History of the American School 1939-1980- Chapter V

Chapter V: The Chairmanship of Mabel Louise Lang, 1975-1980

Chapter V: The Chairmanship of Mabel Louise Lang, 1975-1980

When Mabel Louise Lang (Pl. 10, f) of Bryn Mawr College was elected Chairman of the Managing Committee on May 10, 1975, at the first meeting of the Committee held in Mayer House, Henry S. Robinson of Case Western Reserve University was elected Vice Chairman and William F. Wyatt, Jr. of Brown University, Secretary, all for five-year terms from July 1, 1975. William H. Willis of Duke University replaced Robinson as Vice Chairman for 1978–1980. They accepted a hard challenge with the financial situation critical as it was.

Greece

These officers of the Managing Committee, new as they were in their respective posts, were far from new or strange to the School, especially Mabel Lang who had been a Fellow at the School in 1947-48, had spent part of the summer in Athens for many recent years, and had served as Chairman of the Committee on Admissions; she was closely in touch with the personnel of the School and with conditions of living in Greece. For the two remaining years of McCredie’s directorship she and he worked closely, harmoniously and effectively to salvage all that was possible of the programs and activities of the School which had been revived after World War II and augmented in the intervening 30 years. There was little change in these programs for the regular first-year students (20 in 1975-76, the largest ever) from those of the earlier years except in personnel; the position of Professor of Archaeology was taken up in 1976 by Colin N. Edmonson replacing C. W. J. Eliot, and Francis R. Walton retired as Director of the Gennadius Library. The fall trips continued a policy recently initiated by McCredie of having numerous guest lecturers on sites of their specialties, notably Greek or foreign excavators. On his final trip to Acarnania and Epirus, added to the 1975-76 year in spring 1976, Professor Eliot included the Gulf of Arta, Parga and Corfu instead of Metsova and Meteora. The winter sessions included more and more volunteer lecturers in the museums, scholars offering guidance in their special fields, and the epigraphical discussion group reached out to include members of the British and French Schools and the staff of the Epigraphical Museum. Instruction in modern Greek was arranged at the School for those interested; this had been done occasionally in the past. In 1975-76 John L. Caskey as Visiting Professor worked with the students on Bronze Age problems, particularly Early Helladic, with much lively debate, and Harry Levy’s seminar in the second term on Plutarch, Lucian, Claudian: Their Attitudes toward Rome followed Helen North’s on Political and Individual Values in Archaic Greek Poetry in December. In 1976-77 this sharing of a Visiting Professorship was carried still further: there was no Visiting Professor for the entire year; both positions were divided between two scholars. The result was still greater variety added to the fare offered the students, but no one of the four professors could offer any extended direction and the experiment was not entirely successful. In the first semester Douglas Feaver gave Greek Music and a read-through of Euripides Ion, Peter von Blanckenhagen a discussion of the representational decoration of the Parthenon and views of classical art in the writings of Xenophon, Plato and some later authors; in the second term W. K. Pritchett gave Topography of Herodotean Battlefields and A. E. Raubitschek Athenian Historical Inscriptions. The many other “courses” offered in the previous few years by senior scholars registered at the School continued, varying each year. The Open Meeting of 1976 included John L. Caskey on the progress and results of the excavations on Keos along with McCredie’s summary of American Excavations in 1976, and in 1977 Colin Edmonson gave that review while McCredie discussed results of recent work on Samothrace. The President of the Republic of Greece and Mrs. Tsatsos continued to attend these meetings.

James McCredie’s loyal devotion to the purposes and programs of the School directed it to peaks of achievement and international respect, led by his own example. Miss Lang’s tribute read to the Managing Committee when he completed his Directorship should be recorded, at least in part: “devoted director, active excavator, polished and principled diplomat, genial host tireless teacher and proficient professor, master of budgets, understanding counsellor, efficient administrator, serious scholar, creative innovator, effective housekeeper” to which should be added his light but firm touch and saving sense of humor as part of his sense of proportion no matter how tough the going or how bleak the financial scene.

When Henry R. Immerwahr (Pl. 12, g) of the University of North Carolina succeeded McCredie in July 1977, he was newer to the problems, but as former Chairman of the Committee on Admissions he was familiar with the aims and desires, the training and the potential of the students, and he, like James McCredie and Mabel Lang, saw the regular students’ program as the core of the School.

