Herbert Eugene Bolton_Historian of the American Borderlands Page 6
McMaster began writing the History of the American People as a diversion from teaching Princeton boys the art of surveying. He intended his multivolume work to be a story about ordinary people that was entirely unlike the accounts of political affairs that dominated historical writing at that time. When the first volume appeared in 1883, it became an instant best seller. Almost overnight McMaster had become one of the nation's leading historians. Two months after his book appeared, a representative from Penn offered McMaster a new chair in American history.64
McMaster's enthusiasm for Penn was matched with a deep hatred of Princeton. He detested teaching the surveying courses, and was certain that he would never be promoted or allowed to teach history at Presbyterian Princeton, because he was not a church member. Thus, when he headed for Pennsylvania, McMaster penned in his diary, “Left Princeton, Thank god forever.”65
Bolton found that McMaster was a very different sort of teacher than Turner or Haskins. McMaster was a poor lecturer and inattentive mentor. Although he demanded much from his graduate students, his mentoring style is best described as benign neglect.66 but McMaster had connections and used them to benefit his students. He arranged for Bolton to attend a dinner for Herbert M. Friedenwald, superintendent of manuscripts in the Library of Congress and formerly McMaster's doctoral student. “The party was very select, only the club and three history Fellows,” but it was costly at $1.50 per plate.67 Bolton bore the expense so that he could make the connection with Friedenwald. To Herbert, fresh from the western provinces, Penn must have seemed the center of a social and scholarly world he had only dreamed of in Wisconsin.
Brother Fred had also moved east, to Worcester, Massachusetts, where he won a fellowship at Clark University. The Clark faculty had already accepted the thesis he had written in Germany for a doctorate in psychology, although he had yet to pass his exams.68 Fred was developing a specialty in educational psychology. He soon arranged to publish his thesis as a book and began submitting articles to professional journals. Once again, Fred proved to be Herbert's role model.
By the end of October Herbert had decided on a thesis subject, the “status of negro as a slave in 1860; changes effected in his status by emancipation, reconstruction, and the attempts of the south to make these laws inoperative.” This was his general plan, “but think a doctors thesis may be written on the first chapter.”69 His interest in slavery seems to have developed over a period of a year or so. He began studying slavery intensively in 1896 before returning to Madison for graduate work with Turner.70 Within weeks he could report that he had already written the first few pages of his thesis after going through “at least 100 vols of state statutes and digests,” demonstrating the prodigious capacity for primary source investigation that would distinguish Bolton's career ever after.71 By the end of the fall term he had written forty pages for McMaster's seminar and hoped to finish the dissertation in six months.72
Thesis writing did not go as smoothly as Herbert had hoped. In late December the meeting of the Federation of Graduate Clubs in Chicago took a week out of his crowded schedule.73 Family life had its satisfactions, but “you know the difficulties of studying with small babes in small quarters,” he groused to Fred. Gertrude was nearly worn out. She had been reduced “to a mere nurse and kitchen maid,” he said. To make matters worse, Herbert caught a winter cold. On top of all those distractions he had to write “reports—reports—reports” for every graduate seminar, which were “fatal to thesis work.”74
In February 1898 the explosion of the USS Maine in Havana harbor added the prospect of war with Spain to Herbert's list of distractions. The catastrophe was widely believed to be an act of Spanish sabotage, and war fever was at a high pitch. One week after the explosion President McKinley tried to cool public passions against Spain with a temperate speech to a huge crowd at the University of Pennsylvania. Herbert may have been at the event; he sent the program to his brother without comment.75
Herbert was “no jingo,” he told Fred. Nevertheless, he concluded that the united States was “not to be wholly condemned for interfering in Cuban affairs,” citing “disorder at our doors,” “un-Christian barbarities,” and the “Commercial interests of the united States.” Herbert thought that the United States would ultimately prevail if war came and that Spain should lose its last colonial possessions as a result. Current events compelled him to take a historical view of Spanish America, perhaps for the first time in his career. “At the opening of the century [Spain] was in possession of the whole American continent from the headwaters of the Missouri to Terra [sic] del Fuego.” But now “most of her possessions have been lost by revolution, all by incompetency.”76 No one could accuse Herbert of Hispanophilia in 1898.
