Worcester Polytechnic Institute - Peddler Yearbook (Worcester, MA)

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would fain administer the swift kick to every other form of athletics sup¬ ported at the Institute. But friend and foe alike agree on his ability as a lecturer; he is always deeply interested in his subject, and has that remark¬ able faculty of presenting dry material in a most interesting way. We have listened with the keenest enjoyment to his savage arraignment of unfortu¬ nate Sir William; to his indulgent ridicule of Priestley, the accident; and to his deploring of the frailties of the flesh, with Peruna, Lydia Pinkham, and the electric belt for texts. And even in that damnable organic, he kept us awake all the time, and interested most of the time, which is some stunt, when you think it over. Zelotes W. Coombs, A.M., Professor of English , French , and German The first real prof that the Freshmen meet is “ Z. W.” In English lecture they are charmed by the easy flow of his words as he combines the multitudinous errors, culled from the weekly crop of themes, into sentences. The ease with which he puts together, off-hand, the incidents of the “ Walk to Wachusett ” has caused more than one of the uninitiated to exclaim, “ Say, he must be a pretty good writer.” Not until these Freshmen have met and bound securely the “ beetle-browed robber ” four or five times, does the idea occur to them that perhaps this is all worked out ahead of time and recited. With the calling of this bluff the clay feet of their idol begin to give way, until soon the only support to the once majestic figure is the deep interest taken in and help given to athletics on the Hill. Harold B. Smith, M.E., Professor of Electrical Engineering That Tech, and more especially the Electric Department, is what it is to-day, is due in large part to the unceasing and energetic work of “ H. B.” The value of the electric course is more than doubled by contact with this very successful man, whose knowledge and experience seem to know no bounds. The most heartily admired man on the Hill, he is still human, and alive and sympathetic to the frailties of the students under him. The pecu- 20

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say damning objurgation, but the expression is shy one word.) But these transient memories soon leave us, and we think of him in the times when he let poly sci slide for the moment and talked to us straight, as man to man. Our fool escapades didn’t look quite so brilliant when Jinny got through with them; when he stood us up in front of ourselves for inspec¬ tion at such times, there was nothing heroic in the spectacle. He called things by their names, yet with a tact that never left a bitter taste in our mouths. A gentleman of culture, he has shown us that time devoted to the strengthening and refining of character is time that counts. Those of us who have been fortunate enough to come into more intimate acquaintance with him, outside Room 19, will always remember his altogether delight¬ ful personality, and be proud to number him among our friends. We shall remember his loyalty to Tech; his sincere personal interest in every stu¬ dent and in every alumnus; the standard of usefulness and quality to which he has brought the Journal; but—we will sum him up in language more appro¬ priate to him than anything else we could say —“ Here is a man! ” W. L. Jennings, Ph.D., Professor of Organic Chemistry Dr. Walter L. Jennings is a much-benicknamed man; in fact, each succeeding division of chemists has nicknamed him afresh, and the process will probably go on ad libitum, ad infinitum. Nineteen Hundred and Ten, for example, designated him as “ Stone-Hatchet; ” 1912 favors him with a fair translation of the same general idea, in the more or less compli¬ mentary “ Beilstein,” shortened, of late, to “ Beily; ” but to us he is “ Old Sleuth.” By the time a man is a Senior, he can tell by the sound of Old Sleuth’s footsteps what the weather is going to be—inside: a fairly leisurely tramp means fair and cool, but at the sound of a slight acceleration, the wise chemist winks the other eye at the next man and hides in the chimney of his Bunsen burner. He is capable of being one of the most agreeable per¬ sons you ever met, and, be it said to his credit, he generally is; but it is a fact that he is equally gifted in the opposite direction. When the mood is on him, his insistence on utterly inconsequent details, and his sudden impulses, which he discards and takes up again in bewildering alternation, are the most aggravating things that any chemist has to face, and we are all thankful when the more peaceful, or maybe more indolent, mood comes back again. In spite of his discriminating taste in malt products, his wild ideas on spirits compiled from grain alcohol and caramel have antagonized every connoisseur that ever listened to him. He is an expert in tennis, but 19

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liarity which most impresses those in touch with him is the trick of express¬ ing practically all of his thoughts by means of curves. He seems to think, and he certainly talks, in curves. Those of the underclassmen who are to graduate in the next two years will lose much by his absence, and we can only express the hope that the time spent away from the cares of the school will be of enough benefit to him to offset the great loss to the school. Arthur Willard French, C.E., Professor of Civil Engineering Graduate of Thayer School, Dartmouth, ’92 Member American Society of Civil Engineers Member Society for the Promotion of Engineering Education “ Prof ” didn’t ever write any “ Why I Am and Why I Came to the ’Stute,” so we’re decidedly shy on facts as to his previous career. As a boy, back on the farm, we are led to believe he was a holy terror. He early invented a slide-rule by means of which he could determine the most eco¬ nomical way to hoe ’taters. At one time in his career he aspired to be a pirate, but he soon found out that the pirate business was overrun, so he took a chance on engineering as the next best bet. He has the distinction of having slid through Dartmouth with less plugging and a more varied collection of cribs than any man before or since. In his early days he was of very rotund proportions, but upon graduation from college, he took Jinny Haynes as a model and a bottle of Anti-fat as a means, and beat it for the tall timbers. When he at last emerged he wasn’t at first visible, unless he stood twice in the same spot, but the backwoods air of Hanover, where he was Associate Professor of Civil Engineering, did wonders for his emaciated frame, and at last he was able to cast a shadow if the sunlight was bright enough. His love for civilization at last compelled him to locate down here in God’s(?) country, at Tech. He and Jinny manage to amuse themselves most of the time by trying to see which can look the most like the other. We rather think that “ Prof ” is slipping it over on Jinny, at that. Besides the societies mentioned above, “ Prof ” is a charter member of the Ananias Club. It has been very carefully doped out that he held 4937 jobs between graduation and teaching. He has a job to fit every 21