In his first report Professor Immerwahr listed the responsibilities of the School, as he saw them, as four: (1) to teach both winter and summer students in “their first scholarly experience in Greece,” (2) “to further knowledge in our field by excavation and the study of original material,” (3) to assist advanced students in their research, (4) “to maintain a reputation in the United States, in Greece, and internationally.” Although No. 1 was fulfilled by the general program that had been followed throughout most of the School’s history, some changes were made. The trips were planned and conducted mostly by the Professor of Classical Studies Colin Edmonson. In 1977 part of the northern trip, which was discontinued as such, was added to the Central Greece trip, and a highly successful trip to Crete was added, conducted by Professor Edmonson, the Director’s wife Sara Immerwahr, and Professor Geraldine Gesell, one of the Research Fellows at the School that year. The Peloponnesian and Argolid-Corinthia trips remained as usual. In 1978 and 1979 Professor Edmonson conducted three of the regular four fall trips with the addition noted above (p. 121) of numerous foreign excavators and members of the Greek Archaeological Service as guest lecturers on their sites or museums. Timothy Gregory, Kress Professor of Hellenic Studies, accompanied all the trips in 1979 and lectured on the Byzantine and later monuments. Charles Williams, Field Director at Corinth, regularly conducted the Argolid and Corinth trips; in 1978 the Corinthia was visited in the winter term so that more time could be made in the fall term for preparation for the trips; in 1979 Corinth was the first trip. A special additional and optional trip to Turkey in spring 1978 was arranged and led by the Visiting Professor Frederick E. Winter; this formed a splendid climax to the course in Hellenistic architecture Winter had offered during the winter term. In spring 1979 the Secretary of the School Halford Haskell led a trip to Aigina, Poros and Troizen. The other Visiting Professor in 1977-78, Robert Connor, read Thucydides VI and VII with the students; 1978-79: Charles Beye read Apollonios’ Argonautika, and in the fall James Wiseman led informal discussions of field methods, followed in the second term by William A. McDonald on Materials Research in Archaeology; 1979-80: Mortimer Chambers offered the Athenian Constitution, and Elizabeth Gummey Pemberton held sessions in the museums and gave a course in late 5th-century sculpture. The traditional Topography of Athens and Sites of Attica courses were conducted by Professor Edmonson assisted by several of the Senior Fellows in residence while he was in the United States in January 1979. The other winter courses offered by various Senior Fellows as in recent years continued to give a rich diet, perhaps too full a program the Director felt, although many students expressed appreciation of the range of possiblities. In both years Director Immerwahr gave seminars on epigraphy, and Sara Immerwahr organized sessions in the museums. The Kress Professors of Hellenic Studies (see below, p. 128) offered seminars, in 1978-79 Angelike Laiou on Byzantium and the West, in 1979-80 Timothy Gregory on the end of classical culture. In order to cut down the size of each of these courses and also to give the students more time to work on what they do, in 1978-79 there were two topography sessions, one required, and students were allowed to take only two optional units beyond one topography session and the sites of Attica. This restriction of the work a student might undertake under direction represented a new principle in the School’s program. Some alumni felt it an unfortunate trend toward changing the traditional and highly valued independence and research character of the School into the rigidity of an American university. The Director felt strongly, however, that members should be prevented from spreading themselves too thin; in 1979-80 he was satisfied that he had succeeded in keeping them from overloading their days.

The number of regular first-year students ranged between 15 and 18 including six School Fellows, but the Associate Members continued to increase, to 52 plus 7 second- or more-year School Fellows in 1978-79. Twenty-two Senior Research Fellows swelled the total complement (without staff) to the record nearly one hundred members. In 1979-80 the student Associate Members were down to 33, but with 28 senior Associate Members the total was still very high. This would have delighted the Trustees of some years earlier who were so eager for the School to serve more American classical students. The effects, however, of such a number using the facilities of the School upon those facilities and the services and the attention of the staff were bound to be felt; inevitably more regulations became advisable.

The Open Meeting in 1978 attended by the President of Greece and Mrs. Tsatsos included the report on excavations of the School in 1977 by Professor Edmonson and Art and Literacy in Archaic Athens by Director Immerwahr; in 1979 after Edmonson’s report on 1978 excavations, Visiting Professor James Wiseman gave Interdisciplinary Archaeology at Stobi, a City of Ancient Macedonia. In 1980 Charles Williams reported on the School’s excavations in 1979 and Joseph Shaw on those at Kommos.

In the Library the new card catalogue, so many years in preparation, was ready for use by the first Summer Sesion in 1974, after which its great inclusiveness added tremendously to the convenience of the Library. The topographical bibliography was brought up to date in 1976-77, and arrangements were made to keep it up to date as new acquisitions arrive. The Library continued to be heavily used by friends as well as members of the School; more than fifty cards were issued to persons other than those admitted without cards, namely members of the Archaeological Service, other foreign archaeological schools, and Greek university faculties. By 1976 the Librarian, Nancy Winter, was considering means of alleviating the crowded conditions caused by the number of books as well as of readers; the books are essential to the School’s work and most of the readers are members of the School. The 1959 Davis Wing was already in need of more space even though the number of new acquisitions had begun to decrease because of the inflationary high cost of volumes. One welcome assistance to the Library came in 1975 with the establishment of a fund in memory of George Carpenter Miles for the purchase of books on numismatics and Near Eastern studies; some fifty books were acquired from this fund in 1978-79.

Many gifts are received each year, both by standing exchanges which number about 150 to 200 and by gifts from individuals, alumni or other users of the Library or organizations; over a hundred volumes from the library of William Bell Dinsmoor, Sr. were given in 1978-79 by Mr. and Mrs. William Bell Dinsmoor, Jr. With prices of essential books rising so rapidly it was particularly distressing that an increasing amount (25% of the budget in 1978-79) was going to rebinding (also rising in cost), far beyond that previously normal, due to the damage inflicted by the ever increasing use of the photocopying machine. A gift of the Alumni Association in 1977 of a microfiche reader now permits purchase of inexpensive microfiche reproductions of books too expensive to buy, and the 1978 Alumni gift of $1,000 went toward a new photocopying machine designed to do less harm to the bindings.

The Librarian works in close collaboration with the librarians of the other foreign schools; they discuss and agree upon which of the somewhat peripheral fields each should emphasize and the others not, so that all may save. Much discussion among the School staff went into the problems of reorganizing existing space in the Library as well as possible new construction when funds are available. While Miss Winter was on leave from January 1 to June 1, 1978, Demetra Andritsaki-Photiades, Assistant Librarian, was in charge and was assisted by Helen Townsend.