Bolton's ruminations about the Spanish Empire show a distinct lack of interest in what would become his chief field of study. He emphasized his disinterest in things Spanish when he speculated about “learning a language (Not Spanish)” and preferred picking up Italian so that he could master Renaissance history.77 The days when he would defend Spanish civilization still lay far in the future.
Herbert's opinions about the war and Spain were influenced by McMaster, who thought the sinking of the Maine reason enough to go to war. McMaster's newspaper and magazine articles and speeches were widely publicized. Territorial expansion had been a good thing for the United States in the past, he analogized, and it would be a good thing now. McMaster thought that war would stimulate patriotism and might quiet social discontent in the United States, a position that eventually helped to convince historian Charles beard to conclude that the Spanish-American War was launched to quell domestic unrest. McMaster gave visual reinforcement to his bellicose ideas by decorating his office with Frederick Remington's “savage paintings,” as McMaster's biographer styled them.78
McMaster's choice of art and his high-blooded rhetoric must have impressed Herbert. His prominence as a public intellectual was impossible to miss. Politicos who found academic support for their views deeply appreciated McMaster. As Henry Cabot Lodge said, McMaster's ideas about expansion and the war were significant because he spoke “with the authority of an historian.”79 At Penn Bolton found a new model for professional success: a professor of history who wrote for popular audiences about the historical origins of the important issues of the day.
By the end of the school year Bolton's dissertation was not finished but Penn had renewed his fellowship. Bolton's work pleased McMaster, so one more year of effort would bring the degree if all went well. Fred's success brought renewed encouragement. He passed his examinations and secured the doctorate. Then came the perfect culmination of events when Wisconsin Normal in Milwaukee hired Fred. This justified everything that the Boltons had invested in higher education. If anyone doubted their wisdom, they had only to consider the esteemed professor, Dr. Frederick Bolton, the published scholar who lectured in Milwaukee. “I shall be glad when I have accomplished as much,” Herbert averred, and who could doubt his sincerity?80
With another summer behind him and Fred's gleaming success before him, Bolton plunged back into his work at Penn. Hoping to alleviate the distraction of having a toddler in the house, he rented a three-room, third-floor flat with a living room that was arranged as a study for Herbert. “Herbert is so nicely shut off from us that he is quite certain that he will be able to accomplish a good deal,” Gertrude wrote.81
It was time to finish the degree, and Herbert intended “to make every day count toward the desired end.” Scholarship was not all that Herbert had to think about. He had more privacy in the new home, but in some ways it was not as convenient as their former Philadelphia room, where a neighbor routinely took care of Frances so that Gertrude could get out during the day. Now Herbert babysat when Gertrude had errands or social engagements. Gertrude was not entirely shut in. During the evenings while Frances slept and Herbert studied, she enjoyed the cultural attractions of Philadelphia. She attended lectures and musicals at the Drexel Institute, only three blocks from th
eir apartment.82 Nor had she forgotten her scholarly interests. At home she studied English Medieval history, perhaps as Herbert's study mate.
Bolton plugged away “ under the lash ‘must’ ” in this crowded but companionable setting. “McMaster accepts all my ideas without much comment,” Herbert wrote. “I don't know whether that augurs well or ill. He may tear me to pieces at the end.” In December McMaster accepted Bolton's most recent “batch of ‘negroes’ with the comment that it was ‘ very good.’ ”83 This was where matters stood at Christmas 1898.
