Books on Duke's History

At long last the first history of Duke as a university has appeared with the current release of Robert F. Durden's The Launching of Duke University, 1924-1949 (Duke Press, pp. 572). This completes a trilogy of books, each very valuable but quite different, about the history of the institution. In 1950 the Duke Press published Nora C. Chaffin's Trinity College 1839-1892: the Beginnings of Duke University. Unfortunately out of print, Chaffin's volume remains the only detailed account of the history of the precursor institutions to Duke University before the school moved to Durham. Encyclopedic in nature with a helpful complete index, the volume recounts the transition from Brown's Schoolhouse to Union Institute in 1839, the brief experiment as Normal College, and the change to Trinity College in 1859 with successful affiliation with the Methodist Church. It also serves as an excellent representative history of the development of private higher education in the south. Since one man, Braxton Craven, dominated the school in the nineteenth century, Chaffin's account could be considered a biography of one of the country's foremost educators as well.

Earl W. Porter's Trinity and Duke, 1892-1924 (Duke Press, 1964, pp. 274) recounts the history of the college after it relocated to Durham and before it became a university. Eminently readable, Porter's account has colorful personalities like President John C. Kilgo, quiet yet no less forceful and significant characters like Washington and Benjamin N. Duke, and dramatic events such as the controversy over academic freedom concerning Professor John Spencer Bassett. It clearly describes the development of Trinity College in Durham into one of the regions strongest liberal arts colleges worthy of being the basis of a private research university.

Now Durden's narrative carries the chronological story from the dramatic turn of events with James B. Duke's unprecedented gift in 1924 to the transition to post World War II leadership with the selection of A. Hollis Edens as president in 1949. Perhaps this initial volume of the university's history has been a long time coming because of the complexity of the story. With university status one immediately has to deal with the history of a school of religion, graduate school, law school, medical school, and school of forestry as well as the undergraduate school of Trinity College with its engineering, nursing and separate men's and women's components. Author of the acclaimed The Dukes of Durham, 1865 to 1929 (Duke Press, 1975, pp. 295) Durden is well prepared for the task. He is accomplished in making clear generalizations out of complicated developments and he does not shirk controversy. The reader will discover an obvious hero in President William Preston Few but Few's trials over developing a proper form of university governance are not glossed over.

Even though Durden's volume is a well told story it raises questions as an initial narrative should. The University and the history of higher education ideally would be served if this volume would prompt more detailed accounts of each of Duke's professional and undergraduate schools. Only the medical school has the beginnings of its own history with the publication of James F. Gifford's The Evolution of a Medical Center: A History of Medicine at Duke University to 1941 (Duke Press, 1972, pp. 249). A variety of additional publications about Duke's long institutional history exists. Too little known but greatly valued nevertheless, are The Papers and Addresses of William Preston Few (Duke Press, 1951, pp 369) by Robert F. Woody, The Architecture of Duke University (Duke Press, 1939, pp. 74) by William Blackburn, and The Library of the Woman's College, Duke University, 1930-1972 (Regulator Press, 1978, pp. 140) by Betty Irene Young. Several undergraduate honors papers in the University Archives also are outstanding additions to the historical record. Durden's new history is highly recommended and it should play a vital part in helping the university understand its role in 1993. It also will be highly successful if it prompts further investigation in a variety of published works or prompts one to adding to the record of the rich and varied history of the institution.

Since the above was written, several other works have been published:

William E. King's If Gargoyles Could Talk: Sketches of Duke University (Durham, N.C. : Carolina Academic Press, 1997) is a compilation of his "Duke University Historical Notes" articles in The Duke Dialogue on various aspects of Duke's history.

Jean Bradely Anderson. Campus Club, Duke University: A History (Durham, N.C. : J.B. Anderson, 1998) tells the story of a faculty wives club.

Duke historian Robert F. Durden has released several works:

• Lasting Legacy to the Carolinas: The Duke Endowment, 1924-1994, was published by (Durham: Duke University Press, 1998).
• Electrifying the Piedmont Carolinas : the Duke Power Company, 1904-1997 (Durham, N.C. : Carolina Academic Press, c2001).
• Bold entrepreneur : a life of James B. Duke (Durham, NC : Carolina Academic Press, c2003)

©1993 . William E. King
University Archivist 1972-2002
This article originally appeared in Duke Dialogue, April 30, 1993