While the academic activities of the School were thus flourishing, the financial state and effect on the physical and social aspects of the organization were deteriorating rapidly. Painting and repairs had been put off, but by summer 1978 the outside of the Main Building was being painted, partly financed by a gift, and the inside of the Gennadeion West House was done. The mandatory pay-raises of Greek personnel (amounting to between 20% and 25% in 1977-78, 20% in 1980) added to the large deficits in the budgets of recent years meant drastic cuts in 1978-79. Meals in Loring Hall were curtailed to breakfast Monday through Saturday, lunch on Saturday only, and dinner Monday through Friday, and services in the Main Building and professorial houses were cut hard. Even the charging of fees and tuitions (see below, pp. 130-131), although helping materially, could not balance the budget.

At the May meeting of the Managing Committee in 1980 the Director reported plans for remodeling the Main Building to give more space to the Library and to cut expenses of the Director’s quarters. “The plan calls for the library stacks to go into the first floor of the Davis Wing, library offices to occupy the present saloni and seminar room, School offices to go into the Director’s quarters, and the Director to move into Gennadeion West House.” The physical School of its first century, beloved by the hundreds of members to whom it meant so much, will in large part be gone. This will happen when funds are available, for the Trustees in May 1980 voted to approve the plan in principle but only to proceed when funds are in hand.

Another of those happy occasions on which members of the School have, through the century, been honored by scholarly organizations in Greece occurred on June 10, 1980 when Homer Armstrong Thompson was inducted as a member of the Academy of Athens, a most fitting tribute as the School neared its century mark.

U.S.A.

The Managing Committee concerned itself during these five years chiefly with regulations and procedures, with the organization and program of the School, and in the latter part of the time with measures to meet the critical financial state.

The ad hoc committee to consider policy and program of the School which Richard Howland had appointed with Mabel Lang as Chairman worked hard through 1975 to 1977, with Henry Robinson replacing Miss Lang when she became Chairman of the Managing Committee. The preliminary report presented in May 1976 restated the aims and general purposes of the School as those which have obtained throughout the century since its founding. Some of the specific recommendations were for details of program that had long been part of the School’s activities but had in some cases lapsed in more recent years. Looked at from the perspective of the century, there was little if anything recommended of fundamental policy which would make for radical change in the academic program. This was a strong reaffirmation of the usefulness of the School throughout its history in the classical world and its success in fulfilling its purposes. Two particularly moot matters of policy were referred to the full Managing Committee, first for advice by questionnaire and then as a result for action. The Managing Committee voted in December 1976 to retain the requirements of (1) a knowledge of Ancient Greek for regular first-year members and (2) competitive written examinations for School Fellowships. The full report of the Committee was received in May 1977 and put on file.

If the general purposes and the fundamentals of the academic program of the School were still considered valid to the Managing Committee of the late 70’s, it was quite other with matters of procedure. The Managing Committee examined, discussed (often at length and not seldom with some heat) and took action to legislate and regulate methods and terms of appointment and details of activities of the officers and committees of the School and Managing Committee. The greatly increased size and complexity of both naturally had led to some misunderstandings under the almost century-old more informal and independent procedures of a private organization, but it was probably not only the change in size which determined the change in attitude of members of the Managing Committee. By now the whole voting membership were members of academic institutions (many of them state controlled) in which the growing rigidity of regulation and complexity of administration were facts of life, and they could not envisage an academic organization which did not operate under similar procedural regulations. Their preference was that what had been a small, private, very informal and independent research center should now be brought into line with large regular undergraduate and graduate institutions in the United States. Some of the actions are noted here:

Beginning in 1975 positions in the staff of the School and officers of the Managing Committee were advertised and applications solicited. This entailed of course “job description”. This changed fundamentally the process of selection which had previously been initiated by the Personnel Committee; no one had ever sought a position in the School (except the Visiting Professor); he had been sought. Further, his duties and responsibilities being less precisely defined, he had been prepared to serve wherever, whenever and as ever need arose with no thought of limitations.

When the most welcome grant of $500,000 from the Mellon Foundation in fall 1975 endowed the funds for an Andrew W. Mellon Professor of Classical Studies, the School rejoiced that a resident Professor could now be assured, with adequate salary and other necessary perquisites. Although the intent had been that this appointment would be an addition to the Professor of Archaeology, providing a larger teaching staff, the financial state of the School meant that for the time being this would be The Professor. Since Colin Edmonson had in May 1975 been appointed Professor of Archaeology for 1976–1979, he was in December 1975 named the Andrew W. Mellon Professor of Classical Studies, and after some difference of opinion between committees (clashes between the Personnel and the Executive Committees were not unheard of in this period), in May 1976 the Managing Committee voted that the Professor of Classical Studies should be appointed for three years, with the possibility of reappointments but not tenure. Professor Edmonson was reappointed for 1979–1982. The Regulations were changed in May 1976 to include among the officers of the School a Professor of Classical Studies and to give that officer precedence over a Professor of Archaeology in that he first takes over the duties of the Director in the Director’s absence.

The position of Secretary of the School was considered in December 1975, and although advertising for the position was required, the value to the School of selection by the Director as had been the previous practice was recognized; a limit of two one-year appointments was set.

