General David P.
Barrows
From the California Monthly's, Our Distinguished Faculty
1950
The complexity of modern living seems sound
evidence for the belief that life is too short for one man to become really
acquainted with it. But David Prescott Barrows, retired general, formerly
University president and, as President Robert Gordon Sproul once said,
"sometime" professor of political science, is living proof that such
is not the case.
A brief recapitulation of General Barrows'
thirty-three years of service to the University is all that is necessary for
one to understand that President Sproul's remark, "sometime"
professor was made out of inspired respect and not in empty jest. Those years
were broken by more than five years of absence --- all devoted to public and
military service, but General Barrows is still remembered by his students as
an inspiring teacher.
In 1916, General Barrows served under Herbert
Hoover in food administration in Belgium. He subsequently saw service as a
major in the First World War. Following his retirement from the presidency of
the University in 1923, he spent a year in Europe and Africa --- where he took
a 2500 mile tour of the interior. In Latin America, he was a visiting
professor under the auspices of the Carnegie Endowment for International
Peace. Then, in 1933 and 1934, he was the Theodore Roosevelt professor at the
University of Berlin.
Appointed major general after the First World
War, he commanded the 40th Combat Division of the U. S. National Guard. In the
first war, this division served in France. In the second war, it served in
Melanesia and the Philippine islands.
Retired from the army in 1937, General Barrows
had no active duty with his division in the last war. But in 1941, he became
an expert consultant to the Secretary of War and in 1942 he acted as San
Francisco representative to the director of War Information. He retired from
this position to finish his last year as a teacher at the University.
Those were the "University Years."
They were packed with rich experiences. But if experiences were his only
wealth, General Barrows was "well-to-do" long before he ever came to
the University.
Of New England ancestry which goes back to an early colonist
who settled in Salem, Massachusetts, in 1637, General Barrows grew up on a
ranch in Ventura county.
The influences of California ranch life in the 1879's upon
General Barrow's boyhood probably had something to do with his choice of
recreation in later years. His favorites are hunting, camping and riding. His
love of horses continued throughout his army and academic careers.
As an officer equal in physical strength and stamina to any of
his men, the General celebrated his sixtieth birthday by taking a string of
horses and riding 100 miles.
Another report says that in the early 20's, the secretary of
the Political Science department was a former orderly of the General's.
The man had only two tasks --- to light a pipe for the general and see that
his horse was waiting in front of South hall every evening.
With his sister, Charlotte, General Barrows entered
preparatory department of Pomona college on the day it opened. Since social
studies were not available at Pomona, he came to the University when he
graduated in 1894 to study political science under Bernard Moses whom he
succeeded as professor of Political science in 1912. Further education was
received at the school of politics and public law at Columbia and at the
University of Chicago, where, by reason of published studies of American
Indians, he was appointed a Fellow in Anthropology. In June, 1927, he was
granted at Chicago, the degree of Doctor of Philosophy.
His first teaching position was held at San Diego State
Teachers' college where he was professor of history.
In 1900, when President McKinley appointed the Taft Philippine
commission to reorganize government in those islands, General Barrows became a
member. "It met my deepest yearning," he recalls, "but to this
day I do not know how or why this appointment occurred."
For one year, he was in charge of Manila schools. He was then
appointed chief of the Bureau of Non-Christian tribes and spent almost two
years in reconnaissance of the the little known portions of the Philippines
and in negotiations with primitive tribes, the Sultans of Sulu and Magindanao
and other Moro datus.
In August, 1903, General Barrows was appointed by Taft to
direct educational efforts in the islands. At the end of five years, through
his work and the natural ambition of the people, thousands of young native
teachers had taken over the rural or barrio schools and a system of
primary, intermediate and high schools was in operation.
When he became professor of education at the University in
1910, and later chairman of the political science department, General Barrows
planned to use his position to develop a field of studies in Spanish-American
institutions and relations.
Even though this was the time of the Mexican revolution,
General Barrows made six trips south of the border during actual fighting. But
continuing revolt and the request by President Wheeler for administrative help
ended much of what he tried to do.
"I owed much to Benjamin Ide Wheeler that I could never
repay," General Barrows explains. He was first dean of the graduate
school, then dean of the faculties --- a sort of chief of staff to the
president. In 1913, when Wheeler, in failing health, went to Europe, he became
acting president. He held this position up to the time of the First World War.
After the war, General Barrows was reappointed president at a
time when difficulties surrounding the University were exceptional. Enrollment
had doubled. Facilities were inadequate. Academic salaries were far too low.
Aware of what it might mean to his reputation if the money were not granted,
President Barrows nevertheless asked authority to create a financial deficit
of $1,000,000 in his first year. Fortunately, the state legislature made the
funds available. By three successive increases in as many years, academic
salaries were brought to a satisfactory plane.
"This much done," General Barrows will tell you,
"I was ready to resign. I had over twenty years of exacting
administrative work. The regents accepted my resignation with the request that
I continue for one more year. When that was finished I turned to the freedom
which I had long coveted and which I still enjoy. The great reward which
continues with me from my experience; both as president and professor, is the
warm and generous attachment of the men and women I first knew as
students."
__________
_____. "Our Distinguished Faculty:
General David Prescott Barrows." California Monthly.
Vol. LXI, Alumni Publication,
University of California, No. 2 (October, 1950),
pp. 22, 38.
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