BIO: George W. ATHERTON, LL.D., Centre County, Pennsylvania

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Commemorative Biographical Record of Central Pennsylvania: Including the 
Counties of Centre, Clearfield, Jefferson and Clarion: Containing Biographical 
Sketches of Prominent and Representative Citizens, Etc. 
Chicago: J. H. Beers, 1898.
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COMMEMORATIVE BIOGRAPHICAL RECORD, pages 32-35

GEORGE W. ATHERTON, LL. D., President of the Pennsylvania State College, was 
born in Boxford, Essex Co., Mass., June 20, 1837. The Atherton family came to 
New England between 1620 and 1630. The name was one of the most honorable in the 
early history of Massachusetts, one of its members, Maj.-Gen. Humphrey Atherton, 
being to the Massachusetts Colony what Miles Standish was to the Plymouth 
Colony. This family was a branch of the old English stock whose seat is still at 
Leigh, near Manchester, England.
  At the age of twelve years, the subject of this sketch was left, by the loss 
of his father, to earn his own living, and to contribute in part to the support 
of a mother and two sisters. Circumstances thus early developed the indomitable 
will and tenacity of purpose which have been his leading characteristics in 
later life. By work in a cotton-mill, on a farm, and, later, by teaching,

COMMEMORATIVE BIOGRAPHICAL RECORD.	33

he made his way through Phillips Exeter Academy, and in the fall of 1860 entered 
the sophomore class of Yale College, from which he was graduated in 1863. 
Meantime the war of the Rebellion had temporarily diverted him from his single 
and absorbing purpose of obtaining a collegiate education. On the recommendation 
of President Woolsey and other friends, he was appointed to a first lieutenancy 
in the 10th Connecticut Volunteers, which formed a part of the Burnside 
expedition against North Carolina. He was constantly on duty in all the 
preliminary operations of the expedition, and was in command of his company 
through the battles of Roanoke Island and Newbern, his captain having been 
wounded at the very beginning of the former engagement. After the battle of 
Newbern, he was promoted to a captaincy, was engaged for some months in camp and 
outpost duty at Newbern, afterward took part in the movement under DuPont and 
Hunter from Hilton Head, South Carolina (to which his regiment had been 
transferred), against Charleston. The part assigned to the land forces in the 
movement was to take possession of Seabrook's Island, for the purpose of holding 
the mouth of the Edisto river as a rendezvous for the ironclads. The immediate 
landing was effected without resistance. The confidence of his superior officers 
was shown at this time by the fact that Capt. Atherton with his company was 
detached from the main body and ordered to make an independent reconnoissance up 
the western side of the Island, without guides, in a strange country known to be 
occupied by the enemy, with instructions to rejoin the main body at the upper 
end. This duty he performed in a way that secured the warm approval of his 
superior officers. The next four or five months were passed in camp and out-post 
duty in the constant presence of the enemy, but with no particular incident 
except occasional reconnoissance and skirmishes. He was repeatedly detailed as 
judge advocate of regimental and brigade courts-martial. Meanwhile Capt. 
Atherton had passed through one period of protracted, and nearly fatal, illness, 
and found his health in the summer of 1863 so much impaired that this 
consideration, coupled with the apparent prospect of a long period of useless 
inactivity, led him to offer his resignation. The step was taken with the 
greatest reluctance, and only after consultation with his colonel and chaplain 
and other trusted friends in the regiment, and notwithstanding the assured 
prospect of early promotion.
  After several months of recuperation, our subject was appointed to a 
professorship in the Albany Boys' Academy, one of the best fitting schools in 
the country, in which he had taught before entering college. During the 
succeeding years, while continuing his teaching, he completed the branches of 
study which he had omitted during his absence in the army. In June, 1864, he 
returned to New Haven, passed examination in those subjects, and, as a special 
recognition of his standing in college and the occasion of his absence, received 
his degree (B.A.) to date back with his own class of 1863. During the next three 
years he continued teaching in Albany, and then accepted a professorship in St. 
John's College, Annapolis, Md., where he also acted as principal nearly the 
entire year, in the absence of Dr. Henry Barnard. In the following year he left 
Annapolis, and became a member of the first Faculty of the Illinois State 
University, which was opened for students in 1868, with the Hon. John M. Gregory 
as regent. Here his work and relations were of the most congenial kind; but 
before the close of his first year of service he accepted a very flattering and 
urgently repeated offer of the newly-established chair of History, Political 
Economy and Constitutional Law in Rutgers College, New Brunswick, N. J. He 
occupied this chair nearly fourteen years. During these fourteen years he not 
only vigorously maintained the professional work of the class-room, but was 
active in all matters pertaining to the general work and interests of the 
institution, as well as in a great variety of other and more public duties, such 
as lectures, addresses, newspaper work, etc. In 1873, he was a member of the 
board of visitors to the United States Naval Academy. In 1875, he was appointed, 
by President Grant, a member of the Commission to investigate charges of 
mismanagement and fraud at the Red Cloud Indian Agency. The charges were, at the 
time, a matter of great public notoriety, but the work of investigation was so 
thoroughly done, and the report submitted to the President so conclusive, that 
the House of Representatives, which during the succeeding winter made a point of 
investigating every branch of the government service, made no attempt to 
traverse the conclusions of this Commission.
  In 1876, greatly against his wishes, but in obedience to what seemed a call of 
duty from many who were interested in promoting purer politics, he accepted the 
Republican nomination for Congress, in a district having a very large majority 
for the opposite party. His defeat followed as a matter of course, though he ran 
ahead of the Presidential ticket at almost every polling place, and his vigorous 
canvass of the district elicited the highest praise on account of his 
uncompromising advocacy of honest money as