At the same meeting the very serious personnel problem concerning the Gennadeion had to be faced. Funds were not available to offer the Directorship of the Gennadeion Library to either of the candidates recommended to take office when Francis Walton retired on December 31, 1976. Professor Walton was therefore asked to serve as consultant with his housing continued from January 1 to June 30, 1977, and Sophie Papageorgiou who had been Assistant Librarian was appointed Acting Librarian for 1976-77. For 1977 78 Mrs. Papageorgiou continued as Acting Librarian assisted in the acquisition of books in the Byzantine field by a Visiting Professor (equivalent to the two Visiting Professors regularly at the School), Thomas F. Noonan. At the December 1977 meeting of the Managing Committee a gift from the Kress Foundation was announced, $45,000 to be used for a Samuel H. Kress Foundation Professor of Hellenic Studies in the Gennadeion for three years. This research scholar was to assist the Acting Librarian Mrs. Papageorgiou in the administration of the Library. The first holder of this appointment, in 1978-79, was Professor Angelike E. Laiou of Rutgers the State University of New Jersey, followed by Timothy Gregory of the Ohio State University in 1979-80 and in 1980-81. It was hoped that by the expiration of the grant in 1981 the financial picture of the School would be clearer so that it would be possible to decide what kind of position should be established for the future administration of the Gennadeion and that funds would be available to implement the decision (see below, pp. 235-236). In May 1980 Mrs. Papageorgiou was elected Librarian of the Gennadeion.

The Managing Committee was also reviewing the Directorship of the whole School and in December 1976 voted to define the term of the Director as five years and confirm once more a three-year term for the Professor of Classical Studies, both with the possibility of renewal but no possibility of tenure. The Committee went on in May 1977 to specify that the Director’s performance should be reviewed in the fourth year of his term, and then without advertising he may be nominated by the Executive Committee for reappointment, indefinitely renewable but without tenure. It also made the term of Field Directors of the School’s excavations five years with the provision that these officers may be reappointed without limit to the number of terms after consultation of the Executive and Excavation Committees and of the Director of the School with the incumbent and without advertising if all these persons are in agreement to continue the appointment. Secretaries and Assistants in the excavations shall be advertised but shall be selected by the Field Directors and recommended to the Executive Committee; they serve at the pleasure of the Field Director.

The matter of Cooperating Institutions also received attention. It was recognized that there are geographical areas where a number of smaller private institutions with very limited funds have a keen interest in supporting the School but are unable to raise the annual contribution alone. It was therefore voted in December 1975 to “allow consortial memberships on the basis of multiples of two institutions, each institution to pay one-half the regular membership and to have one representative on the Managing Committee: each pair of consortial members to have one vote.”

As the need to raise more funds became more critical, discussion arose again and again in the Managing Committee about raising the regular contribution of the Cooperating Institutions. Each time there was the same strong division of opinion between those members whose institutions had long been contributing who were sure a raise would drop them from the rolls and those who believed both their own and other institutions would recognize the demands of inflation and rise to the needs of the School. No action was taken.

By May 1976 the budgetary situation had made the Managing Committee feel they must investigate the various aspects of the School’s activities not in regard to present ideal policies and program as the ad hoc committee had reported upon at that meeting, but rather in terms of priorities for the future. It was therefore voted to authorize the Chairman to appoint a Committee on Priorities. This Committee, chaired by Alan L. Boegehold and including the President and Secretary of the Board of Trustees and four members of the Managing Committee beside the Chairman, began work by circulating an extensive and searching questionnaire to all alumni of the School. This offered the alumni (about one half of them availed themselves of it) an opportunity to let be known which aspects and details of the program and life at the School had meant something in their careers and lives generally. The replies guided the Committee along with their own deliberations in formulating the Provisional Report presented at the May 1977 meeting. In general it recommended as not to be eliminated all the regular educational programs, the present level of maintenance of the School excavation sites and research facilities, the excavation at Corinth, the Summer Session, Loring Hall as it then was, Fellowships, Blegen Library, publications, and it suggested studies of means to re-use existing space and facilities more efficiently and of means of special funding for some particular departments of the School’s activities, especially the Gennadeion. The Managing Committee debated a number of items in the report, and it was clear that not all the membership was in agreement with the recommendations. Some felt they did not always reflect accurately the results of the questionnaire or the opinions of the Managing Committee. It was voted “to receive the preliminary report of the Priorities Committee while drawing the attention of that Committee to the Managing Committee’s expressed concern for the Agora and Loring Hall or its equivalent”; it was explained that the intent of the motion was to receive but not implement the recommendations of the report. In May 1978 a final report was presented, and it was voted that it “be received with thanks, spread upon the record, and taken under advisement by those responsible for the management of the School.”

It was at this May 1978 meeting that the Managing Committee took a momentous step in changing one of the fundamental policies of the School. Forced by the deficit in the budget increasing each year to find extra funds for even a curtailed program, it considered making charges to all those who use the School’s facilities, regular first-year members, Associate Members, Research Fellows, and excavations. Fees for Regular and Associate Members were fixed at $1,000, one half of this for graduates and graduate students of Cooperating Institutions. Visiting scholars are to pay $500, members of the faculties of Cooperating Institutions one half; the fee is waived for emeritus members of the Managing Committee. All fees may be pro-rated for periods less than an academic year to a minimum of $50 (or $25). Users of School facilities during the summer are to be charged $25 for a month or less, $50 for a longer period. Members of the Summer Session will have the $50 included in their over-all fee of $1,050. (The Executive Committee had already voted in December 1973 that a fee of $50 per semester or summer term be made for those readers in the Library who are not members of any archaeological school or Greek archaeological service or university.) The fees for summer visitors were to begin in 1978, for Summer Session in 1979 and Regular and Associate Members June 15, 1979. How charges to excavations should be determined caused lengthy debate. These charges cover the individual fees for all staff members of the excavation for the duration of the project. It was finally voted that (1) excavations with funds administered directly by the School should be charged an amount to be determined by the Executive Committee not less than 20% of those funds, (2) of those with funds administered independently of the School, holders of School excavation permits should be charged $1,000, research projects involving three or more investigators an amount appropriate to the size and nature of the project, to be determined by the Director of the School in consultation with the Chairman of the Managing Committee; smaller projects are covered by individual School fees. Since discussion had brought out some uncertainty as to what services are provided by the School to excavations and research projects, it was voted that the Executive Committee in consultation with the Director of the School and the Excavation Committee draw up a statement of appropriate basic services. Further fees were instituted at the December 1978 meeting when a medical fee of $15 for students and $25 for staff members (double these sums for families) was legislated. The retirement in 1978 of Dr. Papantoniou and the increased cost to the School of the services of his successor, Dr. Tsannetis, made it impossible for the School in its financial state to provide free medical care for its members as in the past ten years. Prior to 1968 there had been no such service; members had been entirely on their own in seeking and paying for medical care. The new fees were designed to cover about half the retainer fee of the physician, the other half to be borne by the School. In February 1966 hospitalization coverage for members of the staff had been arranged and paid for by the School.

