DAVID C. ELLIOT (1917 – 2007) INTERVIEWED BY CAROL BUGÉ April – May, 1986 Photo taken in 1967 ARCHIVES CALIFORNIA INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY Pasadena, California Subject area History Abstract Interview conducted in five sessions, April and May 1986, by Carol Bugé with David Clephan Elliot, professor of history, emeritus, who arrived at Caltech in 1950 as an assistant professor, was appointed full professor by 1960, and served as the humanities and social sciences division’s executive officer from 1967 to 1971, as well as the secretary of the faculty from 1973-1985. Born and raised in Scotland, he received his MA in 1939 from the University of St. Andrews. In 1940 the British government sent Elliot to India, where he spent six years in the Punjab region working for the Indian Civil Service. In 1947, Elliot entered Harvard University, where he received an AM in 1948 and a PhD in 1951; later, in 1956, he also received an MA from Oxford University, where he studied international organizational law. The interview begins with Elliot discussing his early years in Scotland, the outbreak of World War II, meeting his future wife Nancy, and his experiences in India. He then goes on to discuss his decision to settle in the U.S., and more http://resolver.caltech.edu/CaltechOH:OH_Elliot_D specifically his arrival in California in 1950. His recollections of the 1950s and 1960s at Caltech include descriptions of the makeup and character of the campus and the students; the humanities division under the chairmanship of Hallett Smith; and later, with the addition of the social sciences to the division, the gradual shift in emphasis from teaching and survey courses to research and specialization, which took place under the helm of Robert Huttenback. Elliot discusses History 5 and the eventual development of the California Seminar on Arms Control and Foreign Policy. He recounts the visit of Alexander Topchev and other Soviet scientists to Caltech in the early sixties. Elliot compares and contrasts the Caltech presidencies of Lee DuBridge, Harold Brown, and Marvin Goldberger: the men, their respective policies, and their influences on the campus. This includes recollections of: Linus Pauling’s political activities, the Honker Group, the La Belle tenure case, the Arroyo Center, and Caltech’s seventy-fifth anniversary. Throughout the interview there are interesting anecdotes regarding a wide variety of individuals: Dr. and Mrs. Robert A. Millikan, Hallett Smith, Alan Sweezy, Matthew Meselson, Carl Rogers, Robert Huttenback, Robert Christy, Harold Brown, Roger Noll, Rochus Vogt, Marvin Goldberger, Phillips Talbot, Matthew Sands, Dean Acheson, General Lauris Norstad, Charles Lauritsen, Albert Hibbs. Elliot concludes the interview discussing his retirement, his years as secretary of the faculty and a member of the steering committee; offers from other institutions; his association with trustees; consulting work for RAND, NASA, and the Ford Foundation; and his research on London during the English Restoration as well as the Vista Project. Administrative information Access The interview is unrestricted. Copyright Copyright has been assigned to the California Institute of Technology © 1988, 2008. All requests for permission to publish or quote from the transcript must be submitted in writing to the University Archivist. Preferred citation Elliot, David C. Interview by Carol Bugé. Pasadena, California, April-May 1986. Oral History Project, California Institute of Technology Archives. Retrieved [supply date of retrieval] from the World Wide Web: http://resolver.caltech.edu/CaltechOH:OH_Elliot_D http://resolver.caltech.edu/CaltechOH:OH_Elliot_D Contact information Archives, California Institute of Technology Mail Code 015A-74 Pasadena, CA 91125 Phone: (626)395-2704 Fax: (626)793-8756 Email: [email protected] Graphics and content © 2008 California Institute of Technology. http://resolver.caltech.edu/CaltechOH:OH_Elliot_D CALIFORNIA INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY ARCHIVES ORAL HISTORY PROJECT INTERVIEW WITH DAVID C. ELLIOT BY CAROL BUGÉ PASADENA, CALIFORNIA Caltech Archives, 1988 Copyright © 1988, 2008 by the California Institute of Technology http://resolver.caltech.edu/CaltechOH:OH_Elliot_D Elliot–ii TABLE OF CONTENTS INTERVIEW WITH DAVID C. ELLIOT From Birth to World War II 1–5 Birthplace; father’s ministry; mother’s death; education; Berlin visit in 1935; University of St. Andrews and the Harkness scholarship; interest in history; Alan Simpson’s influence; anecdotes about the Simpsons; junior year abroad program; University of St. Andrews anecdote; visit with Nancy (his future wife) in Tennessee at outbreak of World War II. Indian Civil Service 5–14 India Office; experiences in India; Nancy’s prolonged attempts to