October 18, 1944
Dear Dad:
I have made the acquaintance of a couple of boys that are in the ASTRP, studying Japanese at the U. They have already had three months of training somewhere else, and they were offered Japanese at the end of it. One of them comes to the Pilgrim Fellowship meeting at First Church. He is Jim English,i son of the Superintendent of the Congregational Conference of Connecticut. Since he is already in the program I intend on getting into, I was interested to begin with, but now that I know him better, that is not the controlling factor now.
I still don't know whether or not my tooth shall be saved, since the dentist put a cement filling in, and said that it would have to stay in for six months without hurting be- fore they would be sure the tooth would be all right. Sometimes if the pulp is thus covered for a long enough period of time, it repairs the surface around itself so that a regular amalgam filling can be put in. Meanwhile, though, I am getting the rest of the work in my mouth done. Back in the second summer session, the dentist that was working said that I had a cavity in practically every tooth in my mouth, and that situation had been aggravated by the fact that I then had to wait for the opening of the first quarter this fall.ii In three or four years I will not (have) such trouble with my teeth because they will not be subject to such widespread and rapid decay. Some of the fillings that I have had put in in the last two weeks are very sensitive to hot and cold because they go so deep. I will get over this in a few weeks or months, however.iii
Mary Alice Beck (First Church's Youth leader)iv has branched out onto the campus with a "hangout" in the YMCA building. She really is helping to organize the young peo- ple of Congregational origin who are from out of town also. In late September, a rally for all Congregational freshmen was held at the church, with a turnout, mostly girls, of about eighty.
After a killing frost, we are having a nice taste of Indian summer here, and it is better than experiencing too soon the ravages of a wild winter.
In a little more than two weeks, I shall no longer be at home, if I pass my physical on Monday, the 23rd. The callous itself has gone down some, and I can walk and even run a little bit without it becoming sensitive.v Otherwise, I feel sure that I can pass, be- cause I am not in bad physical condition. Another advantage of the ASTRP is that, when one has had his basic training after becoming eighteen, he has a better chance than most of continuing his training.
Dear Dad:
I have made the acquaintance of a couple of boys that are in the ASTRP, studying Japanese at the U. They have already had three months of training somewhere else, and they were offered Japanese at the end of it. One of them comes to the Pilgrim Fellowship meeting at First Church. He is Jim English,i son of the Superintendent of the Congregational Conference of Connecticut. Since he is already in the program I intend on getting into, I was interested to begin with, but now that I know him better, that is not the controlling factor now.
I still don't know whether or not my tooth shall be saved, since the dentist put a cement filling in, and said that it would have to stay in for six months without hurting be- fore they would be sure the tooth would be all right. Sometimes if the pulp is thus covered for a long enough period of time, it repairs the surface around itself so that a regular amalgam filling can be put in. Meanwhile, though, I am getting the rest of the work in my mouth done. Back in the second summer session, the dentist that was working said that I had a cavity in practically every tooth in my mouth, and that situation had been aggravated by the fact that I then had to wait for the opening of the first quarter this fall.ii In three or four years I will not (have) such trouble with my teeth because they will not be subject to such widespread and rapid decay. Some of the fillings that I have had put in in the last two weeks are very sensitive to hot and cold because they go so deep. I will get over this in a few weeks or months, however.iii
Mary Alice Beck (First Church's Youth leader)iv has branched out onto the campus with a "hangout" in the YMCA building. She really is helping to organize the young peo- ple of Congregational origin who are from out of town also. In late September, a rally for all Congregational freshmen was held at the church, with a turnout, mostly girls, of about eighty.
After a killing frost, we are having a nice taste of Indian summer here, and it is better than experiencing too soon the ravages of a wild winter.
In a little more than two weeks, I shall no longer be at home, if I pass my physical on Monday, the 23rd. The callous itself has gone down some, and I can walk and even run a little bit without it becoming sensitive.v Otherwise, I feel sure that I can pass, be- cause I am not in bad physical condition. Another advantage of the ASTRP is that, when one has had his basic training after becoming eighteen, he has a better chance than most of continuing his training.
I am looking forward to the end of the war, not only because I don't enjoy it and
because I want to know if men will make the peace sanely,vi but because it will mean that
we will all be united again, and will be able to share our experiences together.