Another economy measure was taken in December 1978 when it was recognized that it might be impossible to continue the annual Visiting Professorship, at least with the then existing perquisites. It was decided to postpone until at least May 1980 the selection of Visiting Professors for 1982-83. Persons had already been appointed through 1981-82. In May 1980 appointments were resumed.

On May 10, 1980 the Managing Committee approved a complete revision of the Regulations which incorporated changes made in recent years and further changes and additions. Significant innovations included the addition of the President of the Board of Trustees to the membership of the Managing Committee; the provision that members representing Cooperating Institutions should be nominated by their institutions; change of quorum number from 15 to 30; deletion of the provision allowing members of Standing Committees to be re-elected; deletion of a representative of the School on the editorial board of the Journal of the Archaeological Institute of America; deletion of the retirement age of 65 normally and 68 positively; change in membership requirement from “be a graduate student preparing for a professional career in classical studies” to “be a student desiring professional training in classical studies”; redefinition and new naming of categories of membership other than Regular Members, namely, Student Associate, Senior Associate, Visiting Associate; change in requirements for School Fellowships: the John Williams White in Archaeology, the Thomas Day Seymour in History and Literature, the James Rignall Wheeler, the George Henry McFadden and the Heinrich Schliemann were designated as First Year Fellowships with the requirement that the holder “will have completed the requirements for the baccalaureate degree and . . . will not have completed the work for the Ph.D. degree by the time of entry into the School”; deletion of eligibility for re-appointment for the Capps Fellow; change from “Gennadeion” to “Gennadeion-Dumbarton Oaks” Fellowship awarded on the recommendation of the Committee on the Gennadius Library in conjunction with the Senior Fellows of the Center for Byzantine Studies; and detailed regulations concerning excavations, the Committee on Excavations, and excavations to be sponsored by but not conducted by the School.

Even though the Regulations were passed including the provision for holding the annual meeting in New York as it had been for 98 years, objections were raised to New York as the location. It was voted “to direct the Executive Committee to arrange the May 1981 meeting in a location more central in respect of supporting institutions, providing such a move entails no added expense.” A mail poll of the Managing Committee revealed an overwhelming preference to keep the meeting in New York, so no change was made.

The membership of the Managing Committee was increased markedly in these years not only through the addition of eleven new Cooperating Institutions and by the action of the Committee to include further ex officio active and emeritus members of the staff of the School (to those elected in December 1972, above, p. 110, were added in December 1975 the Editor Emeritus and Professors of Archaeology Emeriti and in December 1978 the Librarian of the Blegen Library) but also by further retirements and changing of institutions which meant new members for many institutions. In some cases members becoming emeriti preferred to resign from the Committee, but most of those who had long been active in the interests of the School were eager to continue to be informed, even though they could no longer be active, and retained their memberships. The 1979-80 roster numbered a record 225 representing 125 Cooperating Institutions, sister organizations, and School staff. In 1939 there had been 82 members and 24 Cooperating Institutions; in 1882 twelve men (nine professors and three businessmen) constituted the original Managing Committee representing nine colleges. Between 54 and 67 of these 225 members attended the Annual Meetings in May between 1975 and 1979, a larger number, from 57 to 99, depending on the location, the Christmas meetings. Mayer House, with its gracious elegance, first used in May 1975, continued to serve as the meeting place for the May meetings, replacing the Century Club from 1968–1974 and before that the Seth Low Library of Columbia University which had been host to the Managing Committee through 1967. The luncheons at the Men’s Faculty Club of Columbia (and later at the Century) at the close of or between two sessions of the meeting were throughout those many years a treasured opportunity for members of the Committee to meet informally and receive less formal reports of the School complete with the photographs of current activity always so welcome. Already in 1974 the amenity of lunch had to be foregone, and those who know only the scramble for a hamburger on Lexington Avenue between sessions at Mayer House find it hard to envisage the older dispensation in which the School, never affluent, could nevertheless offer lunch as a slight token of appreciation to its Managing Committee members who had come, many of them great distances, sua pecunia, to assist in the conduct of the School’s affairs.

