Robert Maynard Hutchins Papers

Robert Maynard Hutchins (1899-1977) was born in Brooklyn in New York City on January 17, 1899. Hutchins’s father, William James Hutchins, was a Presbyterian minister who raised his family according to strict household rules. Hutchins later claimed that the ascetic lifestyle maintained by his family instilled in him a profound work ethic.

When Hutchins was eight years old, his father accepted the post of professor of theology at Oberlin College, and Hutchins subsequently attended Oberlin Academy and Oberlin College (1915-1917). He left Oberlin College after his sophomore year and, seeking a compromise between his pacifistic beliefs and a desire to serve his country during World War I, enlisted in the United States Army Ambulance Service (USAAS). From 1917 to 1919 he served in Section 587, a section comprised entirely of Oberlin residents, of the USAAS, during which time he was stationed in Allentown, Pennsylvania and later in northern Italy.

After the war, Hutchins returned to the United States and entered Yale University as a junior. Upon graduating in 1921, he taught college preparation at Lake Placid School. In his second year of teaching, he was offered a secretarial position at Yale, which he eagerly accepted. He soon entered Yale Law School and graduated in 1925. From that point, his rise was meteoric. He was immediately offered an instructor’s position for one course, and his efforts were rewarded with the responsibility of teaching an additional course. In 1927, just two years after graduating from law school, Hutchins was named acting dean of the Yale Law School.

Hutchins stayed on as dean of Yale Law School until 1929, when he became president of the University of Chicago. He enacted widespread reforms at the university, believing that higher education was intended to be broad so as to train the intellect and that specialization had no place in universities. In 1951, Hutchins left the University of Chicago, but remained active in education, founding the Center for the Study of Democratic Institutions in 1959 and serving as chairman for the board of editors of the Encyclopædia Britannica until 1974.

Hutchins married Maude Phelps McVeigh in 1921, and the couple had three daughters: Mary, Joanna, and Clarissa. Hutchins remarried in 1949 to Vesta Sutton Orlick. He died on May 14, 1977 at the age of 78.

Sources Consulted

Editors of the Encyclopædia Britannica.“Robert Maynard Hutchins: American Educator,”Encyclopædia Britannica. Accessed June 5, 2018.

“Robert M. Hutchins, Long a Leader in Educational Change, Dies at 78,” The New York Times, May 15, 1977. Accessed June 5, 2018.

Note written by Rebecca Sparagowski