary Publicationresource whereby in their daily lives trained minds may know and free men may see their way. You, sir, the publisher of The New York Times, are the custodian of both an indispensable institution and one of the great traditions of responsibility in our society. For the fidelity and the force with which you have honored that trust, and in grateful tribute to all who have made possible this most distin- guished milestone of American journalism, Dartmouth confers on you her highest honor, her Doctorate of Laws.
FREDERICK LEWIS ALLEN Author; Editor of Harper's Magazine New York, New York
BOSTON born and Harvard bred, loosed from an early editorial career by the tides of World War I and cast up on the shoals of academic administration as Secretary of the Harvard Corporation, pulled free in 1923 by Harper's Magazine, since then you have served this journal with a zeal befitting one saved from a fate far worse than that of being an editor. Your editorship has more than preserved a great landmark of American culture; it has provided contemporary America with one of the rare media where the seller and the buyer of independent thought can create a public market place in which ideas and good writing may make their way on the merit of their quality. As an author yourself you have put American life and lives into words which yield up for the reader the full perceptive honesty and pleasure you put into their fashioning. May Dartmouth's honorary degree of Doctor of Letters bring you some sense of the esteem in which you and your venerable literary ward are held in this outpost of learning.
RUSSELL COWLES '09 Artist New York, New York
WE acknowledge at once the futility and, indeed, the presumption of talking about an artist and his work. Most other men are understood by their words, but what you are and what you say as a painter will only be understood as seen in your paintings. It is therefore well for you to know that your works are not strangers to your associates in this graduating class. It may well be that your paintings, "Girl with Red Hair" or the deer and turkey trophy, will remain for many a man a part of the warm memory of his last year in Hanover. Yourself a Dartmouth graduate of the Class of 1909, a winner of the Prix de Rome and a fellowship at the American Academy in Rome, as one of America's really "good painters" you have given us an art which is rooted in both yesterday and tomorrow, because it portrays with integrity and maturity the beauty of today. In testimony of your distinction in the service of the liberating arts, your College delights in welcoming you into the fellowship of her Doctors of Humane Letters.
REINHOLD NIEBUHR Professor of Applied Christianity,Union Theological Seminary New York, New York
To the manse born as the son of an Evangelical minister, you became by your own capacity and will a pastor, theologian, philosopher and teacher whose name is known throughout the world whereever men seek and teach the word of God. Willing to begin your ministry as the pastor of forty persons, you have dared as a thinker in the service of your Christian faith to match your spirit, your mind, and your courage against the largest issues of life's meaning. Few such efforts in our day have retaken more lost ground on this most ancient frontier of human understanding. You have laid bare for hardpressed mortals the inner truth of the paradox that the limited human creature may yet be the instrument of limitless good. You have no need of further academic honors, but this College which you have long graced as visiting preacher and lecturer has need for herself to honor all that makes you so preeminently worthy of Dartmouth's honorary degree of Doctor of Divinity.
HONORARY DEGREE RECIPIENTS at Dartmouth's 182 nd Commencement shown with President Dickey. Left to right, seated: Frank Pace Jr., Secretary of the Army; Senator Ralph E. Flanders of Vermont; Presi- dent Dickey; Justice Amos N. Blandin Jr. 'lB of the New Hampshire Supreme Court; and Arthur Hays Sulzberger, publisher of "The New York Times." Standing: Frederick Lewis Allen, author and editor; Dr. Reinhold Niebuhr, theologian; and Russell Cowles 'O9, artist.
DARTMOUTH MEN WHO RECEIVED HONORARY DEGREES: Shown chatting with President Dickey at the June 17 exercises are Justice Amos N. Blandin Jr. 'lB (left) and Artist Russell Cowles 'O9 (right).
