The Question of Rank Among the Faculty of 1934

    There was an underlying position of rank among the faculty of 1934. Both the new and old professors knew where each other stood, however, it was not spoken about at the time. Only later do we see comments from retired faculty members about the ranking system among each other.
    One place to look for rank is among the salaries of the professors. Salaries were set up on a monthly basis for either ten, eleven or twelve months of the year. It was not uncommon for certain professors to get paid differently depending on the month. The account book of salaries paid to the faculty during the 1933-1934 school year was set up from the highest ranking member of the faculty to the lowest. Salaries ranged from roughly four thousand dollars to one thousand dollars a year.¹ Whether salary was based on when the professor joined the faculty is an interesting point because it does not hold true for a majority of the professors. If we look at how qualified a professor was based on their education for their salary we see a somewhat stronger case to argue. One would think that if a professor obtained their Ph. D., they would be paid accordingly. However, there are at least two cases where this is not true. Even if one looks at a faculty member's salary in conjunction with their given title, such as Instructor, Assistant Professor, Associate Professor or Professor, there should be a correlation between the two. This is mostly true for the majority of the faculty, however, there are a few cases where this does not apply as well. The best explanation for the faculty's given salary is a combination of all the factors stated above: education, when they arrived at Dickinson College and their given title. There is no apparent set salary for those who have the title of Professor, Associate Professor and the like. This leads many to believe that salary was decided upon by the administration and many factors were taken into account such as rank and education.
    Another interesting aspect is were women stood on the faculty. In 1934 there were only five women on the faculty. Two of the five were librarians, May Morris and Isabella Thoburn McMaster. Two were Associate Professors of their related field Mary Buckley Taintor and Josephine Brunyate Meredith. Meredith also held the position of Dean of Women. Esther Winifred Chapman, Instructor of Physical Education for Women, was the fifth woman on the faculty. Dean Meredith became the first women to be granted full Professorship at the college in 1943.²  Taintor became the third women to achieve Professorship in 1951.³
    Besides rank concerning salary, there were also the viewpoints or standards that the older faculty members held and the new members were expected to gain over time. Ralph Schecter, who joined the faculty in 1922 as an Instructor in English and the Director of the College Band and Orchestra, commented on this in a letter to Charles Coleman Sellers: "In 1922 I was one of the three young men [along with Lewis Guy Rohrbaugh and John C. M.Grimm]added to a faculty of much older men, most of whom had been here [Dickinson College] a long time. I soon discovered that the members of this older faculty talked chiefly about their poorer students among themselves-a sort of licking of each others wounds."⁴  He goes on to mention that by 1930 the educational philosophy among this older faculty was that "a large number of student failures in academic classes indicated a high standard of teaching-a philosophy that is of course preposterous."⁵
    The changing of the presidency clearly showed the different viewpoints of the faculty based upon on when they joined. The faculty was very much affected by the changing presidents at this time. Most of the older faculty were used to James Henry Morgan and his policies and ideologies. However, when Karl Tinsley Waugh took over in 1932, many of the older faculty members could not handle his progressive reforms. Horace Elton Rogers, an Associate Professor of Chemistry at the time, later wrote in his paper, "Fifty Years and More as a Student and Professor at Dickinson College," that many of Waugh's reforms did not meet Morgan's approval.⁶  Morgan would frequently visit Waugh which made it hard for Waugh to succeed. Rogers was one of the younger faculty members since having been appointed to the faculty in 1925. He and other younger faculty members actually wanted Waugh's progressive reforms. Rogers mentions again in his paper that "some of us on the faculty felt that Dr.Waugh's progressive administration ended all too soon. Several of the reforms Dr. Waugh had have subsequently been put into practice."⁷Read more about the changing presidency and its effects
    Rank among the professors was certainly felt among themselves and the college community. The faculty of 1934 only had a few of the "much older men" from the turn of the century. By this time most of the faculty came during the twenties and brought a fresh view to campus policies.

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Class of 1934     Chronicles Dickinson College

Dickinson 1934 is a project of Prof. Osborne's History 204 Class, Fall Semester 2000.