In January disaster struck the Boltons when Frances developed a fever and then severe convulsions. The frightened Boltons, who were loving but inexperienced parents, doused Frances with cold water and called for a doctor who decided that Frances's intestines were inflamed. After two days and nights of nursing, Frances's condition did not improve, although the doctor visited twice daily and Herbert got a woman in to help Gertrude during the day. Then Frances developed hives and a severe cold.84 The cash-strapped Boltons hired a nurse. The doctor prepared them for the worst when he said that Frances was “desperately sick.”85 Complications set in. Frances's bowels had stopped and poison was building up. Her abdomen, face, and limbs were bloated “fearfully” and her pulse ran at 150 beats per minute. It was “now a question of which way the tide goes.” “We only hope,” Herbert told his brother. “My faith in the result is weak.”86
With everything in the balance and the outlook bleak, on the last day of January the tide carried Frances back to the Boltons. The worst symptoms had abated and Herbert thought that she would survive, although the recovery period proved to be lengthy. It had been an expensive illness, but family members pitched in to defray expenses.87
Amidst the uncertainty and chaos of late winter, Herbert returned to his thesis. McMaster thought that it was better than the work he had seen from Harvard and that it should be published.88 With the dissertation approved, Bolton still had to pass his examinations. “I do not see how they can pluck me,” he mused, “but they might.”89 It was not likely that the Penn faculty would “pluck” Herbert at this stage of the game. They had arranged for him to lecture on his thesis before the Professors’ History Club, a group of faculty from Penn and other Philadelphia colleges.90
If he won the degree, Herbert believed, his best opportunity for college teaching would be in a normal school. Sometimes he wished that he had taken pedagogy and psychology like his brother, because it would have given him “a pull” at the normal schools.91 If he could not get a normal school job, Herbert was willing, even anxious, to teach high school if the pay was good. He was tired of being poor, tired of annual searches for summer jobs, tired of subjecting his wife and child to the inconvenience and risk of a life without money to spare. And while he was sure that he was a good teacher, uncertainty about his other abilities dogged him. “I have never thought I am a whale at originality,” he explained to Fred, “but I always thought I could teach some.”92 Herbert's insecurity in the final stages of his graduate education was natural enough. Like many doctoral students, he had taken in a mass of data and detail and was uncertain about how to digest it. Nor did he know whether his work was worthwhile in the eyes of others. He thought it would take an additional year to turn it into a book, if that feat was even possible.
Examinations still loomed. He was prepared, but no matter what he had accomplished thus far, a few professors could take it all away from him. Yet the preliminary signs were all there. Bolton had received nothing but praise and recognition at Penn—two prestigious fellowships with an even better one promised, an invited lecture, generous support from a nationally recognized mentor, an office in a national organization. Turner was still thinking about him too. In April Turner informed Herbert that he had put his name in for a position, but he did not tell him where.93 Herbert should have gone into his exams with a high degree of confidence, but like virtually all well-prepared graduate students, he worried nonetheless.
His anxiety was misplaced. Bolton passed written examinations in economics and European and American history in early May, days of “severe travail,” as he called the process.94 The oral examination was the only hurdle that remained. Finally, Herbert could see the dawn coming. At Penn the orals were “supplementary ‘farces,’ ” he told Fred. “Unless I am inordinately asinine on Tuesday, I shall pull through.”95 A few days later he reported that he had passed the orals “with no great honor and no bad scars or scares.” Now that the ordeal was over, he was glad that he was “no longer a school boy. That gives me more satisfaction than the degree, (which has depreciated much within 24 hours).”96
But would it pay? Bolton still did not have a professional position, although McMaster had promised him a postdoctoral fellowship at Penn if a job did not materialize. Bolton was understandably concerned about his professional prospects, but he was in a very strong position to compete for jobs. At Wisconsin and Penn he had studied with some of the country's most important historians, who showed confidence in him at every turn. In the early summer, however, Bolton returned to Wisconsin without a job.