34  COMMEMORATIVE BIOGRAPHICAL RECORD.

against the green-back folly then prevalent; of civil service reform as against 
the spoils system, and of the purity of the ballot as against corruption in the 
North, and fraud and violence in the South. In 1878, he was chairman of a 
Commission, composed of five citizens appointed by the Governor of New Jersey, 
to prepare and propose to the Legislature, a digest and revision of the State 
system of taxation. During this period, the nature of his professional studies, 
and his widening interest in public questions, led him to take up the study of 
law. He was admitted to the New Jersey Bar, and practiced for some time as 
consulting attorney, but without relinquishing his College professorship. All 
these varied activities he regarded as subsidiary to his principal work as a 
teacher and guide of young men. Himself an ardent believer in one school of 
political opinion, he scrupulously avoided everything like partisanship in the 
teachings of the lecture-room, endeavoring only to instil a high sense of the 
responsibilities and privileges of citizenship, and especially of the public 
duties of educated men; and there can be no doubt that it was his practical 
experience of affairs which gave that force and effectiveness to his influence 
in the classroom, of which his students speak with warmth and gratitude. The 
scientific department of Rutgers College had received from the Legislature of 
New Jersey the benefits of the United States Land Grant Act, of 1862, and his 
connection with the institution naturally led him to an examination of the 
provisions and the underlying principles of that legislation. He became 
thoroughly convinced that it was not only a measure of far-reaching wisdom as a 
provision for higher public education, but that it was peculiarly in keeping 
with the genius of our system of institutions.
  An unsuccessful effort made in Congress in the winter of 1872-73, by Senator 
Morrill, of Vermont, the author of the original measure, to increase the 
endowment of the colleges established under that Act, led Prof. Atherton to make 
a careful study of the results already accomplished by it. These results he 
presented in a paper read before the National Education Association at its 
meeting in Elmira, N. Y., in the summer of 1873. There had been no previous 
attempt to make so systematic an inquiry, and the array of facts showing what 
the colleges had already accomplished in the short time since their 
establishment was a surprise to friends and opponents alike. It was shown that 
the proceeds of the Land Grant had on the whole been wisely managed, and that 
the spirit of the Act of Congress had been promptly met by the action of States, 
counties, towns, and private individuals, from which sources nearly five 
millions of dollars had been already received in grants and gifts, for the 
purpose of supplementing the funds set apart by the United States. This address 
was the beginning of an active interest in the subject of government support for 
higher education which has given direction to all his subsequent work; and there 
has since been no Congressional legislation in the shaping and securing of which 
he has not taken an active and influential part. The well-known Act of 1887, 
providing for the establishment of Agricultural Experiment Stations in 
connection with the Land Grant Colleges in every State in the Union, and under 
which fifty principal and several subordinate stations are now in operation, is 
probably more largely indebted to him for its passage than to any other single 
individual outside of Congress. While he would be the last to detract from the 
credit due to the efforts of others, it is the simple truth to say that, in the 
midst of the numerous and wide-spread agencies which were set in operation in 
behalf of that important measure, his leadership was freely recognized by all 
who had part in securing it. The passage of this Act was followed by the 
organization of an Association, including in its membership all these Colleges 
and Experiment Stations, which at once took rank as one of the most influential 
bodies of educational and scientific workers in the United States. This 
Association, known as "The American Association of Agricultural Colleges and 
Experiment Stations," chose Dr. Atherton as its first president. In 1890, 
Congress passed a third Act intended to strengthen the educational work of the 
Land Grant Colleges, in distinction from the work of experiment and research 
which has been especially provided for by the Act of 1887. In promoting the 
passage of this measure, also, Dr. Atherton rendered important service.
Meantime, in the summer of 1882, he received and finally accepted a call to the 
Presidency of the Pennsylvania State College, one of the Land Grant 
Institutions. After having received the income of the Land Grant Act for fifteen 
years, the institution had less than one hundred students, a meagre equipment, 
with a public sentiment either hostile or indifferent, and this, notwithstanding 
the fact that its Faculty and Board of Trustees had never been without strong 
and able men. The task of building it up and making it worthy of so rich and 
powerful a Commonwealth as Pennsylvania seemed almost a hopeless one, but to 
this task Dr. Atherton devoted himself with a courage and enthusiasm

COMMEMORATIVE BIOGRAPHICAL RECORD.  35

which astonished even his friends, and the spirit of which was in itself an 
inspiration to others. At the end of ten years the results have been greater 
than the most sanguine friends of the College had dared to anticipate. A total 
change in public sentiment has shown itself in a steady increase in the number 
of students, and the appropriation of nearly four hundred thousand dollars by 
the Legislature has given the College a substantial equipment of the buildings 
and apparatus required for its work. The foundations of future growth have been 
laid on so broad and comprehensive lines that it is rapidly taking a place among 
the leading technical institutions of the country. In 1883, the degree of LL. D. 
was conferred upon him by Franklin and Marshall College. In 1887, he was 
appointed, by the Governor of Pennsylvania, chairman of a Commission created by 
authority of the Legislature of the State to make inquiry and report upon the 
practicability of introducing manual training into the public-school system. The 
report of this commission has been widely recognized in this country and in 
Europe as the most complete single presentation of the subject published up to 
that date. At sixty years of age, after a life filled to an unusual degree with 
exacting labors, it may still be said of the subject of this sketch, as Cecil 
said of Sir Walter Raleigh, "he can toil terribly," and, like Raleigh, he 
possesses the extraordinary mental grasp and breadth of intellectual interests 
and sympathies which render him an equally congenial companion to men of letters 
and men of affairs.