Word: eliot
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Dates: during 1950-1959
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President Lowell, though, was not only the symbol of tremendous progress in the University; he was a personality. Occasionally irritable, often opinionated, he was, according to Samuel Eliot Morison, Jonathan Trumbull Professor of History, Emeritus, "a man who conversed rapidly and listened little." He pushed incessantly for what he wanted for the University and, as a result, generally...
...While Eliot, in his 40 years as president, had been primarily interested in unified administration for the whole University, Lowell was concerned with academic reform within the College. The College should be the foundation on which the rest of the University is built, he declared. If the College is "not to be absorbed by the secondary school on the one side and the professional school on the other, we must construct a new solidarity to replace that which is gone...
Even before his election as president, Lowell, professor of Government, took no pains to hide his opinion that the undergraduate part of the University badly needed reorganizing. On numerous occasions he had uncompromisingly opposed Eliot's approval of both the free election system and the three year degree, so that by the time of Eliot's resignation, Lowell had made it entirely clear that he disapproved of the College's present condition...
...knew he wouldn't be Eliot's choice for a successor, but then he knew as well that Eliot wasn't doing the choosing. In fact, the chairman of the selection committee asked to consider 24 possible names later reported, "It took about one look at the list to make it clear that the only real candidate was A. Lawrence Lowell." A scant two weeks later, Lowell's election had been confirmed by both the Corporation and the Overseers...
...Administration had expected, Lowell lost no time in making his policy known. While President Eliot had pleaded in his final report for a sweeping adoption of the three year degree "to save the College," Lowell, in his inaugural address on Oct. 6, 1909, declared, "The most vital measure for saving the College is not to shorten its duration, but to ensure that it shall be worth saving." And from then on, the three year degree was doomed...