The subcommittees of the Managing Committee continued their devoted effort for the School. The Committee on Admissions and Fellowships, after the studies of the ad hoc Committee on Policy and Program brought criticism of the character of the qualifying and fellowship examinations, restudied the problem and presented a report in May 1977. Some of the points made were: The following year the Committee planned to set the examinations as a Committee incorporating questions solicited from a large number of members of the Managing Committee instead of asking one member to set the examination. The qualifying examination for admission is a single paper “made up of bits of the fellowship examination with wide choice.” “The Greek examination will include passages better suited to archaeologists”; “the History examination will include optional questions on Near Eastern history” and if possible on social and economic history; the Archaeology examination will include questions on the technical aspects and recent developments. Examinations are not “passed” or “failed” but ranked and adjusted with other criteria in deciding upon admission or fellowships. The new Hirsch Fellowship (see above, pp. 114, 118) was awarded for the first time in 1975-76. Conditions governing it were studied and recommended to the full Managing Committee who voted in May 1976 that “the Hirsch Fellowship be awarded annually to a student writing his dissertation or to a recent Ph.D. to complete a project, such as a dissertation for publication. The field is to be Pre-Classical, Classical and Post-Classical archaeology and the project must require substantial residence in Greece with Associate Membership in the School. Examinations will not be required. The amount is to be $5,000, graduated according to need and qualification.” In 1979 the Jessie Ball duPont Foundation awarded the School a Special Research Fellowship for 1980-81, and on May 12, 1979 the Managing Committee approved the establishment of a joint Gennadeion-Dumbarton Oaks Fellowship (see below, p. 238).

The Committee on Personnel continued to be responsible for nominating to the Managing Committee candidates for officers of the School and members of the Managing Committee. The new policy was to advertise at least a year in advance the positions to be filled, complete with descriptions of the positions, and to invite applications and nominations from any member of the Managing Committee. The Committee also concerned itself with the question of terms of office for the School staff and made recommendations to the Executive Committee; the two Committees did not always see eye to eye either in the matter of personnel or of length of term, and in more than one case the recommendation of the Personnel Committee was overridden by the Executive Committee, sometimes to the confusion of the Managing Committee as a whole. This was something quite new in the history of the School. The first major appointment the Personnel Committee had to make in these years was that of Professor of Archaeology to succeed C. W. J. Eliot who had resigned his reappointment; Colin N. Edmonson of the University of Washington was selected to succeed him (see above, p. 128). The other important appointment of this five-year period was that of a new Director of the School. Henry Immerwahr of the University of North Carolina was elected on May 8, 1976 for a five-year term beginning July 1, 1977.

The Committee on Excavations was appointed first in 1961 to assist the Director in decisions about the allocation of School permits to excavate (above, pp. 89-90); Professors Blegen, Broneer and Thompson were the original members. By 1976 the members included Professors Broneer, Shear, Thompson, Vanderpool and Field Director Williams, plus Mabel Lang and James R. McCredie ex officiis. The constitution and responsibilities of this Committee were considered by the ad hoc Committee on Policy and Program, and recommendations were made which were further elaborated by the Managing Committee in May 1976. The membership was defined as the Director (or in his absence the Professor of Classical Studies), the Professor of Archaeology, the Field Directors of the Athenian Agora and Corinth Excavations, plus three (later four) persons to be named by the Chairman of the Managing Committee; of the last four one should be a historian and the other three should have served as field directors of excavations, and at least one of them should be a pre-historian; later it was voted that one of the four should be a philologist. These four are to serve for four-year terms. Duties of the Committee were extended beyond allocation of permits to a general supervisory function; they should visit the excavations, make themselves available for advice at all times, make suggestions where appropriate and encourage use of scientific resources where appropriate and reporting of results to School personnel. The first membership of this new Committee named in 1977 included Henry Immerwahr, Chairman, Colin Edmonson, T. Leslie Shear, Jr., Charles K. Williams, II, James R. McCredie, Homer A. Thompson, Alan L. Boegehold, Thomas W. Jacobsen.

One more ad hoc committee was active in these years. At the request of the Trustees a joint Committee was appointed at the May 1977 meeting to consider suitable means of celebrating the Centennial of the School which falls in 1981. The Publications Committee had already in fall 1973 decided to publish a history of the School from the time Professor Lord’s volume on the History of the School stops up to the time of going to press, timed to be ready for the Centennial. Lucy Shoe Meritt, Editor Emeritus, was asked to prepare the volume. The Centennial Committee, chaired by Harry Levy, consisted of eight members of the Managing Committee and two trustees, Charles Morgan and Richard Howland. At its first meeting decision was taken to mount a drive among alumni for $100,000 toward the Endowment for the School the Trustees had undertaken to raise.

Not only was the one hundred thousand appropriate for one hundred years of life but one hundred thousand dollars was the total original endowment decided upon as necessary when the School was founded in 1881; actually that sum was not reached until 1903. A fresh $100,000 from the Alumni seemed a suitable contribution to the far greater need in 1981. No more appropriate means of marking the appreciation by its former members of the School’s century of achievement could be undertaken than such assistance to the dwindling financial resources to help bolster the beginning of the second century. By fall 1980 two thirds of the goal had been subscribed, and on March 21, 1981 the final sum of the fund was $122,522. As for any activity or ceremony to mark the centennial, it was agreed that a ceremony of two or three days in Athens, centered in the School’s property in June 1981, was most appropriate. Possible academic and/or social gatherings sponsored by alumni groups in various parts of the United States during the centennial year 1981-82 were also to be encouraged.

