During the first forty years it appears that the Faculty itself took the initiative in choosing teachers to fill vacancies in their number, formal election resting then, as now, with the Board of Trustees. From 1870 on the responsibility for selecting teachers has rested more and more on the President of the institution, but be has been largely guided, particularly in [Page 196] filling the more important positions, by the advice of the senior professors.
The Hanover Faculty has never been distinguished for remarkable scholarship, yet at all times it might be properly described as scholarly. In the earlier the teachers, like the Professors in most American institutions of those days, were well trained in the classics, and in what was then called "classical learning". Many of them had some advanced instruction in eastern colleges and universities. Since the "seventies" Hanover professors have kept pace with the growth of modern scholarship and bring to the classroom the fruit of graduate study in the leading universities. The present teaching staff has graduate training in Harvard, Columbia, Michigan, Chicago, Wisconsin, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, New York, Princeton, Berlin, Paris and Madrid. In the selection of instructors scholarship has received primary consideration, after full assurance as to the candidate's personal character. It has been the policy of the College from the beginning to fill the chairs with teachers whose personal lives exerted a wholesome influence upon the students - to regard what the man is as of more significance than what he knows. It has also been the policy to choose men possessing facility in imparting instruction and power to inspire young men and women with zeal for learning and usefulness. Scholarship, character, teaching skill and inspirational power. Hanover professors have possessed adequate scholarship for the courses they, have undertaken, unusually high moral character, a reasonable degree of skill in the technique of teaching many of them superior teachers, and many of them having rare power to inspire growth for truth and righteousness. All of them were too heavily loaded with classroom and administrative responsibilities to undertake research and [Page 197] other lines of productive scholarship. A modest shelf will hold the books they have written, but the books which they have inspired their students to write fill a respectable alcove in the library.
The older faculty without doubt had t shade more than their successors in office, which is true of all colleges. With the passing of the older type of oratory of a somewhat fervid rhetoric, the silk hat and the long coat, along with the saddle-horse and the family carriage, there has passed also a certain dramatic quality in manners and conduct. Rapid transit, the increased amount and frequency of mail delivery, the desk telephone, and the immeasurably increased volume of activity leave developed a frankness, a directness, and a democracy of relationships, which result in a new type of college professor. The modern college teacher reads much and widely, fraternizes with all classes of people, belongs to lodges and luncheon clubs, is a leader in sports, and "drives a wicked car." His income from transactions in commercial paper may far exceed his salary. He is short on the classics, but informed in music, art and mechanics. He may need a lexicon to translate his diploma, but be expert in raising light bulbs, building radio sets, or restoring old furniture. We can not agree that his culture is less trivial his seniors'; rather it is different, as all the world is different. We can claim that the modern professor represents his times at their best.
While Hanover College has not at any time in her history been legally subject to ecclesiastical control, except for a short period as described in a former chapter, the institution has at all times been consciously and consistently an instrument of the Presbyterian Church. All of the presidents and the great majority of the professors have been members of this denomination, although nothing in the charter [Page 198] or by-laws makes this obligatory. Many have been members of other churches. The only regulation touching this matter is a provision in a contract between the Trustees of the Collecre and the Board of Christian Education of the Presbyterian Church, U. S. A., which requires on the part of the College that no one shall be employed in any capacity by the institution who is not of positive Christian character and of evangelical faith. One-fourth of all the professors and all of the presidents have been ministers. The majority of other Faculty men have been deacons, elders, and other church officers. All have been members in good standing of evangelical churches.
The average tenure of professors and instructors, including those in present service, has been seven years.
Seventeen have served ten years or more.
Seventeen from five to ten years.
Ten have served four years.
Eight, three years.
Thirteen, including two 1925 appointees, two years; sixteen, including six 1926 appointees, one year.
Those who have served ten years or more constitute a Roll of Honor:
Joshua B. Garrett, 50 years. Retired on accountof age.
Andrew Harvey Young, 47 years. Died in office.
Glenn Culbertson, 34 years. Remains in service.
S. Harrison Thompson, 33 years. Retired on account of health.
John Finley Crowe, 32 years. Retired on account of health.
H. H. Young, 19 years. Retired on account of health.
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Peter H. K. McComb, 18 years. Retired on account of health.
Minard Sturgis, 16 years. Died in office.
Arthur H. Woodworth, 14 years. Remains in service.
Richard F. Souter, 13 years. Retired.
Leonard L. Huber, 12 years. Remains in service.
Edward J. Hamilton, 11 years. Retired to accept another position.
Walter C. Gold, 11 years. Remains in service.
Reuben S. Lawrence, 11 years. Died in office.
John F. Baird, 10 years. Retired to enter the ministry.
Lloyd L. Alexander, 10 years. Retired.
Frank 0. Ballard, 10 years. Remains in service.