join him in India; the declaration of intent; marriage deed; Nancy’s arrival in India; marriage in Lahore Cathedral. Beginning of Academic Career 14–19 Decision to come to U.S.; departure from India in January 1947; choice of Harvard for graduate study; Oxford degrees; research interests; Harvard PhD; two children; Rodman Paul and Godfrey Davis; Caltech offer in December 1949; arrival in Pasadena, summer of 1950. Caltech in the Fifties 19–29 Welcome by Hallett Smith; courses; emphasis on undergraduate teaching; George Tanham; Melvin Brockie; Herbert Nash; first impressions; congeniality of Caltech people; psychologist John Weir, admissions, and sensitivity training; all male school; first women graduate students in the fifties; scientific atmosphere; unsophisticated students; effort to improve students’ manners; students during Korean War; ROTC; post-World War II students’ characteristics; Fred Anson; Howard Berg; Neal Pings; Matthew Meselson (Elliot’s best student). The Humanities Division, 1950s to 1969 29–35 Gradual shift in emphasis from teaching to research; Daniel Kevles; Peter Fay; social contacts with students; Master of Student Houses, traditionally from humanities till recently; function of division; social sciences approach; Bruce Cain; division more disparate since late sixties; restructuring curriculum; loss of History 5, with its general approach, taught by Elliot and Alan Sweezy; humanities lunch table’s demise; growth of social scientists—aggressive economists; attitude of English faculty; Elliot’s reason for giving support to social scientists in late fifties and http://resolver.caltech.edu/CaltechOH:OH_Elliot_D Elliot–iii early sixties; split over psychologists’ approaches; Ted Scudder’s approach versus Charles Plott’s; the economists: Burt Klein, Lance Davis, Roger Noll. The Humanities Division, 1970 to 1986 35–48 Robert Huttenback; promotion of graduate program in social sciences; Hallett Smith’s difficulties as division head; the revolt against Smith and Elliot (as division executive officer) by social scientists; Elliot’s heart attack in December 1970; Harold Brown as the new president; Brown’s quick replacement of Smith by Huttenback; decision to limit division chairmen to five- year term; Brown as a good administrator; Lee DuBridge’s style; Huttenback as division head and as Dean of Students; Smith’s style; the Jenijoy LaBelle case; formalization of procedures a result of that case; Robert Millikan, Harold Wayland, and a microscope; process of changes in humanities division since fifties; relations with Caltech scientists; good “explainers” George Beadle, Robert Bacher, Francis Clauser, and Charles Lauritsen; Ruth Tolman; Roger Noll as division chairman; Noll’s love of challenging Harold Brown in meetings; Bob Sharp’s comment on their confrontations; engineers’ discontent with economists’ growing strength; loss of Marty Ward and the Baxter Art Gallery; complications resulting from Noll’s ability to get Murph Goldberger’s approval for additional people in the humanities division; philosophers Alan Donagan and Brian Barry; overall stability of division. Early Caltech Personalities 49–52 Clinton Judy; William Bennett Munro; Robert Millikan; Mrs. Millikan; Millikan’s legacy to Caltech Y; Elliot as chairman of Y in the fifties; Wes Hershey, and the Leaders of America program—Elliot’s “first leadership experience;” Elliot, DuBridge and Freshman Camp; characteristics of the Millikan and DuBridge administrations; Earnest Watson’s and Frances Humphrey’s skills; impressive divisional chairmen of that era: Smith, Beadle, Sharp, Bacher, Lindvall, and Pauling. Attitudes in the Fifties 52–55 Upheaval over Linus Pauling’s activities regarding nuclear testing, and the AEC’s Louis Strauss; trustee Reese Taylor’s resignation; Pauling’s dissatisfaction with the administration; Matt Sand and others’ public stand during ’56 election; Robert Oppenheimer case; Edward Teller; division relatively untouched by national security issues; VISTA Project; JPL; William Pickering and History 5 course; government funding of research’s effect on Caltech salaries and attitudes. The Sixties 55–63 Bacher’s formation of the Honker Group; Carl Rogers; faculty complaints about Caltech; no- grades-in-freshman-year policy; policy’s influence on division’s social sciences; the Honkers and Carl Rogers; Bacher and the Honkers; DuBridge, the sixties, and approaching retirement; Hallett http://resolver.caltech.edu/CaltechOH:OH_Elliot_D Elliot–iv Smith’s disinterest in change; Geology department’s changes in late fifties; Ian Campbell’s departure; problems between humanities and engineering; Elliot and Robert Daugherty visit California water system dam and pumping station; Daugherty and the progress of hydraulic engineering; attitudes towards physics and humanities at