Until then, I am your loving son,
Stewart
i Unbelievably, I actually talked with Jim English on the phone! (I was able to find him not only because of the power of the Internet, but also because I had on hand a 1960 Yearbook of Congre gational Churches which listed his dad and his dad's full name, and I learned that Jim English was James, Jr.). He is 92 years old and living in Mystic, CT! When I read him this paragraph, he said, "Yep, that's me." After his Japanese language training, he went on to do Counter-intelligence in Japan in the army of occupation, came back to Yale, went to Clare College, Cambridge, came back to Hartford, became head of Connecticut Bank & Trust, and eventually (in the 70's) Presi- dent of Trinity College, Hartford. However, he did not remember Stewart, but that is not surprising, because Stewart was around a very short time after meeting Jim English before he left home himself. An article about his appointment as President of Trinity and a photo is below.
ii Since Stewart was having his dental work done at the School of Dentistry, he had to deal with vacations when no dental students were around.
iii This all sounds so primitive! I can't help but wonder if a modern dentist would read this and shudder!
iv I'm unable to find any reference to this Mary Alice Beck on-line (there are others, one of whom is an actress).
v Given this history of a broken bone, and the possibility that it might interfere with marching, etc, it is sort of amazing that Stewart did pass his physical.
vi This could be an allusion to the "peace" following WW I, which was not "sane" regarding Germany and is widely regarded as leading to the rise of Nazism. Stewart ended up not being home much after the war - he went to college as soon as he was discharged. So I'm not sure we got to "share our experiences together" very much.
An article in the New York Times, June, 1981, about James English:
HARTFORD TRINITY College named a new president last week to lead it through the financial and academic challenges of the years ahead. Like most institutions of higher learning, Trinity faces potential shortages of both students and money - and to handle the problem, the college stepped outside the world of scholars and picked James F. English Jr., the former president and board chairman of the Connecticut Bank and Trust Company, to take over the presidency on July 1.
''I nearly became a scholar, but I'm not a scholar,'' said Mr. English, who has been at Trinity since 1977 as vice president for finance and planning, and for the last eight months as acting president while the current president, Dr. Charles Lockwood, has been on sabbatical.
Being in charge of a college differs from being the head of a business, Mr. English said, because a college president is ''less of a chief executive officer.'' ''You're more like a mayor, or the governor of a small state,'' he said of the college presidency. ''You have to balance some fairly diverse constituencies; it's a political job, in the best sense.' ''You do indeed have to exercise leadership,'' he added. In the coming months, Trinity will need leadership as it faces several challenges.
Trinity, like other colleges, has watched the number of high school seniors shrink precipitously from its peak a decade ago. The number of freshmen entering colleges nationwide is expected to drop by 30 to 40 percent by the early 1990's. ''We don't plan to make our place bigger,'' Mr. English said. ''With these demographics, there's no point enlarging Trinity. On the other hand, we have a gorgeous physical plant, and a first-class faculty, and we don't see any need to shrink Trinity,'' he said. With 1,700 undergraduates, the college receives about 3,000 applications for 450 places in the freshman class. It admits more than 1,200 to get the 450 because most of those it offers admission to go to other colleges, he said.
Mr. English said that maintaining a pool of high-quality applicants was ''a little bit like marketing.'' The college would also like to add to the number of minority applicants in the pool, he said. Another challenge is that of money. With an endowment between $45 million and $50 million, Trinity, which was founded in 1823 and is a private liberal arts college, ranks well nationally but behind schools of similar size and prestige, like Wesleyan, Amherst and Williams. Tuition, room and board, and other charges exclusive of books and personal expenses will reach $9,180 a year this September. ''Certainly, my being here is not going to get us a lot of money from corporations,'' he said. ''I view development work as not very different from the work that political people or business people do to develop their constituencies. It's part of one's job. If you're enthusiastic about your institution or your product or your college, it can be kind of fun,'' he said.
Mr. English said he also wanted to change the curriculum to ''intensify the experience of students in their majors.'' The curriculum has no required courses, except that students must take a certain number of courses in an area of their choice. The college has recently completed a study of its curriculum and decided not to make any major changes. Trinity must also improve social facilities for students, Mr. English said. Smith College has residential houses, Yale its colleges and Amherst its fraternities, he noted, and Trinity should consider some changes.
