Edwin F. Gay was hired as instructor to cover the economic history field left vacant by the departure of William Ashley for the University of Birmingham in 1901. By the end of his first semester (December 1902) he was promoted to an assistant professorship. Medieval economic history proved not to be a magnet for student enrollment (I am shocked to report) so he began to give greater emphasis to “modern” European economic history.
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Getting to 1903-1904
The outstanding feature of Gay’s years of study abroad is their number. He went to Europe expecting to return within two years, but stayed twelve and a half. Instead of getting his Ph.D. after working for three or four semesters on medieval history, he spent nine in universities–three in Leipzig, five in Berlin, and one in Zurich; then for seven years he studied privately; and finally, after being registered for three more semesters in Berlin but attending no classes, he wrote a dissertation on a theme in economic history, took his examinations, and was granted his degree in the summer of 1902….[p.30]
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…[Gay] arrived in Harvard somewhat nervous about the reception he was likely to receive. Apart from the President, the only men who knew him — Gross and Haskins — were in the history department. His position, junior and temporary, was in the economics department, yet the economists had played no part in choosing him. When he visited Cambridge for his interview, he met neither the veteran F.W. Taussig nor the recently appointed younger men, Carver and Ripley. Apart from a very brief encounter with Carver in Berlin in the summer of 1902, he was a complete stranger to all his associates….[p. 63]
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…By Christmas, 1902, [Gay] felt confident that he was holding the attention and interest of his students. By that time he also had learned, through T. N. Carver, chairman of the department, what the students thought of his work: they said it was so stiff and heavy in its demands that “whenever you see any of us going around with circles under our eyes, you can know we are taking Gay’s course.” There were very few of them at first; the medieval story [10 students] and the German economists [4 students] did not attract much attention… [p. 61]
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…by Christmas 1902, [Gay] was informed the department wanted him to stay and before his first year ended he was raised to the rank of assistant professor of economics with a tenure of five years. In recommending the promotion Carver wrote to [President] Eliot: “His scholarship is of the very highest type and his success as a classroom lectureer is unqualified, as shown by his work this year.” [p. 64]
Source: Herbert Heaton, A Scholar in Action: Edwin F. Gay. Cambridge (Massachusetts), Harvard University Press, 1952.
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Related posts
A short bibliography for “serious students” of economic history assembled by Gay and published in 1910 has also been posted.
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ECONOMICS 11
Course Enrollment
1903-04
Economics 11. Asst. Professor Gay. — The Modern Economic History of Europe.
Total 18: 10 Graduates, 2 Seniors, 2 Juniors, 4 Sophomores.
Source: Harvard University. Report of the President of Harvard College, 1903-1904, p. 66.
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ECONOMICS 11
Mid-Year Examination, 1903-04
- Explain briefly:—
(a) convertible husbandry.
(b) bodgers.
(c) book of rates.
(d) Gutsherrschaft.
(e) lettre de maîtrise.
(f) Fondaco dei Tedeschi.
- Describe briefly, with indication of the bearing on wider questions:—
(a) The divergent views as to the security of copyhold tenure in the sixteenth century.
(b) The organization of the Florentine woollen industry.
(c) The rise of the Merchant Adventurers.
- Comment on the following passage:—
“Everie day some of us encloseth a plote of his ground to pasture; and weare it not that oure grounde lieth in the common feildes, intermingled one with a nother, I thincke also oure feildes had bene enclosed, of a common agreement of all the townshippe, longe ere this time.”
- Give an account of the gild system of industry in England, emphasizing the analogies and contrasts with the continent.
- It is estimated that the following series of figures represents the change in the average purchasing power of wages in England:
|
1451-1500 |
100 |
|
1501-1520 |
88 |
|
1521-1550 |
70 |
|
1551-1570 |
57 |
| 1571-1602 |
47 |
| 1603-1652 |
40 |
| 1653-1702 |
47 |
(a) How would you construct such a series and what is its value?
(b) What caused the change thus indicated and what were its effects?
Source: Harvard University Archives. Harvard University, Mid-year examinations 1852-1943. Box 7, Bound volume: Examination Papers, Mid-Years, 1903-04.
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ECONOMICS 11
Year-End Examination, 1903-04
I. Explain briefly:—
(1) contractus trinius.
(2) two forms of capitation.
(3) Gesellenverbände.
(4) Gulden and Thaler.
(5) the vend.
(6) Exchequer Bills
(7) the Molasses Act.
(8) roundsmen.
II. Describe briefly:—
(1) the influence of the Civil War on English economic history.
(2) the distinction between the economic views of Whigs and Tories.
III.
(1) State the chief provisions and significance of
(a) the Statute of Artificers (1563),
(b) the Navigation Act (1660), and
(c) the Corn Law of 1688.
(2) When in England was the policy embodied in each of the above statutes changed, and under what circumstances?
(3) Indicate the analogies and contrasts of this English policy in relation to industry, commerce, and agriculture with the policies of France and Holland in the seventeenth century.
IV.
When and why did indirect taxation become prominent in Western Europe?
V. Comment on the following statement:
“the domestic system existed [in England] from the earliest times till it was superseded by capitalism; … craft gilds were a form of industrial organization which was appropriate to the domestic, rather than to the capitalist system.”
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, … in Harvard College, pp. 33-34.
Image Source: Edwin F. Gay, seated in office, 1908. From Wikipedia. Colorized by Economics in the Rear-view Mirror