With John Cummings we saw the story of a professor who left Harvard to become a Unitarian minister. Here we see an American version of the reverse story of a young person who forsakes being/becoming a man of the cloth to ultimately become an economist (cf. Thomas Robert Malthus, Alfred Marshall…). Henry Carter Adams was awarded the first Ph.D. from Johns Hopkins University.
Excerpt from a memorial presented to the Senate of the University of Michigan by S. L. Bigelow, I. L. Sharfman and R. M. Wenley, published in 1922 in The Journal of Political Economy, Vol 30. pp. 201-205.
Research Tip: Henry Carter Adams Papers at the University of Michigan.
Portrait of Henry Carter Adams: Colorized by Economics in the Rear-view Mirror.
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“[…] Henry Carter Adams was born at Davenport, Iowa, December 31, 1851. He came of old New England stock; his forebears had made the great adventure over sea in 1623. His mother, Elizabeth Douglass, and his father, Ephraim Adams, were a likeminded pair, representative of the soundest traditions of New England character and nurture. Ephraim Adams, one of a small band of missionaries from Andover Theological Seminary who forsook everything for Christ’s sake, arrived on the open prairies of Iowa in 1842—the goal of three weeks’ hard journey from Albany, New York. Their mission it was to kindle and tend the torch, not merely of religion, but also of education, among the far-flung pioneers. Consequently, it is impossible to understand why Henry Adams was what he was, became what he became, unless one can evoke sympathetic appreciation of the temper which determined his upbringing. For example, it may well astonish us to learn that his nineteenth birthday was but a few months off ere he received his first formal instruction. The reasons thereof may astonish us even more. The child had been sickly always, physicians informing the parents that he could not survive the age of fourteen. The “open prairies” proved his physical salvation. Given a cayuse [pony] and a gun, the boy roamed free, passing from missionary home to missionary home, sometimes bearing parental messages to the scattered preachers. In this way he outgrew debility and, better still, acquired a love for nature, and an intimacy with our average citizenry, never lost. Meanwhile, the elder Adams taught him Greek, Latin, and Hebrew as occasion permitted. At length, in 1869, he entered Denmark Academy whence, after a single year, he was able to proceed to Iowa College, Grinnell, where he graduated in 1874. During these five years, the man whom we knew started to shape himself.
“In the home and the wider circle of friends, the impressionable days of childhood had been molded by Puritanism. God’s providence, the responsibility of man, the absolute distinction between right and wrong, with all resultant duties and prohibitions, set the perspective. Fortunately, the characteristic Yankee interest in education—in intelligence rather than learning-—contributed a vital element. An active mind enlarged the atmosphere of the soul. Despite its straight limitations as some reckon them, here was a real culture, giving men inner harmony with self secure from disturbance from the baser passions. As we are aware now, disturbance came otherwise. To quote Adams’ own words, he was “plagued by doctrines” from the time he went to the Academy. The spiritual impress of the New England home never left him; it had been etched upon his very being. But, thus early, Calvinistic dogma aroused misgiving, because its sheer profundity bred high doubt. As a matter of course, Ephraim Adams expected his son to follow the Christian ministry, and Henry himself foresaw no other calling meantime. Hence, when skepticism assailed him, he was destined to a terrible, heart-searching experience, the worse that domestic affection drew him one way, mental integrity another. His first years at Grinnell were bootless; the prescribed studies held no attraction and, likely enough, sickness had left a certain lethargy. But, when he came to history, philosophy, and social questions, he felt a new appeal. His Junior and Senior years, eager interest stimulating, profited him much. Still dubious, he taught for a year after graduation at Nashua, Iowa. Then, bowing to paternal prayer and maternal hope, he entered Andover Theological Seminary, not to prepare for the ministry, however, but “to try himself out”—to discover whether preaching were possible for him. In the spring of 1876, he had decided irrevocably that it was not. Adams’ “first” education—education by the natal group—ended here. It had guaranteed him the grace which is the issue of moral habit, had wedded him to the conviction that justice is truth in action. For, although he abandoned certain theological formulas, the footfall of spiritual things ever echoed through his character. The union of winsome gentleness with stern devotion to humanitarian ideals, so distinctive of Professor Adams, rooted in the persistent influence of the New England conscience.
