Amherst College - Olio Yearbook (Amherst, MA)

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Professor Elijah P. Harris. ie I HE history of the Class of 1855 presents some rather re- ps kr I markable features. It is generally admitted that it was the smartest and the liveliest class that was graduated during 7 , .43 that decade. Certainly ability and class spirit can be argued from the subsequentcareer of its. members. Of the fifty-six graduates of that class almost a third responded to their country's call at the outbreak of the civil war, filling positions in the army from a private in the ranks to a Brigadier-General on the field. This proof of patriotism becomes all the more striking in view of the fact that the class was but six years out of college and thus only fairly started in the work of life. An unusually large number of the class were also destined to attain distinction in the different professions. Of these may be mentioned Bissell, the eminent missionary and Biblical scholarg Derby, who has gained foremost rank as an oculistg Farman, who, while Consul- General at Cairo, obtained for America the gift of C1eopatra's Needle, and who also rendered distinguished service in international delibera- tionsg Fiske, brother of the famous tt Tutor Fiske Q Dunn Browne J, who did noble service as Superintendent of the Freedmeng Montague, who was connected with his Alma Maier for over thirty years as Librarian and Professor of Romance Languagesg Washburn, who has had a notable career as missionary to Constantinople and later in connection with Robert College as'Professor and President. It remained for two of the class to achieve a national reputation in the domain of science. One of these was Nason, late Professor of Chemistry and Mineralogy in the Troy Polytechnic Institute, and the other was Harris, the subject of the present sketch. Elijah Paddock Harris was born in LeRoy, N. Y. There was almost nothing in the environment of his boyhood to encourage the acquirement of an educationbeyond that afforded by the common 5 l

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schools, and to most boys in like Circumstances a college, not to saysa university, training would have seemed wholly unattainable. But a kindly fortune brought him, while a mere lad, under the instruction and influence of a teacher of remarkable power and ability, and from that time a liberal education was the goal toward which he steadily worked. In the recent history of Amherst's graduates it would be hard to find a parallel to the difficulties and obstacles which young Harris, aided only by his indomitable will and unfaltering courage, met and conquered in his preparatory course and later in his college and university career. He fitted at Lima Seminary, N. Y., and after spending his freshman and sophomore years at Genesee College, in the same State, he removed to Amherst. His junior and senior years here witnessed the transition from the administration of President Hitchcock to that of President Stearns. His career as a college student was marked by an unswerving purpose and a loyal adherence to scholarly ideals. After spending two years in teaching he was matriculated as a student of chemistry and physics in the University of Gottingen, famous then, as now, in the department of science. Here he came under the instruction of Professor Wohler, the foremost chemist of his day, who with Rosa, Liebig, and Bunsen had been students under the famous Berzelius. Under these men the science of chemistry was taking immense strides, and new discoveries of far-reaching importance were being made. The enthusiasm of Professor Harris for scientific study received here full encouragement and stimulus with a teacher like Wohler, whose devotion to science was so great that on one occasion he spent an entire year's salary upon one experiment, the result of which was the discovery of aluminium. ' After two years' study at Gottingen, Professor Harris received the degree of Doctor of Philosophy cum laude. His inaugural dissertation was entitled 4' The Chemical Constitution and Chronological Arrange- ment of Meteoritesf' It represented unusual study and research, and continues to be one of the standard authorities on this subject. A In the preparation of this thesis, errors made by Faraday, Filhol, Leymerie, Chancel, and Montissier in meteorite analysis were discovered and 6