Mr. English's previous Trinity position - as vice president for finance and planning - did not bring him into extensive contact with students. He had responsibility over the endowment, the treasurer's office, the administrative computers and the development office. Before becoming acting president, however, Mr. English also taught a freshman seminar called ''Society, Business and the Individual,'' which he said was a critique of the market system. Mr. English also became the faculty adviser to the 30 students who took the course over two years.
Mr. English, who is 54 years old and whose father, the Rev. James F. English, graudated from Trinity in 1916, came to Trinity in 1977 at the suggestion of Dr. Lockwood. Mr. English had been chairman of Connecticut Bank and Trust's board of directors since 1970. He joined the bank in 1951. ''I had a marvelous education at the bank - finance, administration, and economics,'' he said. Mr. English worked as a securities analyst and in the acquisition of smaller banks. ''After a while,'' as he put it, ''I became president of the bank.'' That was in 1966, when he was 39. ''I'd been at the bank for 26 years, and run it for 11,'' he said. ''I was ready for a change.'' While at the bank, Mr. English held a variety of other positions, including president of the Connecticut Bankers Association, president of the Greater Hartford Chamber of Commerce and a director of the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston. He was also a member of the Connecticut Commission on Higher Education. Mr. English remains a director of several corporations, including Heublein, Emhart, Connecticut Natural Gas and Connecticut Bank and Trust.
Mr. English had teaching experience as a part-time lecturer in law at the University of Connecticut Law School, from which he received an LL.B. in 1956. A native of Putnam, he graduated from Loomis Chaffee (Loomis at the time) in 1944, spent a year studying Japanese and went to Japan while in the Army. On his return, he went to Yale, graduating two and a half years later, in 1949. He received a second degree from Clare College, Cambridge University, in 1951.
Mr. English is married to the former Isabelle Spotswood Cox, and they have four children. Mr. English said that he and his wife would keep their house in West Hartford, but would spend ''a lot of time'' on campus.
Until then, I am your loving son,
Stewart
i Unbelievably, I actually talked with Jim English on the phone! (I was able to find him not only because of the power of the Internet, but also because I had on hand a 1960 Yearbook of Congre gational Churches which listed his dad and his dad's full name, and I learned that Jim English was James, Jr.). He is 92 years old and living in Mystic, CT! When I read him this paragraph, he said, "Yep, that's me." After his Japanese language training, he went on to do Counter-intelligence in Japan in the army of occupation, came back to Yale, went to Clare College, Cambridge, came back to Hartford, became head of Connecticut Bank & Trust, and eventually (in the 70's) Presi- dent of Trinity College, Hartford. However, he did not remember Stewart, but that is not surprising, because Stewart was around a very short time after meeting Jim English before he left home himself. An article about his appointment as President of Trinity and a photo is below.
ii Since Stewart was having his dental work done at the School of Dentistry, he had to deal with vacations when no dental students were around.
iii This all sounds so primitive! I can't help but wonder if a modern dentist would read this and shudder!
iv I'm unable to find any reference to this Mary Alice Beck on-line (there are others, one of whom is an actress).
v Given this history of a broken bone, and the possibility that it might interfere with marching, etc, it is sort of amazing that Stewart did pass his physical.
vi This could be an allusion to the "peace" following WW I, which was not "sane" regarding Germany and is widely regarded as leading to the rise of Nazism. Stewart ended up not being home much after the war - he went to college as soon as he was discharged. So I'm not sure we got to "share our experiences together" very much.
An article in the New York Times, June, 1981, about James English:
HARTFORD TRINITY College named a new president last week to lead it through the financial and academic challenges of the years ahead. Like most institutions of higher learning, Trinity faces potential shortages of both students and money - and to handle the problem, the college stepped outside the world of scholars and picked James F. English Jr., the former president and board chairman of the Connecticut Bank and Trust Company, to take over the presidency on July 1.
''I nearly became a scholar, but I'm not a scholar,'' said Mr. English, who has been at Trinity since 1977 as vice president for finance and planning, and for the last eight months as acting president while the current president, Dr. Charles Lockwood, has been on sabbatical.
