Tag Archives: Hamilton College

’32 football team first to be called Red Raiders (p. 311)

Posted on June 21, 2012 by | Comments Off on ’32 football team first to be called Red Raiders (p. 311)
1932 Football Team, Sports-12, p311

The coaches were: Richard C. Harlow (1922-26), George W. Hauser (1926-27), Earl C. Abell, ’16 (1928), and Andrew “Andy” Kerr (1929-46). All made genuine contributions but it was Andy and his teams who became legendary. His gridiron innovations, which he insisted be executed with mathematical precision, and the impact of his character on his players are a legacy of great value.

The outstanding 1932 team will always be remembered in Colgate annals as “unbeaten, untied, unscored on,-and uninvited” to play in the post-season Rose Bowl game. This team incidentally was the first to be called “Red Raiders.” Their new uniforms of maroon pants, white jerseys trimmed with maroon, and white helmets were responsible for the designation which all successive football teams have borne. The unbeaten 1925 team inaugurated a 23-year period in which Colgate either defeated or tied its arch-rival, Syracuse. Hamilton College reappeared on the schedule for the last time in 1926 and ’27. Four

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p. 164 – Recovery and expansion, 1850-1869

Posted on May 3, 2012 by | Comments Off on p. 164 – Recovery and expansion, 1850-1869

and to refrain from playing politics in the affairs of the literary societies. Unmoved, the faculty proceeded to inform the Dekes that they must either pledge in writing to disband or face expulsion. Fourteen complied in June and were thereupon ejected from the fraternity. The others eventually capitulated, but not before they had perfected a plan to outwit the faculty. The last one delayed signing until the day of his graduation in August, 1857. On the night before, he and the chief officer of the Hamilton College chapter had initiated eight members of the incoming freshman class, who, as students in the Grammar School, knew the struggle of the past year and were ready to carry it on.

To all appearances the anti-secret society rule had been enforced and only gradually did the truth come out. The new members, knowing the penalty if they were discovered, nonetheless exulted in preserving the organization. They usually assembled every two weeks if conditions favored, sometimes in a member’s room, but more frequently at the Eagle Hotel where a brother would take “lodging” for the evening. As partial satisfaction of the requirement that the fraternity be given up, they formally voted at the close of each meeting to disband and then reorganized when they next convened. They initiated some of the best students in the University and gave particular attention to literary programs of orations, essays and debates, then important features of fraternity life which the Greek letter groups had appropriated from the literary societies. In the need for maintaining secrecy they. once deposited their charter with the Hamilton College chapter and for six months stored their records in the bureau drawer of a local Deke sweetheart. Such precautions gradually became needless, and in 1868 a room in the business section of the village was rented for regular use. The prohibition against fraternities still stood but the faculty no longer attempted to enforce it.

The unity which the Dekes maintained in their struggle with the faculty also made itself felt in the two literary societies, the Adelphian and the Aeonian. During the early ’50’s, the rivalries of these enthusiastic and successful organizations was intense and their public meetings and the Junior Exhibitions-for which they elected third-year men in the College to be their representatives-attracted large and responsive audiences from Hill and village. In 1857 the Adelphians fell into a bitter dispute among themselves over an election in which the Dekes

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p. 62 – The expanded program, 1833-1846

Posted on May 1, 2012 by | Comments Off on p. 62 – The expanded program, 1833-1846

natural philosophy to ecclesiastical and civil history, intellectual and moral philosophy, or theology, as the needs of the curriculum dictated; he seemed to be at home with each. His tall commanding figure, kind, demonstrative nature, gracious manner, and ready anecdote or biting sarcasm attracted and held attention. A clear memory and natural eloquence made him an apt and forceful speaker, while his facile pen gave his ideas expression equally vigorous.

