George Abraham Harter (1853 - 1943)

Born 7 Nov 1853 in Leitersburg, Washington Co., MD

Ancestors

Died 22 Jul 1943 at age 89 in Newark, DE

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Biography

George A. Harter, M.A., Ph.D., was born in Leitersburg District, November 7, 1853, the son of Peter K. and Mary (Poe) Harter. He was reared in his native District and attended the local schools, after which he was for a brief period a student at the National Normal University, Lebanon, Ohio. He was then engaged in teaching several years. In September, 1874, he entered St. John’s College, Annapolis, Md., from which he was graduated in 1878 with the degree of B.A. Immediately after graduation he was appointed tutor in mathematics and Latin at that institution and continued in this position until 1880, when he accepted the principalship of the Leitersburg Grammar School. He was elected principal of the Washington County High School in 1881; this position he resigned in 1885 to accept the professorship of mathematics and modern languages in Delaware College, Newark, Del. In 1888 he was made professor of mathematics and physics in that institution; in 1896 he was elected President of the College by the board of trustees and has since performed the duties of this responsible position with ability and success. He received the graduate degree of M.A. from his alma mater in 1880 and that of Ph.D. in 1892. In 1882 Professor Harter married Ellen S., daughter of Rev. James J. and Catharine B. (Simpson) Graff, of Annapolis, Md., and they are the parents of one child, Elinor. The Professor is a member of the Protestant Episcopal Church.^[1]

Forty-two years old when elected president in June 1896, Harter was a native of western Maryland who had taken all his degrees at St. John's College, Annapolis, including a Ph.D. that he received in 1892, after additional study and examination, seven years after he joined the Delaware College faculty. He was the first president of the college to have an earned doctorate, but all of the presidents since Harter have had this degree.

The Harter presidency was on the whole a quiet but happy time in the history of Delaware College. ...

... Harter had "always been admired and respected" by the students, and he soon won the confidence of the trustees, who elected him as the permanent president in June 1897. They had been particularly well pleased both "in form and substance" with the report Harter made in March, in which he called for close relations with the public schools and emphasis on the value of broad and liberal training, not just the vocational courses. He urged, as Raub had done, the admission of more high school graduates on certification, without examination, and in the college he proposed more attention to English composition. In the latter connection, he suggested changing the title of the professor of moral, mental and political science to professor of English language and literature and political science, because it did not look well to have English, "the most important study in the College course," not mentioned in the faculty list. Among changes that he announced were a new emphasis on the library and a revision of the curriculum, allowing some electives in the senior year. He also urged the establishment of a museum to illustrate natural history and material resources, possibly something like the "cabinet" of which the college had boasted in the 1850s, but this project remained unrealized.

.... Faculty supervision of athletics, which had begun with restrictions on scheduling, was gradually extended. ... With competitive athletics an accepted college function, there was no place on teams for anyone who was not a student in good standing. President Harter approved the new status of athletics, declaring that they were "in every way good for the development of the mind."

... One of the next two buildings to be erected on the Delaware College (as distinct from the Women's College) campus was named for Wolf; the other was named for Harter. They were the first two buildings named for any individuals and they owed these names to the influence of H. Rodney Sharp, who had not been a trustee when Harter felt so downcast, but was a loyal former student of both the men memorialized by these buildings.

... Through the years of the Harter presidency (1896-1914) the student enrollment doubled, growing by erratic steps from 77 in 1896-97 to a high of 184 in 1908-09. Thereafter the number of students declined a little because the college raised its entrance requirements, seeking to reach standards set by the Carnegie Foundation. Only eight undergraduates received degrees in 1897, at the Harter administration's first commencement (slightly fewer, however, than in preceding or succeeding years), whereas twenty-one baccalaureates were awarded in 1914--and a high of thirty-eight had been reached in 1911.

.... President Harter defended military training as "a valuable feature of college work" and a good influence on "the mental, moral and physical sides of student life" and averred that military drills helped produce "physical manhood...mental alertness, promptness in decision, respect for authority, intelligent patriotism, and moral restraint." At the same time he resisted War Department regulations asking for more hours a week than he thought reasonable.

... Two old relics of pre-land-grant-college times, the two literary societies, struggled for survival through the years of the Harter administration. Their Saturday morning meetings became unpopular once a majority of the students were commuters.

... As the old societies died, a new kind of society came to the campus, the Greek letter fraternity. ...

Answering an inquiry from another college, President Harter declared that fraternities "have been very useful to our boys and of great advantage to the college itself....By bringing our students in contact with the activities of other institutions [they] tend to quicken their grasp of the true objects of College life."

If Harter encouraged the growth of social fraternities, he seems directly responsible for bringing the first honorary fraternity to campus. Phi Kappa Phi was founded at the University of Maine in 1897 as an honor society especially suitable for land-grant colleges, since it admitted students from all curricula, including agriculture and engineering, whereas Phi Beta Kappa, the oldest honorary fraternity, required its new chapters to admit only students in the liberal arts. Chartered in 1904, the local chapter of Phi Kappa Phi, the fifth in the nation, held its first installation in 1905. ^[2]

User ID

User ID: 2D22D0D40A74D611831A14A4FAC0000067FD

Data Changed

Data Changed:

Date: 11 Aug 2012

Prior to import, this record was last changed 11 Aug 2012.

Note

Burial

Burial:

Place: The Head of Christiana Cem., Newark, DE

Occupation

Occupation: Professor of Math and Physics

Date: BET 1885 AND 1935

Place: University of Delaware

Note: So far as we know, George was the first of Jn. Georg Harter's descendants to have received the PhD degree.

Occupation: University President

Date: BET 1896 AND 1914

Place: University of Delaware

Note: From History of the University of Delaware:

Event

Event: Protestant Episcopal

Type: Church

Sources

• Source: S38 Abbreviation: A Harter Journal Title: Byron E. Harter, A Harter Journal: The Family of Jn. Geo. and Eva Harter (Self published, 1982) Subsequent Source Citation Format: Byron E. Harter, A Harter Journal: The Family of Jn. Geo. and Eva Harter BIBL Byron E. Harter. A Harter Journal: The Family of Jn. Geo. and Eva Harter. Self published, 1982. Page: page 326
• Source: S912 Abbreviation: A Harter Journal Title: Byron E. Harter, A Harter Journal: The Family of Jn. Geo. and Eva Harter (Self published, 1982) Subsequent Source Citation Format: Byron E. Harter, A Harter Journal: The Family of Jn. Geo. and Eva Harter BIBL Byron E. Harter. A Harter Journal: The Family of Jn. Geo. and Eva Harter. Self published, 1982. Page: page 326

1. ↑ History of Leitersburg District Washington County, MD By Herbert C. Bell 1898
2. ↑ History of the University of Delaware

Acknowledgments

Thank you to Robert Harter for creating WikiTree profile Harter-929 through the import of harter.ged on Nov 25, 2013. Click to the Changes page for the details of edits by Robert and others.