At any period in the hundred years there has been a sufficient number of men of long tenure to hold the College true to its objectives, and to assure mature consideration of all measures proposed. But there has also been a sufficient number of men at every period, fresh from the universities and other fields of experience, to keep the Faculty alive to new procedures. In the present teaching corps six department heads have taught in Hanover a total of one hundred years, and six others a total of seventeen years. In a faculty conference the perspective is secured of members trained in twenty-five different colleges and universities.
The teaching load has varied from twenty exercises per week in 1832 to as high as thirty or thirty-five one year when three men gave all of the instruction in the four college and two preparatory classes. But for the greater part of the time the actual load has been from fifteen to seventeen exercises per week. The standard load at the present time is sixteen hours per week.
[Page 200] Hanover salaries have never encouraged extravagance. During the first decade they were from six to seven hundred dollars per year, for ten months' teaching. As a matter of fact the professors frequently received not more than half of their supposed salaries, or received credit for contribution of one or two hundred dollars toward the maintenance of the College. In 1845 a new professor was employed at $400 for the year. In 1855 the standard was set at $800, but for several years the men actually received about $300 only of the amount promised them, and Professor Garritt states that at no time between 1855 and 1872 did the professors receive their salaries in full and when due. In 1868 the schedule was raised to $1,000 per year, but this amount not fully and promptly paid. The year 1876 brought an increase to $1,200, but in 'seventy-nine the Board ordered a twenty-five per cent. horizontal reduction of all salaries. Early in President Fisher's administration a schedule ranging from $900 minimum to $1,200 maximum was established, and remained in effect until 1919 when the Board ordered a twenty-five per cent. increase of all salaries. The following year the maximum increased to $1,800, and again in 1924 to $2,000. Those professors who teach during the summer receive a pro rata share of the net income of the term, thus adding from $400 to $800 a year to their fixed income. Those who do extension work also add some years as much as $600 from that source. The incomes from teaching of the present Faculty range from $1,600 to $3,200 per year.
In Hanover much administrative detail which in institutions is performed by deans, secretaries and bureaus is added to the load of the older and stronger professors. Matriculation. personnel service, registration, discipline, management of extra cur- [Page 201] ricular activities, and similar functions were added to schedules already over full. This condition makes for faculty solidarity and for a valuable contact between the teacher and the administrative problems, but the tax upon time and nervous energy is frequently excessive.
The "small college" is a splendid training school for the development of college professors. The close contacts with other men, and with all varieties of educational and administrative questions, affords a young teacher an invaluable experience. To a rather embarrassing degree Hanover has been a training school for other faculties. Of the sixty-nine professors whose connection with the Faculty has ceased, nine died either in active service or in the emeritus relation; some twenty withdrew from the teaching profession to engage in other professional pursuits; but approximately half of the whole number were called to other institutions at higher salaries. Many others rejected attractive proposals in response to the missionary urge. Six members of the present Faculty have declined invitations to transfer to other institutions at large increases in salary because of their devotion to Hanover.
A significant factor in Hanover College is the intimate personal contact of teacher and student, on the campus as well as in the classroom and laboratory, in play as in work. This relation has always been present, but the evidence indicates that in the earlier years there was a certain austerity on the part of the instructors, and "respectful attention" on the part of the students, which gave way year by year to a natural, friendly, helpful comradeship. Some years ago a New York newspaper woman spent two weeks on the campus, seeking to coin a phrase which would fitly express the spirit of Hanover. The slogan she produced is [Page 202] "Friendliness, Naturalness, Service." Those who know the College best accept these words as a faithful portrayal of the personal relations which prevail within the Faculty, the student body, and between students and professors.
Another large factor in bringing about this happy comradeship is the cordial attitude of the Faculty families toward the students. Professors' wives serve as sponsors for sororities, chaperon social functions, assist in the student fetes and entertainments, open their homes for group gatherings, and are ready to mother the boy or girl away from home, or in need of what only a tactful woman can give. Any picture of Hanover College would do an inexcusable injustice, which did not give due credit to the noble, intelligent, loving women of these Faculty families, who for a hundred years have made Hanover a home to the thousands of students who have come this way. In this generous service they were assisted by their own sons and daughters whose more intimate acquaintance greatly strengthened the bonds of sympathy and friendship between the College homes and the student body. This intimacy is beautiful and wholesome. It is Hanover. Possibly nowhere else have family china and silver been loaned for more student functions. Possibly nowhere else of equal numbers have "College widows" broken in more freshmen.
The activities of the members of the Faculty have by no means been confined to the campus. They have been conspicuous in the work of the local churches, of Presbytery and Synod. They have accepted their share of responsibility in town, county and state civic affairs. They are found active participants in all religious, industrial, educational and social gatherings seeking the betterment of conditions in this part of the state. A number of them have been trusted [Page 203] leaders in educational and church reorganization, in legislation, and scientific enterprise. Their contributions as citizens have been by no means small.
The names, degrees, offices and tenure of the members of the Faculty from 1827 to 1927 are appended as a matter of record.