Swarthmore College - Halcyon Yearbook (Swarthmore, PA)

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THE HALCYON OF NINETEEN SEVENTEEN floor West, in what are now, I think. Doctor Baldwin ' s rooms, and who helped run the study hour and the floors (we worked alternate nights). When off police duty. Smith taught rhetoric. The story goes that he once got shut in a folding fed, and Mrs. Smith had to get him out. He was a bit timid of high places, and being a married man (I was not at the time) once asked me to creep along the outside ledge of the fourth floor, in a nor ' west gale, and look in certain win- dows for boys supposed to have gone down the fire escape and across country to Morton for a night off. That night I realized that, though I had no degree of A.B., I was entitled to it — not Bachelor of Arts in my case, but able-bodied sea- man. I lived in the college for three months; that was in the days of the Preparatory School, the three classes of ON THE CORNICE IN A G. LE which, together with the Freshmen, oc- Icupied the present Collection Hall in the evening, studying at desks for an hour and a half. I sat on the platform looking over this studious (?) throng (likewise overlooking much). Upper classmen were given to appearing at the doors of the dark gallery above, and throwing divers unseemly articles at these innocents. This life was too strenuous for me, and when George A. Hoadley came, in Novem- ber, I 888, I asked to have the police job turned over to him. From that time on I be- came a communter. Hoadley is a fine type of the New England man, resourceful, versatile, and a good friend of his students and colleagues. I think it was the late Presi- dent Birdsall who once remarked that Hoadley was the wheel horse of the faculty. He certainly took the heavy end of a great deal of the work of administration for many years. After Doctor Appleton resigned, Charles De Garmo was elected President and served seven years. He was an enthusiastic man, fresh from the Middle West, rich in pedagogical ideas, six-foot in his stockings and bearded like a pard. De Garmo went to Cornell as Professor of Education, and the presidential mantle fell on William W. Birdsall, of the Friends ' Central School, a man of high purpose. In i 902 came our own well-beloved President Swain. As you see, I have been through five administrations. When I first came to Swarthmore, there was nothing but open country to the south of the railroad. Tom Dolphin (the present deputy postmaster) ran the old post office STUDIOUS PREPS Page Sixteen

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THE HALCYON OF NINETEEN SEVENTEEN oughly enjoyed the sport of still hunting. That bell seemed possessed; it could not be located. After several nights of scout work, I went home for some days with tonsilitis. Before I got back to college I received a post card from Doctor Magill, wishing me a speedy recovery, and addmg, Have got the bell. That was Doctor Magill; but do not misunderstand; he was a great teacher, too, and in those days a college prex had to be a bit stiff as a disciplinarian. When Doctor Magill resigned in 1889, and took the Chair of French, after a year abroad. Doctor William H. Appleton was elected President of the college and served three years, but resigned at the end of that time, preferring the life of a scholar. Trotter, ' Uneasy lies the head that wears a crown, ' he once remarked. During these years, Will Hall was the Supe. He was the brother of Mrs. Chester Roberts; a most lovable man, and his memory will always live in the hearts of those who knew him, and and in the gymnasium that honors his name. Our Librarian, John Russell Hayes, poet and book-lover, and delightful friend, graduated in 1 888, the year I came, and later was appointed instructor in English. I recall, too, William Penn Holcomb, the Professor of History, (Doctor Hull came in the early nineties) ; Ferris W. Price, Professor of Latin, an accomplished botanist and a kindly friend; and William C. Day, the Professor of Chemistry. Day was an earnest man, and was, if I remember, the one who started the Joseph Leidy Scientific Society. By his untimely illness and death the college lost a strong, good man. This puts me in mind of Leidy, a name famous throughout the scien- tific world. He was the first Professor of Biology at Swarthmore, and the founder of the Museum Collection. After his resignation on account of advancing years. Doctor Charles Dolly held the post for three years, and I was appointed after he resigned. It is a some- what curious coincidence, but neither of the three professors of Biology has ever lived at Swarthmore. The splendid collection that Doctor Leidy had labored so hard to build up during the early years, was utterly destroyed at the time of the great fire in 1882. The fire occurred some years before I came, and by that time Leidy had built up a second natural history collection. When I first came to Swarthmore, the word Biology was not in use as a departmental term ; I was appointed Professor of Natural History, and I often think that it is quite as appropriate and needs less of an explanation to begin- ners. There are many others who come to mind, but space for- bids — only the name of Benja- min Smith, a fatherly man who lived with his wife on the first ?e p .- SCOUTING ON FOURTH WEST Page Fifteen

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THE HALCYON OF NINETEEN SEVENTEEN in a little shack on the other side of the platform. The old station had steps leading up to the waiting room, and Ellis Yarnall, the present station-master, and his wife have been there since before my time. The double track system ended just east of the road cross- ing; Michael was not here then, and the crossing was unguarded except for the switch- man. The oaks along the asphaltum were runts. There was no library building; no Somerville Hall; no Wharton Hall. The boys ' gym was in an old ramshackle build- ing by the laundry. Whittier Field had just been completed, and Doc Shell was the Physical Director. Before this time, football was played on the lower part of the campus, and the grass tennis courts were along the walk in front of Parrish Hall. There was no pie shop nearer than Media; no trolley line during the first half dozen years after I came. The Sproul Observatory is on the site where the President ' s house once stood. Chemistry, Physics, and Engineering were all done in the Science Building. MICH. EL ON GU. RD Among the present members of the faculty who have been in college as students dur- ing my time, and some of them in my classes, are Battin, Baldwin, Robmson, Fussell, Palmer, Johnson, Gilkyson, Hicks, Mrs. Newport, Mrs. Griffin, Miss Peirce, Miss Walker, Miss Oliver, and Miss Vest and Miss Burnett of last year ' s graduating class. Of other members of the college staff — Miss Coale, the pleasant Matron of Wharton, came in the early nineties; Miss Lukens has cheerfully dispensed all needful things from the same little old book room these many years, and she was a student here and took her degree back m the nmeties. I thmk she was m one of my classes. I used to meet her at Mrs. Townsend ' s table (Mrs. Townsend was Housekeeper in the early times, and died here). We had much good times at her table, with extra good things in the way of food. Here Miss Cunningham would sometimes come, and regale us with her opinion of cer- Page Seventeen