Samuel was the father of my 4GG, Freeman Munson, Calvin was Freeman's oldest brother.
Harry Kenneth Newburn was the middle son of three boys of Charles R Newburn and his wife Mary Alice Bayless. He was born Jan 1, 1906 in Cuba, Fulton County, Illinois. He married Wandaleigh "Lee" Brady on Jun 16, 1928 in Burlington, Iowa.
Harry attended university at Western Illinois University, graduating in 1929. He got both his master's and Ph.D. from the University of Iowa, finally completing his formal education in 1933.
His first jobs were in K-12 education, teaching high school and serving as both principal and superintendent in Iowa and Illinois before accepting a position as dean of the liberal arts college at the University of Iowa in 1941.
In 1945, he accepted a position as the president of University of Oregon, where he made great strides in improving the university and elevating its position in the University system. The U of O website describes his term as 8th university president as:
"When Harry K. Newburn became the eighth UO president, he faced a rapidly growing enrollment on an under-staffed and under-built campus. Student housing was inadequate to meet the 81 percent enrollment increase from 1945 to 1946, and long-time faculty members were reaching retirement age. Convincing the legislature to allow salary increases, he enabled the UO to compete for and attract more highly qualified professors. The classroom, office, and housing shortages were met with a variety of responses, some temporary, such as Quonset huts used as classrooms, and others more permanent, such as the building of Emerald Hall and the establishment of single and married students housing. During President Newburn's tenure, the number of graduate degrees earned also increased dramatically." ~ University of Oregon
Newburn had a good, solid career at U of O. I found this little vignette about his sense of humor (very academic, that humor):
"The university's eighth president, Harry K. Newburn, was not without a sense of humor. In a series of letters sent during Oct. 1949, professor Eldon Johnson submitted to the dean of the College of Liberal Arts an emergency request for the creation of the class "Pipe Smoking." President Newburn responded that while the course "passes through all sixteen committees," he could not submit the request for the course to the State Board of Higher Education. He did, however, recommend the book reading list be made available in the browsing library, and that there should be lectures on the subject." ~ Oregon.edu
He held the position at Oregon until 1953, when he resigned to take a position as president with the Ford Foundation's Educational Television Foundation and taught at Arizona State University.
In 1959, Harry took a position as president of the Montana University. This was his most challenging and clearly most frustrating professional challenge to date. Montana University, formerly known as Montana State University, had many presidents prior to Newburn coming on board. Tenures were relatively short. Newburn was known for wanting to ensure the university could attract brilliant teaching minds and wanted the salaries that would attract those types of educators. The Board of Regents did not feel that was a priority. When Newburn resigned in 1963, Time Magazine described MU as a "graveyard of presidents." Though Newburn did not publicly state why he departed, it was widely believe his growing frustration with the Regents on a number of important issues and financial support were to blame.
Off he went in 1963 to his new position as professor of education and as director of the ASU Center for Higher Education. He took the position as president of Cleveland State University from 1965-1966, returning to ASU as Dean of the College of Education and in 1969, he became president of ASU until 1971. Harry's last position was as president of Cleveland State University from 1971-1973. In 1973, he retired to his home in Arizona.
Harry had a heart attack in 1974 and was taken to Desert Samaritan Hospital, where he died four days later, on Aug 25, 1974. He was 68.
As I was reading about Harry, I noted how important the role of the wife of the president plays in the career of the president (during that time, only men were named president, so no politically incorrect terminology is intended). Wanda was a great partner and did all the right things as she raised her own three children and provided important support to Harry. I found this great article about their arrival to University of Oregon and the coverage she herself received.