The Trustees on November 17, 1975 elected a new Chairman of the Board, William Kelly Simpson, and Frederick C. Crawford became Chairman Emeritus; Elizabeth Whitehead succeeded Mr. Simpson as President. At the same time two new regular members were elected, Richard Hubbard Howland in his own right and William T. Loomis, and honoris causa Miss Clara Woolie Mayer. In 1976 Philip Hofer was elected trustee emeritus as were John Nicholas Brown and Nathanael V. Davis in 1977 and John Dane, Jr. in 1979. Further new members were added: David W. Packard in 1976, Lloyd E. Cotsen in 1977, Robert O. Anderson, Doreen Canaday Spitzer, and Elizabeth R. Gebhard in 1978 and J. Richardson Dilworth and Hunter Lewis in 1980. On November 10, 1978 the Trustees changed their by-laws to give members a definite term of office of five years. Of the twenty-five members in 1980, three were emeriti, one honorary and one ex officio; the twenty active members included six alumni and only eight who had served more than ten years. It was a new, largely young board with a mountain of financial problems to surmount, as staggering as that which the original Board of eleven members faced in 1886. In November 1979 William T. Loomis replaced John Dane, Jr. as Secretary, and in May 1980 J. Richardson Dilworth took over as Treasurer from John J. McCloy, who had served with such distinction and dedication for 25 years, the longest service as Treasurer in the Board’s history. The School was not to lose his great experience, wise counsel and devotion, however, for he remained an active member of the Board.

At the May 1980 meeting the Trustees voted to change the principal office of the Trustees in Massachusetts (as a Massachusetts corporation there must be an office in Massachusetts even though the headquarters of the School in the United States are in New York) to the care of William T. Loomis, Room 2400, 225 Franklin Street, Boston.

A generous and timely gift was accepted with gratitude in November 1975 to aid the publications of the School, $50,000 to be used as a revolving fund for the publications of the Corinth excavations (see below, p. 270). The death in 1976 of the long-term president of the Board, Ward M. Canaday, prompted an offer of $25,000 from his daughter, Doreen Canaday Spitzer, on May 19, 1976 “provided a matching sum is secured in the current fiscal year.” Since the end of the year was so near, the time was extended to the end of the calendar year; by November 29 the challenge was met, by other Trustees and others, with more than matching funds so the Ward M. Canaday Memorial Fund for general purposes amounted to more than $50,000 on that date.

During these years the entire bookkeeping system was restructured in order to bring the School’s records into conformity with accepted accounting principles. And in 1979 the School adopted the unit system in order to assure the most equitable means of allocating investment income. Miss Virginia Sauer, the School’s account manager at Chase Investment Management Corporation, undertook and carried through both these operations efficiently and with meticulous attention to detail. Miss Sauer took over the School’s accounts in 1977 when Mrs. Edna Deegan retired after long years of caring service.

A ruling exempting Mayer House from New York City real-estate taxes was received in 1976 and a $9,000 refund made, but certain repairs were required before a certificate of occupancy could be obtained to allow the institutional use of the building. Funding for those repairs and preservation of the fabric was obtained by a grant of $50,000 from the Arthur Vining Davis Foundation; these were carried out in 1976 by the Trustees whose responsibility Mayer House is. In June 1977 Alan Shapiro was appointed Registrar of Mayer House, continuing until 1980 when the position was merged with that of Administrative Assistant for Resources (see below, p. 138). The income and expenses are being kept in balance.

The budget of the School, on the other hand, was running a serious deficit year after year, thanks to the constantly spiraling inflation in Greece, and that drive for much more endowment which each Chairman of the Managing Committee since the close of World War II had urged upon the Trustees had now become a matter of the life and death of the School. In June 1977 the President of the Board was authorized to appoint a committee to investigate the whole subject of fund raising. Various projects were then initiated. One, in the category of publicity, served both to keep alumni informed of the School’s manifold activities and to inform and, it was hoped, to interest others in the School with the further hope that their financial backing might thus be encouraged. This was a printed Newsletter, edited and published by the President of the Board, Elizabeth Whitehead, put out twice a year beginning in fall 1977 and financed by a special gift for the purpose. In its six (Fall 1977) to sixteen (Spring 1979 and following) well-illustrated pages were included items of current interest from all departments of the School, including reports on the Centennial Fund and a plea for support. It is too soon (1980) to judge how much contribution to School Funds this has generated, but it has brought the School to the attention of many potential new friends and has renewed alumni concern. Another bid for funds on a large scale came with the filing of application in fall 1978 for a Challenge Grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities for the years up to the Centennial in 1981. This was granted in late 1979 and would bring one dollar of Federal Funds to match every three raised otherwise. Other requests for support from large foundations were also under consideration. The drive by the Centennial Committee of the Managing Committee to raise $100,000 from the alumni had been launched in May 1977 (see above, pp. 135-136). In 1979 the Trustees voted to undertake a Centennial Fund Drive to raise a new endowment and capital funds. The Arthur Vining Davis Foundation continued the active support Mr. Davis had given while he was alive (see above, pp. 27, 64-67, 73, 93, 183) by awarding the School $50,000 to aid in fund-raising. An Administrative Assistant for Resources, Melinda Locher, began work for the capital campaign from her office in Mayer House. On September 2, 1980 Gary Farmer succeeded her as Development Administrator. In 1980 the Trustees voted the amount of the Centennial Fund Drive to which they committed themselves as six million dollars. By late 1981 some one third of the goal had been reached.

