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When Elder George Bowman, an itinerant Methodist preacher, decided
to build a college in Mount Vernon, he made sure that the study
of the Greek and Latin classics should be at the heart of the curriculum.
And although Classics has undergone some ups and downs since the
founding of the Iowa Conference Seminary in 1853 (renamed Cornell
College in 1857), it has been a part of the curriculum since the
beginning. By tracing the history of Classics at Cornell College,
it is possible to understand the changes that the discipline of
Classics has undergone throughout the past 150 years.
The Nineteenth Century
From the beginning, Cornell--like so many other colleges at the
time--featured a strong classical component. The four year program
as defined in the 1856 catalogue, for example, included eight courses
in Latin, six courses in Greek, seven each in mathematics and science,
and eight in courses that would now be classified as philosophy
or religion. In addition, there was one course each in rhetoric
and logic, political economy, and "universal" history.
In these first years, the Greek texts most frequently read were
Xenophon's Anabasis and Memorabilia, Greek New Testament,
Herodotus' History of the Persian Wars, Homer's Iliad
or Odyssey, and Demosthenes On the Crown. Typical
Latin texts included Vergil's Aeneid, Tacitus' Agricola
and Germania, Cicero's On Old Age and On Friendship,
Horace's Satires and Epistles, and Livy's History
of Rome.
In order to be admitted to Cornell, students were expected to have
considerable knowledge of Latin and Greek. The 1875 catalogue, for
example, required Greek and Latin prose composition, two books of
Xenophon's Anabasis (in Greek), and in Latin four books of
Caesar's Commentaries (on the Gallic Wars) and six orations
of Cicero. It was not until 1916 that knowledge of Greek and Latin
was waived for admission to the Bachelor of Arts degree.
Why Classics were considered central to the curriculum in the nineteenth
century can be seen most clearly in the Cornell College motto: Deus
et Humanitas (God and Humanity). The first part of the motto,
Deus, makes sense, given that Bowman was a Methodist evangelical
preacher and that nearly two-thirds of Iowans claimed no church
affiliation in the 1860 census! Harper's Latin Dictionary
defines the second part of the motto, humanitas, as "liberal
education, humane and gentle conduct toward others, philanthropy,
kindness, politeness, and elegance of manner and language."
In other words, a liberal education rooted in the Classics, Bowman
hoped, would provide a means to the first goal and would create
a strong civilizing effect on the Iowa frontier.
Notable Faculty
The liberal education that Cornell strove to provide can be seen
in the careers of some of her earliest faculty. David Wheeler,
the college's first professor of ancient languages (1853-54, 1857-61),
later served as U.S. Consul in Genoa and correspondent for the New
York Tribune, professor of English at Northwestern University,
Editor of The Methodist, and President of Allegheny College
in Pennsylvania. William Harmon Norton, hired in 1874 as
instructor of Latin and Greek, was not only Professor of Greek (1881-90),
but also Professor of Geology from 1881-1924, fellow of the Geological
Society of America, President of the Iowa Academy of Science, author
of the widely used textbook Elements of Geology, prominent
researcher on ground-water and water resources, and trustee of Cornell
College.
Literary Societies
The importance of Classics was not confined to the classroom. Literary
Societies--many given Greek and Roman names, such as the Philomathean,
Amphictyon, and Aesthesian--were also active in the first 75 years
of the college and kept abreast of recent developments. They sponsored
lectures on Schliemann's excavations of ancient Troy, staged scenes
from Greek tragedies, such as Sophocles' Antigone and Electra,
argued the merits of "The Habitual Study of the Classics,"
and published "A Plea for Oratory."
Curricular Innovations
Yet change, ever gradual, was on the way. Already in the 1885 the
faculty recognized the need for lectures on Greek and Roman culture
in conjunction with reading Greek and Latin authors. For example,
lectures on the Athenian constitution accompanied study of Lysias'
Orations, lectures on Greek Philosophy accompanied Plato's
Apology and Crito, and lectures on Greek mythology
accompanied readings from Homer's Iliad. In addition, later
in the 19th century, tragedy was introduced to the curriculum, especially
Aeschylus' Prometheus and Sophocles' Oedipus the King.
At the same time, the study of Latin was transformed by Prof. Hugh
Boyd, who espoused the still relatively new "Roman [classical]
pronunciation." Some idea of the way a typical class period
might have looked like during this era can be gleaned from the 1894
catalogue, which emphasized not only translation, memorization,
and recomposition of passages into Latin, but also "the reading
and re-reading [aloud] of the Latin text, carrying the thought through
the medium of the Latin expression, reproducing the energy of the
original writer or speaker, and conveying the sense purely through
the voice of the reader and the ear of the listener," "the
paraphrasing in Latin of the Latin text," and "an oral
inquisition into the meaning and forms of the text, through Latin
questions extemporized by the teacher and answered extempore by
the learner."