Students liked to have Eaton speak at their gatherings. One of his best addresses, The Duty and Rewards of Original Thinking, he gave at a literary, society meeting in 1841. In a practical and forthright approach to his subject he urged the members to throwaway intellectual crutches and think “independently of direct aid from other minds.” Anyone resigning his thinking to “authorities,” Eaton felt, dishonored God and his own lofty nature as a rational being. The student whose compositions were mere compilations from books and lectures was “nothing more than a cistern, if not a broken one; for the contents which he has gathered from outward sources can be exhausted and leave him empty and dry…” Original intellectual activity, he maintained, yielded rich rewards in personal respect and dignity and in power over other men. Even today most of the address would be stimulating advice for a college community.

Stephen W. Taylor, who had distinguished himself by bringing order out of chaos in the Preparatory Department after his appointment as principal in 1834, succeeded Eaton as Professor of Mathematics and Natural Philosophy four years later. A native of Massachusetts and valedictorian, of the Class of 1817 at Hamilton College, he came to the Institution after several years’ experience as head of the Lowville Academy, Lowville, New York. By nature and inclination a poet, he suppressed his aesthetic tendencies in the interest of mathematics and science, fields which he thoroughly mastered. A born teacher, he had a way of dealing with boys by which he enforced discipline and yet at the same time retained their affection. One alumnus recalled:

I used to regard him as the most perfect model for young men forming a character, and I still think no one can imitate his regularity, promptness and rigid division & improvement of time without being a hundredfold better prepared for the stern duties of life….*

When he resigned in 1845 despite the unanimous wish of the Trustees,

*Ira, J. Stoddard, Nowgong, Assam, to Eastern Association, Aug. 11, 1851.

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p. 60 – The expanded program, 1833-1846

Posted on May 1, 2012 by | Comments Off on p. 60 – The expanded program, 1833-1846

made him famous as a teacher. Conservative and independent in his views, once he had formulated them, he was not a man to be “persuaded otherwise,” nor did he hesitate to express his opinions, let the chips fall where they would. These, characteristics made him a formidable adversary whenever he chose to do battle. Since his position was considered second to that of Dr. Kendrick, he had hardly taken up his duties when he began to act as Chairman of the Faculty in the absence of the former.

As early as 1830, in response to student demands for instruction in science, the Executive Committee,”having long had an eye upon a brother of much promise,” selected Joel Smith Bacon as Professor of Mathematics and Natural Philosophy. He had graduated from Hamilton College in 1826 and was then studying at Newton. It was not until 1833, however, after completing a brief period as president of Georgetown College in Kentucky, that he accepted the offer. A year later, in accordance with a previous understanding with the Board, he exchanged his chair for that of Intellectual and Moral Philosophy. After a teaching career of only four years, he resigned in 1837 to go to Massachusetts for the settling of his father-in-law’s estate. From 1843 to 1854 he was president of Columbian College.

George Washington Eaton came to the faculty in the fall of 1833, probably through the influence of Bacon who wanted to be relieved of his work in mathematics and natural philosophy in order to teach intellectual and moral philosophy. As professor of Greek and Latin, Eaton had been associated with him at Georgetown College. After Bacon resigned the presidency there, Eaton, despairing of the college’s future, was glad to leave. After his appointment seemed certain, he wrote Mrs. Eaton: “I think…that this of all the places in the world is the place for us. We Can both be happy and useful here…”Thirty-eight years of devoted service bore out his initial response to the life of the Institution and village.*

A native of Pennsylvania, Eaton had grown up in Ohio where he attended Kenyon College and Ohio University at Athens. After a year’s interruption during which he was a private tutor in Virginia and studied briefly at Princeton, he resumed his education at Union College to which President Eliphalet Nott’s fame attracted him. Graduat-

*George W. Eaton to Eliza B. Eaton, Lee, Mass., Nov. 15, 1833.

