Judging from his faculty photos published in the Harvard Classbook Oliver Mitchell Wentworth Sprague (1873-1953) was an assistant professor of economics with boyish good looks. His main field was banking and finance but he carried on Charles Dunbar’s interest in monetary and financial history in both his teaching and his research. He was sort of a Charles Kindleberger in his day, see his History of crises under the national banking system (Washington, Gov’t Print. Off., 1910, 1911).
__________________________
Course Enrollment
1904-05
Economics 6. Asst. Professor Sprague. — Economic and Financial History of the United States.
Total 79: 9 Graduates, 13 Seniors, 42 Juniors, 12 Sophomores, 3 Others.
Source: Harvard University. Report of the President of Harvard College, 1904-1905, p. 74.
__________________________
Course Description
1904-05
[Economics] 6. The Economic and Financial History of the United States. Tu., Th., Sat., at 9. Asst. Professor Sprague.
Course 6 gives a general survey of the economic history of the United States from the close of the eighteenth century to the present time, and aims to show on the one hand the mode in which economic principles are illustrated by American experience and, on the other, the extent to which economic conditions have influenced social and political development. The following are among the subjects considered: aspects of the Revolution and commercial relations during the Confederation and the European wars; the history of the protective tariff policy and the growth of manufacturing industries; the settlement of the West and the history of transportation, including the early canal and turnpike enterprises of the states, the various phases of railway building and the establishment of public regulation of railways; various aspects of agrarian history, such as the public land policy, the growth of foreign demand for American produce and the subsequent competition of other sources of supply; certain social topics, such as slavery and its economic basis, emancipation and the present condition of the Negro, and the effects of immigration. Comparisons will be made from time to time with the contemporary economic history of Europe. Finally the more important features of our currency and financial history are reviewed.
The course is taken advantageously with or after History 13. It is open to students who have taken Economics 1, and also to Seniors who are taking that course.
Source: Harvard University. Faculty of Arts and Sciences. Division of History and Political Science Comprising the Departments of History and Government and Economics, 1904-05 (May 16, 1904), pp. 40-41.
__________________________
ECONOMICS 6
Mid-year Examination, 1904-05
- Mention at least five of the means by which, according to Hamilton, manufactures may be encouraged. Comment upon the one which he considers at greatest length, and as probably the most effective.
- Compare the views of Hamilton and Gallatin upon the effect which the trade policy of other countries should have upon that of the United States.
- What section of the country suffered most severely from the separation from England?
- (Take seven.) Whitney, Slater, Dallas, Cheeves, Biddle, McDuffie, Guthrie, Taney, Walker, Morrill.
- United States monetary legislation, 1830-1860.
- What lessons may be drawn from the financial experience of the Government during (a) the War of 1812; (b) the years following the Crises of 1837 and 1857?
- Mention by date and character (more or less protective) the chief tariff acts between 1810 and 1860.
- The relation of tariffs to crises to 1860.
- The policy adopted with reference to their debts by Ohio, Michigan, and Mississippi.
Source: Harvard University Archives. . Harvard University. Mid-year Examinations, 1852-1943. Box 7, Bound Volume: Examination Papers, Mid-Years 1904-05.
__________________________
ECONOMICS 6
Year-end Examination, 1904-05
- (a) The negro and the cultivation of tobacco.
(b) The negro death rate.
(c) The negro in the North. - Protection and the iron industry before and after the Civil War.
- The taxation policy of Congress in successive wars.
- Government deficits and the currency, 1893-96. Would the situation have been essentially different if the act of 1900 had been in operation during those years?
- The act of 1894 as a free trade measure.
- Treasury arrangements for the resumption of specie payments.
- The policy and the results of refunding under the acts of 1870 and 1900.
- Wages and prices, 1890-1903.
Source: Harvard University Archives. Harvard University, Examination Papers 1873-1915. Box 7, Bound volume: Examination Papers, 1904-05; Papers Set for Final Examinations in History, Government, Economics,…,Music in Harvard College (June, 1905), p. 26.
Image Source: Harvard University. Quinquennial Catalogue of the Officers and Graduates, 1636-1920. Cambridge, Massachusetts, 1920. Front cover.