Bolton's fondest hope was that he would land a professorship with his brother at Wisconsin Normal. He expected Fred to help him get it, but there were no guarantees. He sent letters to high schools while teaching a summer institute for teachers in Appleton.97 Then a job opened at Albion College, a Methodist school in Michigan. Herbert applied, hoping that his acquaintance with a prominent Methodist minister would help his cause.98 Turner wrote for him too. Bolton's reliance on a church friend to vouch for him bordered on hypocrisy. He no longer belonged to the church. The word “church” appears only rarely in Herbert's correspondence with his brother; “prayer,” “god,” and “bible,” were never used. If he prayed for a good job, he never told his brother about it. Any appeals to god during his child's desperate illness likewise went unreported. Nevertheless, Albion called Herbert to Michigan for an interview. Methodist or not, Herbert was “elected OK ,” he wrote Fred. “You fix up the newspaper accts,” he added. “They are going to give me a column here, & [in] Detroit.”99 Evidently Fred did more than fix up newspaper announcements, for soon Wisconsin Normal offered Herbert a position teaching economics and civics at $1,000 per year, $100 more than Albion, but $300 less than Herbert had hoped for. So much for Methodism at Albion; back to Wisconsin.100
And so it came to pass that the Bolton brothers engineered the perfect ending to their years of struggle. Herbert's salary was small but it was secure, and he hoped for raises. Living near his brother in Milwaukee gave him great personal satisfaction. The feeling was mutual. As Fred wrote many years later, “No two young couples ever experienced greater mutual enjoyment than we did that year.”101 Surely this happy ending foreshadowed many years of contentment for the brother professors in their alma mater. Some happy endings are not destined to last.
T H R E E · Gone to Texas
Life in Milwaukee was good, but despite Herbert's happiness in being with Fred, the reality of normal school teaching soon set in. Herbert's teaching load was heavy: four classes in three subjects, while more favored faculty taught only three classes in two subjects.1 This was a matter of preferential treatment rather than merit, Herbert believed. He had little control over what he taught. “He had to teach what was handed to him at the opening of each term,” Fred explained; “mathematics, economics, ancient history, etc.” Herbert was rarely permitted to teach U.S. history in Milwaukee. He taught in a college, but his colleagues and administrators did not value his hard-earned PhD. What had the sacrifice been for? Institutional life at Normal was riven with pettiness, politics, and the narrowest sort of pedagogical cant, at least as far as Bolton's letters told the story.2 Then there was the matter of salary. The Boltons had a second child, Helen. Despite Gertrude's careful management, $1,000 did not go far with Herbert's growing family. He even considered taking a sales job with a publishing house.3 Surely he had not invested so heavily in the doctorate merely to become a traveling salesman.
Herbert became increasingly unhappy at Milwaukee and was anxious to get out. In a surprising move in the spring of 1900 he applied for the presidency of Oahu College, a small preparatory school in Honolulu originally founded to educate the children of Congregationalist missionaries. A more remote, insignificant posting for the ambitious Herbert can scarcely be imagined. The title of president may have appealed to him as much as anything else. At least he would have been in charge of a school. Perhaps the idea of being in a balmy land far away from the ordinary pressures of academic advancement and petty politics charmed him, but it was only a dream. He did not get the job.4
Herbert was not the only Bolton who was dissatisfied in Milwaukee. In September 1900 Fred left for the University of Iowa, where he would head an education program. This turn of events, while unwelcome from a personal standpoint, lit the forward path for Herbert: be patient, get more experience, publish, establish yourself in your field, then move to a better place where you will be in charge. Fred's move to Iowa was an important step upward, but Herbert's happiness for him was tinged with sadness. The brothers would never again live in the same town or even in the same state.
Herbert toiled on alone. He condensed his dissertation for a magazine.5 That essay was not accepted, but he published his first short article for a teachers’ magazine, “Our Nation's First Boundaries,” which in a general way foreshadowed his interest in the borderlands. He was also working on a textbook manuscript on U.S. territorial development. A sketch of his ideas about the U.S. acquisition of Florida included a section called “Race Antipathy and Spanish Weakness,” which declared that “Race dislike between Spaniards and Americans was…a constant spur inciting the stronger to encroach upon the other.” Spaniards, Bolton thought, “lived in constant dread of the irresistible westerner.”6 At the turn of the century, Bolton's thinking about Spain in America had not penetrated beyond the common prejudices of the day.