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While working on a list of University of Chicago Ph.D.’s in economics, I came across the press report (transcribed below) of the tragic death of an early pioneer in the field of labor economics (then known as “labor problems”) at the University of Chicago.
What might have been, had this scholar’s life not ended so early?
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Hoxie, Robert Franklin in the Columbia Encyclopedia (6th ed.)
Charles Robert McCann, Jr. and Vibha Kapuria-Foreman. “Robert Franklin Hoxie: The Contributions of a Neglected Chicago Economist” in Research in the History of Economic Thought and Methodology 34(B), September 2016: 210-304.
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Robert Franklin Hoxie: Life and Career
1868, April 29. Born in Edmeston, New York.
1893. Ph.B., University of Chicago.
1893-6. Fellow in Political Economy.
1897-8. Acting Professor of Political Economy, Cornell College, Iowa.
1898-1901. Instructor in Economics, Washington University.
1901-2. Acting Professor of Political Economy and Political Science, Washington and Lee University.
1903. Fellow in Political Economy, University of Chicago.
1905. Ph.D., University of Chicago. An analysis of the concepts of demand and supply in their relation to market price. Published as The Demand and Supply Concepts. An Introduction to the Study of Market Price. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1906.
1903-6. Instructor in Economics, Cornell University.
1906-8. Instructor in Political Economy, University of Chicago.
1908-12. Assistant Professor in Political Economy, University of Chicago.
1915. Scientific Management and Labor. New York: D. Appleton and Company.
1912-16. Associate Professor in Political Economy, University of Chicago.
1914-15. Appointee of United States Commission on Industrial Relations.
1916, June 22. Died [suicide].
1917. Publication of Hoxie’s notes and lectures on trade unionism by Lucie B. Hoxie and Nathan Fine: Trade Unionism in the United States, with an Introduction by E. H. Downey. New York: D. Appleton and Company.
2006. Publication of “Robert Hoxie’s Introductory Lecture on the Nature of the History of Political Economy [1915]: The History of Economic Thought as the History of Error.” Edited by Luca Fiorito and Warren J. Samuels in Research in the History of Economic Thought and Methodology, Vol. 24-C, 49-97.
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TEACHER SUICIDE
Professor Takes Life While Suffering Mental Collapse
Prof. R. F. Hoxie Takes His Life
University of Chicago Student of Labor Problems Cuts His Throat
Robert Franklin Hoxie, associate professor of political economy in the University of Chicago, committed suicide yesterday.
Prof. Hoxie had been for years the subject of a nervous depression, his associates said yesterday upon learning of his death. He was constantly in charge of a physician.
While worry over the justice of his economic conclusions was not a direct cause of his act, his desire to view labor problems scientifically was regarded as the keynote of his career. He has been charged with bias resulting from labor affiliations and socialistic leanings. He denied this, and seemed overanxious to maintain a position of scientific neutrality in his studies.
He was to have delivered his first lecture of the summer term yesterday. He had asked his physician, Dr. Archibald Church, if he would be permitted to meet his classes. Dr. Church told him he could do so with safety. When it came time to leave his home at 6021 Woodlawn avenue for the university he was unable to go.
Unable to Meet Class.
“I haven’t the power to meet the pupils,” he told Mrs. Hoxie. “I think you had better have a notice to that effect posted on the bulletin board.”
Mrs. Hoxie left the house, and in a few moments had placed on the bulletin board the note saying that Prof. Hoxie would not lecture. She returned home, and upon entering found her husband lying on the floor. He had cut his throat and severed the veins of his wrist. Mrs. Hoxie’s screams brought neighbors.
There was an inquest in the afternoon, at which it was determined that the professor had taken his own life in a fit of insanity.
Praise from Judson.
“He was a very enthusiastic student of his subject,” said President Harry Pratt Judson of the university, “and a very able student of labor conditions. His death is a distinct loss to the university. He had been in ill health for years and it is a tribute to his will power that he forced himself to continue in his work as he did.”
Samuel Gompers, president of the American Federation of Labor, who was in the city yesterday, said Prof. Hoxie had done more toward the study of labor problems than any other man.
Prof. Hoxie left besides his widow a son of 4 and a daughter 2 years old.
He was statistician for the United States commission on industrial relations and was associate editor of the Journal of Political Economy. He was the author of a work on political economy and numerous articles. He had been a member of the faculties of Cornell college, Washington and Lee university, and Cornell university. His most recent work was a study of scientific management.
Source: Chicago Tribune, June 23, 1916, p. 1.
Image Source: University of Chicago Photographic Archive, apf1-02878, Special Collections Research Center, University of Chicago Library.