There were deaths in these five years which deprived the School of men who had served it with outstanding dedication over many years. On February 26, 1976 Ward M. Canaday died after serving as a Trustee since 1937. As President of the Board 1950–1964, Chairman 1964–1971, and Chairman Emeritus 1971–1976 he had not only led the Board longer than any other in its history but he had been one of the most active and most directly concerned with the business of the School, devoted to its interests and to fostering its activities, and generous of his own time and energies on its behalf (notably to the Athenian Agora Excavations) throughout that long tenure (see pp. 48-49, 64, 183, 186). Another Trustee, with the longest tenure in the Board’s history, John Nicholas Brown, died on October 9, 1979; he had served actively from 1931 to 1978 and as emeritus the final year, always with a keen interest and loyal support, for he was a lover of fine architecture and had an affection for Greece and a strong sense of the significance of its history and its art in our lives today. On February 11, 1978 Alfred Raymond Bellinger died. Fellow of the School in 1925-26, he became a member of the Managing Committee in 1943 and acted as its Chairman from 1960 to 1965 (see above, pp. 83-96). His tireless devotion to the School and his wise and concerned judgment on its problems made a notable contribution to its progress. The death on January 2, 1980 of Rhys Carpenter brought to an end 60 years of membership on the Managing Committee of a man who began his association with the School as a student in 1912. His term as Director of the School in 1927–1932 was one of the most brilliant in the School’s first century for the distinction of his own scholarly achievements, his inspired and effective teaching and guidance of the students, and his diplomatic administration. Unfortunately he was unable to serve again in residence as Director to which post he was once more called in 1946 (see above, pp. 23, 24, 31), but he did fill the position of Annual Professor in 1956-57. His dedication to the ideals and best interests of the School and his personal care for them never wavered even in the later years when he was no longer able to attend meetings of the Managing Committee. His vision, his logical thought and his wisdom were ever at the service of the School and often called upon, always with conspicuous profit for the School and pleasure for the applicant.

It was a real disappointment when Mabel Lang indicated that she would not accept reappointment in 1980 as Chairman of the Managing Committee. She had given unstintingly of her time, and she could not justify more time away from her scholarly commitments. Her term had been one of the most difficult in the century. No Chairman had ever been without financial worries; the School had never had sufficient funds to make use of all its possibilities in classical education. But when the School’s operations were more limited and its membership very much smaller, it was possible, by rigid economy in existing programs and strict refusal to initiate others however desirable they might appear, to live within its income most of the time. Once the operations had expanded and as numbers of members increased astronomically it was another matter to meet inflationary costs. It is not easy to eliminate what has become regular practice or custom or programs and projects whose value is without question. To guide the School through a period of enforced entrenchment which was bound to hurt in many quarters was a thankless task which Miss Lang handled with dauntless courage, strong conviction and firmness tempered with compassion. She gave of herself, her time, her judicial thought and boundless energy to steer a course between the shoals of the Managing Committee and Trustees, and of staff and students. The School will enter its second century in as good a state as it does thanks to her careful and concerned guidance as much as to that of her eight predecessors in the Chairmanship.

The Managing Committee in December 1979 elected as her successor James Robert McCredie of the Institute of Fine Arts, New York University to serve as Chairman of the Managing Committee for 1980 to 1985. Michael H. Jameson of Stanford University was elected Vice Chairman and John H. Kroll of the University of Texas at Austin Secretary, but since he was unable to serve in 1980-81 Keith DeVries of the University of Pennsylvania was elected Acting Secretary in May 1980. Professor McCredie came to his post as second of the Chairmen who had previously acted as Director; he knew the problems and understood all aspects of the School’s activities and personnel as few before him (see above, pp. 102-110, 121-123).

ADDENDUM 1980-81

Since delay in printing prevented the publication of this volume in time for the celebration of the Centennial of the School in June 1981, it is now possible to bring the account up to the full hundred years with the following brief note on the year 1980-81 under the Chairmanship of James R. McCredie.

Greece

Henry Immerwahr continued as Director. Colin Edmonson as Andrew W. Mellon Professor of Classical Studies and some others conducted the regular fall trips and the winter topography courses. Other courses: Plato (Henry Immerwahr), the Neolithic Village in Greece (Thomas W. Jacobsen, Visiting Professor, Jessie Ball duPont Special Research Fellow), Paganism and Christianity in the 4th to 7th centuries (Timothy Gregory, Samuel H. Kress Professor of Hellenic Studies), museum sessions (Sara Immerwahr and other volunteers).

The Centennial Celebration took place from June 17 to 20, 1981. An opening convocation on the 17th in the Gennadeion included greetings from Greek officials, foreign archaeological schools, and the Archaeological Institute of America and a review of “100 Years of the American School” by James McCredie; it was followed by a reception in the School garden for the several hundred American and foreign guests. The next two days were devoted to a symposium on Greek Towns and Cities with 11 papers by alumni (some current or former staff), which were published in Hesperia 50, 1981, and to a visit to the Athenian Agora conducted by the staff of the excavation. On the final day a bus trip was made to visit the museum at Isthmia and the excavations at Corinth under the direction of the staff there. Retiring United States Ambassador and Mrs. McCloskey gave a reception in the garden of their home on the evening of the 18th and paid high tribute to the part the School has played in Greece throughout the century of its life.

The Centennial was also marked by the clearing and further study in May and June of one of the School’s earliest excavations (1888 and 1889), the sanctuary of Dionysos at Ikarion in Attica. William R. Biers and Thomas D. Boyd worked with the full cooperation of Dr. Basileios Petrakos, Ephor of Attica, and the financial support of the Society for the Preservation of the Greek Heritage; the results were published in Hesperia.

U.S.A.

Most significant of the Managing Committee actions were amendments to the Regulations to revise the payments for members and visiting scholars to equalize them (above, pp. 130-131) and to permit mail ballots on matters of substance.

The chief activity of the Trustees was the Centennial Fund Drive which had by June reached about one third of its goal of six million.