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Harvard Ph.D. Alumnus (1906) and Berkeley Professor Stuart Daggett

I have my eye out for such Faculty memorial minutes like the following from the University of California System for Berkeley professor Stuart Daggett. In the previous post you can find the list of fields chosen by Daggett for his doctoral examination.

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Stuart Daggett, Transportation Engineering: Berkeley
by E. T. Grether, I. B. Cross, and P. S. Taylor

Stuart Daggett was born on March 2, 1881, in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. His career ended on December 22, 1954, at his home in Berkeley. It was characteristic of him that on the same day on which his final illness struck him, he had been at the University collecting materials dealing with the St. Lawrence Seaway. Although he had just sent to his publisher the revised manuscript of the fourth edition of his monumental Principles of Inland Transportation, first published in 1928, he was already beginning another major investigation. His physician has remarked that it would have been mental and physical bondage for Stuart Daggett to have given up systematic scholarly pursuits.

Stuart Daggett received all three of his degrees, the A.B. in 1903, the A.M. in 1904, and the Ph.D in 1906, from Harvard University. During 1906 to 1909 he was Instructor at Harvard, but in 1909 accepted appointment to the University of California as Assistant Professor of Railway Economics on the Flood Foundation. From that day until his death he was a faculty member at Berkeley. When he came to the campus he joined that small, distinguished pioneering company of scholars in economics, which then included Adolph C. Miller, Wesley Clair Mitchell, Carl Copping Plehn, Lincoln Hutchinson, Jessica B. Peixotto, A. W. Whitney, and Henry Rand Hatfield. Professor Daggett was the last surviving member of this group. His notable contributions to teaching, research, scholarly writing, and University and public service over the years more than amply justified the wisdom of the University administration in bringing him into this extraordinarily able assembly of economists. Only six years after his arrival at the University, he was appointed Professor of Transportation on the Flood Foundation.

Professor Daggett was the author of numerous books, contributions to scholarly publications, and reviews. Among his most significant publications were Railroad Reorganization, Chapters on the History of the Southern Pacific, Principles of Inland Transportation (four editions), Railroad Consolidation West of the Mississippi River, and Structure of Transcontinental Railroad Rates.

Professor Daggett was often called upon to render federal, state, and local public service. In 1912 he served as expert for a committee to advise the governor of California on the equalization of taxes. During World War I, he was with the War Industries Board, Division of Planning and Statistics. In 1924 he was expert for the Presidential Committee on Coördination of Rail and Water Facilities. During World War II, he was public member of various War Labor Board panels. He also made important contributions to private industry in various ways, including publication in trade papers, participation in business conferences, and acting as private arbitrator.

Professor Daggett’s greatest influence, however, was through his services as a teacher, administrator, and colleague on the faculty of the University of California. In the classroom his lectures were marked by extraordinary care in preparation and presentation. Running through the orderly discussion were numerous evidences of subtle humor, much to the delight of those students whose thirst for knowledge included also an appreciation of the lighter touch. His judicious temperament and ability in carrying heavy responsibilities brought him many demands in University government and administration. From 1920 to 1927 he was Dean of the College of Commerce (replaced by the School of Business Administration in 1943). The truest evidence of his stature among his colleagues was his inevitable membership or chairmanship on those committees concerned with the most serious, urgent, and critical issues of University government. Over the years, he was a member or chairman of almost all of the leading committees of the Academic Senate, and in 1948 became its Vice-Chairman. In 1951, on the recommendation of the Senate committee, he was elected Faculty Research Lecturer, the highest accolade bestowed by the Academic Senate.

Stuart Daggett was truly one of the great statesmen of the University of California. In a sense, too, he may be characterized as a “professor’s professor,” for he possessed to a high degree so many of the talents and qualities characteristic of the academic scholar–objectivity, meticulous precision, unyielding integrity, high standards of performance and personal dignity. His intimates and members of his immediate family realized that behind his reserve and dignity there was also warm friendliness, kindliness, affection, and a high degree of sensitivity.

 

Source: Academic Senate of the University of California System. University of California: In Memoriam [1957], pp. 45-47.

Image Source:  University of California Yearbook. Blue and Gold, 1922.