“Turning to the “second” education, destined to enrol our colleague among economic leaders, it is necessary to recall once again conditions almost forgotten now. When, forty-five years ago, an academy- and college-bred lad, destined for the ministry, found it necessary to desist, he was indeed “all at sea.” For facilities, offered on every hand today by the graduate schools of the great universities, did not exist. The youth might drift— into journalism, teaching, or what not. But drifting was not on Adams’ program. He wrote to his parents who, tragically enough, could not understand him, “I must obtain another cultural training.” His mind had dwelt already upon social, political, and economic problems; therefore, the “second” education must be non-theological. Whither could he look? At this crisis his course was set by one of those small accidents which, strange to tell, play a decisive part in many lives. By mere chance, he came upon a catalogue of Johns Hopkins University, so late in the day, moreover, that his application for a fellowship, with an essay inclosed as evidence of fitness, arrived just within time-limits. Adams was chosen one of ten Fellows from a list of more than three hundred candidates, and to Baltimore he went in the fall of 1876. His letters attest that the new, ampler opportunities attracted him strongly. He availed himself of concerts, for music always moved him. Here he heard the classics for the first time. Hitherto he had known only sacred music. Sometimes he played in church and, as records show, he sang in our choral union while a young professor. We find, too, that he served as assistant in the Johns Hopkins library, not for the extravagant salary, as he remarks humorously, but on account of access to books—”I am reading myself full.” His summers were spent in his native state, working in the fields. In 1878 he received the doctorate, the first conferred by the young and unique university.
“The day after graduation President Gilman sent for him, and told him, “You must go to Europe.” The reply was typical —”I can’t, I haven’t a cent.” Gilman continued, “I shall see what can be done,” with the result that the benefactor to whom Adams dedicated his first book found the requisite funds. Brief stays at Oxford and Paris, lengthier at Berlin and Heidelberg, filled the next fourteen months. The journalistic bee still buzzing in his head, Adams had visited Godkin before leaving for Europe to discuss the constructive political journalism he had in mind. Godkin received him kindly, but, as Adams dryly remarks, had a long way to travel ere he could understand. In the summer of 1878, President Andrew D. White, of Cornell, traveling in Germany, summoned Adams to discuss a vacancy in this university. To Adams’ huge disappointment, as the interview developed, it became apparent that White, with a nonchalance some of us remember well, had mistaken H. C. Adams, the budding economist, for H. B. Adams, the budding historian. The vacancy was in history, not in political science or economics. Expectation vanished in thin air. But Adams was not done with. Returning to his pension, he sat up all night to draft the outline of a course of lectures which, as he bluntly put it, “Cornell needed.” Next day he sought President White again who, being half-persuaded by Adams’ verbal exposition, kept the document, saying he would communicate with Cornell, requesting that a place be made for the course if possible. Writing from Saratoga, in September, 1879, Adams tells his mother that all is off at Cornell, that he must abandon his career and buckle down to earning a livelihood. A lapse of ten days transformed the scene. The Cornell appointment had been arranged, and he went to Ithaca forthwith. So meager were the facilities then offered in the general field of the social sciences that Adams gave one semester, at Cornell and Johns Hopkins respectively, to these subjects in the year 1879-80. The same arrangement continued till 1886, Michigan being substituted for Johns Hopkins in 1881. As older men recall, Dr. Angell taught economics, in addition to international law, till the time of his transfer to Pekin as Minister to China. At this juncture, Adams joined us, forming a life-long association. He himself says that he “gave up three careers—preaching, journalism, and reform—to devote himself to teaching” where he believed his mission lay. […]”
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Image source: Henry Carter Adams Page at the NNDB website.
