Carl F. Hovde, Former Columbia Dean, Dies at 82
Carl F. Hovde, who as dean of the undergraduate school at Columbia University played a key role in restoring calm to the campus after six weeks of student protests in the spring of 1968, died on Saturday at his home in New Canaan, Conn. He was 82.
The cause was lung cancer, his wife, Bertha Betts, said.
A lanky, boyish-looking professor of comparative English literature, Dr. Hovde brought a soft-spoken equanimity to the post of dean of Columbia College when he was appointed in July 1968.
Traditionally, deans had been nominated by the university president and approved by the board. But in part to meet student demands for greater faculty and student participation in the university’s decision-making, Dr. Hovde (pronounced HUV-dee) was subject to a revised selection process in which he was nominated by a committee of three faculty members and six administrators, then approved by the university president, Grayson L. Kirk.
“It is clear that things at Columbia need changing, and the sit-ins and the demonstrations were not without cause,” Dr. Hovde said at the time.
The war protests, led largely by the Students for a Democratic Society, began on April 23, 1968, as an attempt to end Columbia’s ties to the Institute for Defense Analyses, a consortium that did research for the government, and to halt construction of a gymnasium in Morningside Park, which protesters portrayed as a symbol of indifference to the interests of the Harlem community. Five buildings were occupied during the first week of the turmoil; windows were shattered; records were burned. Dr. Kirk called in the police, and hundreds of officers in riot gear cleared the buildings. About 700 students were arrested, mostly on charges of criminal trespassing. The protests continued and the campus was frozen for five more weeks.
Early in the unrest, Dr. Hovde was part of a three-member faculty committee that created a joint disciplinary committee composed of seven students, seven professors and three administrators. The committee drafted guidelines for disciplining student demonstrators.
As dean, Dr. Hovde called for the university to drop criminal trespassing charges against students. That, he told Newsweek magazine, “is a difference between me and the administration and the trustees.” Some students were sentenced to 15 days in jail and fined $250.
Striking a balance, Dr. Hovde also said that the protesters “were not acting without cause, but they were acting with insufficient cause.”
Dr. Hovde was dean of Columbia College for four years. When he returned to teaching in 1972, an editorial in The Columbia Daily Spectator said he had “sought to quietly guide the college, not to rule it; to use the force of persuasion and reason, not the blunt power of authority.” ...
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The cause was lung cancer, his wife, Bertha Betts, said.
A lanky, boyish-looking professor of comparative English literature, Dr. Hovde brought a soft-spoken equanimity to the post of dean of Columbia College when he was appointed in July 1968.
Traditionally, deans had been nominated by the university president and approved by the board. But in part to meet student demands for greater faculty and student participation in the university’s decision-making, Dr. Hovde (pronounced HUV-dee) was subject to a revised selection process in which he was nominated by a committee of three faculty members and six administrators, then approved by the university president, Grayson L. Kirk.
“It is clear that things at Columbia need changing, and the sit-ins and the demonstrations were not without cause,” Dr. Hovde said at the time.
The war protests, led largely by the Students for a Democratic Society, began on April 23, 1968, as an attempt to end Columbia’s ties to the Institute for Defense Analyses, a consortium that did research for the government, and to halt construction of a gymnasium in Morningside Park, which protesters portrayed as a symbol of indifference to the interests of the Harlem community. Five buildings were occupied during the first week of the turmoil; windows were shattered; records were burned. Dr. Kirk called in the police, and hundreds of officers in riot gear cleared the buildings. About 700 students were arrested, mostly on charges of criminal trespassing. The protests continued and the campus was frozen for five more weeks.
Early in the unrest, Dr. Hovde was part of a three-member faculty committee that created a joint disciplinary committee composed of seven students, seven professors and three administrators. The committee drafted guidelines for disciplining student demonstrators.
As dean, Dr. Hovde called for the university to drop criminal trespassing charges against students. That, he told Newsweek magazine, “is a difference between me and the administration and the trustees.” Some students were sentenced to 15 days in jail and fined $250.
Striking a balance, Dr. Hovde also said that the protesters “were not acting without cause, but they were acting with insufficient cause.”
Dr. Hovde was dean of Columbia College for four years. When he returned to teaching in 1972, an editorial in The Columbia Daily Spectator said he had “sought to quietly guide the college, not to rule it; to use the force of persuasion and reason, not the blunt power of authority.” ...