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p. 38 – Administration, setting and staff, 1820-1833

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teaching he occupied the pulpit in the village Baptist Church. Following his transfer from languages to theology in 1835, he went to Germany to study at Halle, Leipzig, and Berlin. Less than a year after his return in 1835 he resigned to join the Newton Faculty. Professors, students and townspeople greatly regretted his leaving. He subsequently became President of Newton, Horace Mann’s successor as Secretary of the Massachusetts Board of Education, President of Brown, and the first General Agent of the Peabody Fund.

Another young faculty member destined to make a prominent place for himself was Asahel C. Kendrick who succeeded Sears as Professor of Languages. The son of the Rev. Clark Kendrick of Vermont, he had come to Hamilton at the age of thirteen to live with his father’s cousin, Nathaniel, while he prepared for Hamilton College at the Academy. On his graduation from Hamilton in 1831, he became an instructor in the preparatory department of the Institution. After two decades of able teaching he was to continue his career at the University of Rochester.

For a few years in the 1820’s the Executive Committee hired upperclassmen and recent graduates as tutors to assist with the instruction of beginning students. Beriah N. Leach, Class of 1825, was employed while a senior with the understanding that he should have “sabbaths to himself, and … the privilege of attending the theological lectures….” When he left at the end of a year to take a pastorate, his classmate, Chancellor Hartshorn, succeeded him but after a two-year

As the Trustees reviewed the progress of the Institution to 1833, they took courage from the evidence they found that it “had been raised up by special providence of God, amidst the prayers and efforts of his people.” They could point to a widening patronage from churches and friends, an able and self-sacrificing faculty, an extensive campus and substantial buildings, and a growing student enrollment. The latter called for new facilities, and an expanded curriculum, which the Board was prepared to provide in the expectation that increased contributions to the treasury would cover the cost. Both the Trustees and Executive Committee could agree that the Institution had become “too important to the interests of Zion to be neglected and left to wither.”*

* Baptist Education Society, Annual Report, 1833, pp.3, 11.

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p. 37 – Administration, setting and staff, 1820-1833

Posted on May 1, 2012 by | Comments Off on p. 37 – Administration, setting and staff, 1820-1833

measured speech until his subject roused him to excitement. He had a cautious, involved style in writing which appears in his chief publications, the Annual Reports of the Education Society. He had slight regard for “elegant literature” which he probably regarded as frivolous. Religion was his chief interest and “his library was the common resort for the solution of doubtful theological questions. . . .”

Although Kendrick was fully occupied with his duties as professor and President and as Secretary of the Education Society, he found time to support some of the reforms of the day. He and Hascall were both members of the Madison County Colonization Society, Kendrick the first president. He also belonged to the county temperance society, was one of the Board of Curators of the New York Lyceum, and a  Trustee of Hamilton College. The University of Vermont granted him  an A.M. and Brown University both an A.M. and D.D.

Zenas Morse, A.B., Hamilton College, 1821, an instructor in the Hamilton Academy, assisted Hascall with Latin and Greek when the classes grew too large for him to handle alone in the fall of 1821. This arrangement lasted four years, after which Morse became principal of the Academy, a position he filled capably for many years.

Seth Spencer Whitman, Professor of Languages and Biblical Literature, 1828-1835, had been one of the most promising students of the Seminary. A member of the Class of 1823, he left before graduation at the suggestion of the Executive Committee to complete his studies at Hamilton College. The Committee even agreed to aid in defraying his expenses on condition that he refund them by his services as teacher in  the Seminary. After taking his degree at Hamilton he went to Newton Theological Seminary for three years. On his return, the Executive  Committee expressed their high regard for him by asking him to sit with them and by providing that Hascall should introduce him to the assembled students and that Kendrick should make the prayer after Whitman had delivered his inaugural address.

Whitman’s classmate at Newton, Barnas Sears, who came to the faculty in 1829 as Professor of Languages, was later to achieve a greater national reputation than any other member of the teaching staff in this period. Young, popular, and brilliant, he had a brief pastorate at Hartford, Connecticut, between his graduation from Brown and his professorship at the Institution. In addition to

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