Being in charge of a college differs from being the head of a business, Mr. English said, because a college president is ''less of a chief executive officer.'' ''You're more like a mayor, or the governor of a small state,'' he said of the college presidency. ''You have to balance some fairly diverse constituencies; it's a political job, in the best sense.' ''You do indeed have to exercise leadership,'' he added. In the coming months, Trinity will need leadership as it faces several challenges.
Trinity, like other colleges, has watched the number of high school seniors shrink precipitously from its peak a decade ago. The number of freshmen entering colleges nationwide is expected to drop by 30 to 40 percent by the early 1990's. ''We don't plan to make our place bigger,'' Mr. English said. ''With these demographics, there's no point enlarging Trinity. On the other hand, we have a gorgeous physical plant, and a first-class faculty, and we don't see any need to shrink Trinity,'' he said. With 1,700 undergraduates, the college receives about 3,000 applications for 450 places in the freshman class. It admits more than 1,200 to get the 450 because most of those it offers admission to go to other colleges, he said.
Mr. English said that maintaining a pool of high-quality applicants was ''a little bit like marketing.'' The college would also like to add to the number of minority applicants in the pool, he said. Another challenge is that of money. With an endowment between $45 million and $50 million, Trinity, which was founded in 1823 and is a private liberal arts college, ranks well nationally but behind schools of similar size and prestige, like Wesleyan, Amherst and Williams. Tuition, room and board, and other charges exclusive of books and personal expenses will reach $9,180 a year this September. ''Certainly, my being here is not going to get us a lot of money from corporations,'' he said. ''I view development work as not very different from the work that political people or business people do to develop their constituencies. It's part of one's job. If you're enthusiastic about your institution or your product or your college, it can be kind of fun,'' he said.
Mr. English said he also wanted to change the curriculum to ''intensify the experience of students in their majors.'' The curriculum has no required courses, except that students must take a certain number of courses in an area of their choice. The college has recently completed a study of its curriculum and decided not to make any major changes. Trinity must also improve social facilities for students, Mr. English said. Smith College has residential houses, Yale its colleges and Amherst its fraternities, he noted, and Trinity should consider some changes.
Mr. English's previous Trinity position - as vice president for finance and planning - did not bring him into extensive contact with students. He had responsibility over the endowment, the treasurer's office, the administrative computers and the development office. Before becoming acting president, however, Mr. English also taught a freshman seminar called ''Society, Business and the Individual,'' which he said was a critique of the market system. Mr. English also became the faculty adviser to the 30 students who took the course over two years.
Mr. English, who is 54 years old and whose father, the Rev. James F. English, graudated from Trinity in 1916, came to Trinity in 1977 at the suggestion of Dr. Lockwood. Mr. English had been chairman of Connecticut Bank and Trust's board of directors since 1970. He joined the bank in 1951. ''I had a marvelous education at the bank - finance, administration, and economics,'' he said. Mr. English worked as a securities analyst and in the acquisition of smaller banks. ''After a while,'' as he put it, ''I became president of the bank.'' That was in 1966, when he was 39. ''I'd been at the bank for 26 years, and run it for 11,'' he said. ''I was ready for a change.'' While at the bank, Mr. English held a variety of other positions, including president of the Connecticut Bankers Association, president of the Greater Hartford Chamber of Commerce and a director of the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston. He was also a member of the Connecticut Commission on Higher Education. Mr. English remains a director of several corporations, including Heublein, Emhart, Connecticut Natural Gas and Connecticut Bank and Trust.
Mr. English had teaching experience as a part-time lecturer in law at the University of Connecticut Law School, from which he received an LL.B. in 1956. A native of Putnam, he graduated from Loomis Chaffee (Loomis at the time) in 1944, spent a year studying Japanese and went to Japan while in the Army. On his return, he went to Yale, graduating two and a half years later, in 1949. He received a second degree from Clare College, Cambridge University, in 1951.
Mr. English is married to the former Isabelle Spotswood Cox, and they have four children. Mr. English said that he and his wife would keep their house in West Hartford, but would spend ''a lot of time'' on campus.
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| A group of former presidents of Trinity College: James English is at far right. |
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