The Twentieth Century
While the nineteenth century emphasized breadth of knowledge (it
was not uncommon for a single professor to teach several subjects
at Cornell), the twentieth century brought with it a rise of professionalism
within academia organized along disciplinary lines. As a response
to this new notion of higher education, the college in 1916 introduced
majors and minors, no longer requiring the relatively rigid course
of study that characterized the nineteenth century. Modern languages--French,
German, and Spanish--now competed with Greek and Latin to fulfill
the foreign language requirement. In addition, distribution requirements
in humanities, fine arts, social sciences, and sciences were introduced.
As a result, students had a wider range of electives to choose from
and could graduate with a bachelor of arts without taking any Latin
or Greek courses.
Yet classics continued to attract students. Although Greek and
Latin ceased to be separate departments in 1932, until around 1950
the new department of Classical Languages and Literature offered
a curriculum that looks remarkably familiar. The two-year foreign
language requirement in Latin featured one year of elementary Latin,
followed by Cicero and Vergil in the second year, with advanced
courses in Roman comedy, prose composition, Pliny, Horace, Tacitus,
and Juvenal. In Greek, the first year of elementary Greek was traditionally
followed by Xenophon's Anabasis, Plato's Apology,
and Lysias' Orations or the Greek New Testament. In addition,
over the years a variety of culture courses in English translation
were offered, not as lectures to augment a reading course in an
ancient author, but as courses to attract students who may not have
had any Latin or Greek.
Notable Faculty
While seven women had taught Latin or Greek since the opening of
the college in 1853 and many had completed the Classical Course,
it was only in the first half of the twentieth century that the
first woman--Evelyn Carrie Riley (1903-17)--was appointed
full professor in Latin. And while Charles T. Goodwin (1890-92)
was the first Classicist at Cornell to hold a Ph.D., it was not
until 1918 that it became the norm for professors to hold this degree.
An additional sign of the increasing professionalization of Classics
was that Mark Hutchinson (1926-50) organized several Classics
conferences at Cornell attended by 150-200 teachers and scholars.
He also specialized in assessment and authored the Hutchinson test
for Latin.
By the 1960s, Classics began to be seen as less relevant with the
onset of the Vietnam War, the civil rights movement, and the women's
movement. Yet interest revived in the 70s under the influence of
John Crossett, recipient of the APA's first award for Excellence
in Teaching. Unfortunately, the college's overall enrollment plummeted
and when Crossett died in 1981, the Greek major was dropped (the
Latin major was eliminated in 1977), and the college authorized
no full-time replacement until six years later in 1987. Fortunately,
Charles Milhauser, who by then served as full-time Registrar,
kept Classics alive by teaching Latin part-time during the interim.
The Present and Future of Classics at Cornell
Since 1987, the program has been revised to attract the widest
array of students. The new major in Classical Studies offers a balance
between language classes, literature in translation, and courses
in culture, art, and history. The program enrollments have increased
so that there is often a waiting list to take Latin, and Greek,
which is offered every third year, often enrolls 16-25 students.
Following the lead of Professor Hugh Boyd in the 19th century, oral
Latin (and Greek) is once again part of beginning language classes.
Intermediate Latin students regularly stage a bi-lingual, outdoor
production of Roman comedy. And students utilize on-line resources
such as Perseus (a digital
Greek and Latin library), visit virtual Rome at the VRoma
MOO, and use homegrown websites for learning beginning Greek
such as Ariadne:
Resources for Athenaze. Thus, the Classics--transformed to reach
a new generation of students--continue to fulfill Elder Bowman's
desire that they form an essential part of a liberal arts curriculum.
Readers are invited to share stories about their own Latin and
Greek teachers and their experiences learning Latin or Greek, whether
at Cornell or elsewhere. Please send comments to John Gruber-Miller,
jgruber-miller@cornellcollege.edu.
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Cornell College Sesquicentennial logo shows
Old
Sem and King Chapel
Cornell Motto, Deus et Humanitas, atop
Norton Geology Building
William Harmon Norton, shown here as a young
professor of Greek (1881-90), was also Professor of Geology (1881-1924)
Hugh Boyd, Professor of Latin (1871-1906)
promoted the use of spoken Latin in his classes
Evelyn Carrie Riley, first woman to be named
Professor of Latin (1902-17) at Cornell College
Mark Hutchinson (1926-50) was known as an
expert on assessment and developed the Hutchinson Latin tests
Elfrieda Frank (1953-56) was the first woman
Professor of Classics to have earned the Ph.D.
John Crossett (1970-81) received the APA's
first award for Excellence in Teaching
Charles Milhauser taught Latin and Greek full-time
1964-70 and part-time 1971-93, during which time he served as Registrar.
He has authored Cornell
College: 150 Years from A to Z
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