University of Pittsburgh - Owl Yearbook (Pittsburgh, PA)

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1787 1987 The McCormick administration is best remembered today for changing the name of the University, moving the University to the new campus, and erecting six major buildings. It should be remembered as well for other less dramatic developments. That administration was one in which the deans of the schools and the heads of the departments wielded extraordinary power. They had, in fact, more authority to act and to command than faculty administrators were to have at the University of Pittsburgh for almost a half century. McCormick apparently felt no fear of being overshadowed by his faculty. The McCormick administration also was one that set out to save the College of Liberal Arts from extinction and in so doing produced an accommodation in the century-old conflict between proponents of technical training and those of liberal education. If McCormick was known for progressive academics, his successor, John G. Bowman, will always be remembered for progressive architecture. His contribution to the University stands as a symbol of Pitt’s excellence. Under Bowman, the people of Pittsburgh came together to erect the Cathedral of Learning. In a 1924 letter to architect Charles Z. Klauder, Bowman spoke of his dream of building the Cathedral. He wrote, My life is tied up in the idea that the proposed structure will be the most beautiful and outstanding building ever erected. I am confident that Pittsburgh will build it.” After a massive public fundraising campaign, work began on the tall building at 11:15 on September 27, 1926. After a series of setbacks, it was finally completed in October 1934. The construction of the Cathedral of Learning is probably what it has been called, the most important single event in the history of the University. The late 1930s were a time of crisis for the University. Chancellor Bowman was dissatisfied with the situation and ordered a committee be formed to look Frick Acre . here the Qitlwdral of I-earning was «o be coiwtrucled. in 1924. Right: A nearly completed Cathedral. into it. The investigation of the situation at the University in all of its aspects was a model of its kind: a painstaking, probing, productive study of the operations of an institution in trouble. The members of the special committee went directly to the heart of the University's problems. They made surprising proposals that opened the way for a revolution in procedure and style. They conducted the investigation in a manner that reflected credit on themselves — the seven trustees who asked the questions — as well as on the administrators, faculty, and alumni who answered them. In the history of the University, December 1941 is a watershed between the old and the new, a Great Divide between the past and the future. Doubts were quelled and uncertainties resolved by the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, and for the students there was relief and unaccustomed excitement in the common national purpose. In a flurry of activity, the University prepared to make its contribution to the war effort. By mid-1943 the Cathedral of Learning was at the center of a large, important, and efficiently run military installation. The classrooms, the halls, the Commons Room, the lawn, the sidewalks about the building were crowded with young soldiers. Soldiers who were taught at the University and professors who taught them speak highly today of the 1943-1945 experience. The seriousness and discipline in the classrooms were hitherto unknown on many campuses. The students marched to their classrooms to the cadence count of a section marcher, who was distinguished for the day by a blue band around his upper left arm. They stood at attention when the professor entered. The marcher reported his section all present and accounted for, holding his salute until the professor returned it. With the end of the war on August 14, 1945, the University turned its attention to new and happier problems. Now and for some years ahead it would be necessary to process, enroll, and find room and teachers for a flood of veterans. John Bowman declared in his biennial report, Everyone who comes in contact with this group of students is impressed by their intelligence and by the strength of their purpose. They are eager, disciplined, and, the faculty say, a joy to teach.” 16 Bicentennial

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1787 1987 Student in the William Pitt Union 20 year before its renovation. Right: Nikita Khrushchev at Pitt in 19S9. At a board meeting on February 16, 1945, John Bowman asked the trustees of the University to accept his resignation as chancellor, effective July 1. He was succeeded as chancellor in 1945 by Rufus Henry Fitzgerald. Fitzgerald inherited an institution that was almost free of debt and was about to enter a ten-year period of unprecedented demand for higher education, much of it subsidized by federal support for veterans in a booming economy. Fitzgerald, who had been a University administrator for many years, noted the effects of the post-war campus expansion immediately. Increased use of admission tests and interviews, coupled with the opportunity of selecting from among large groups of applicants, had given the University the most able student body in (its) history. To accommodate the increased enrollment, Fitzgerald initiated a fundraising campaign to raise the funds necessary to construct several new campus buildings. Out of this campaign came Clapp Hall, Scaife Hall, and Parran Hall. With the addition of these new scientific facilities came exciting developments in research. Foremost among these was the development of the Salk vaccine. Salk and his team of researchers worked round the clock at Pitt's School of Medicine in an attempt to find a cure for the crippling disease. The cure was announced in April 1955 in Ann Arbor, Michigan. After nearly a decade of painstaking research, in February 1957, thirty inoculation teams began operating in the Commons Room of the Cathedral of Learning, giving free injections to students, faculty members, staff personnel, and their families. Fitzgerald's tenure marked an era of unprecedented growth for the University of Pittsburgh. His unexpected resignation in 1955 left many questions concerning the future. In July 1955 Edward Harold Litchfield was elected as the University’s twelfth chancellor. Litchfield!s first address was a full-scale formal presentation on December 13 to the trustees assembled in the chancellor's office in the Cathedral of Learning. In a step-by-step progression and with the aid of charts thrown on a screen, the chancellor outlined the factors involved in the announced intention of the board to make the University a top-ranking institution. At first, there was some dissension concerning Litchfield’s plans to bring quick glory to the University. However, as Litchfield's programs began to move forward, faculty resentment was bottled up, or left the campus, or changed to applause. Robinson Miller Upton, president of Beloit College, was exaggerating only a little when he said, The other universities throughout the nation consider the rebirth of the University of Pittsburgh as one of the phenomena of our age.” By the beginning of Edward Litchfield’s fourth year, July 1, 1959, the University had made substantial progress in pursuit of its goal: to attain a level of distinction in its faculty, its student body, and its programs that would ultimately provide the region it served with a quality of higher education equal to the best in the nation. 18 Bicentennial