Charles Eliot was an educator and was the president of Harvard University for 40 years (1869 to 1909), a remarkable tenure. During this time Harvard grew into a top modern university in the United States.

Eliot founded the New England Liberal School of education, and was the antithesis of conservatives such as Mortimer Adler and Robert Hutchins. Eliot was assistant professor of Mathematics and Chemistry at Harvard from 1858 to 1863. After two years in Europe he returned to Boston to work at MIT, and in 1869, became president of Harvard University.

Harvard became one of the foremost schools in the world under his leadership. During his tenure there, he changed the elective system, added new courses, required written exams, enlarged the faculty, and upped the entrance requirements in addition to raising the standards for professional degrees. Several new schools founded during his tenure including Agriculture, Applied Science, the Graduate School for Arts and Sciences and Business Administration. In addition, he was a prolific writer who was published widely.

After his retirement in 1909 from the presidency of Harvard, he devoted himself to various cultural and social movements. Eliot is credited with the statement that a five-foot shelf of books, if diligently studied, might supply a liberal education. He selected the contents of The Harvard Classics (1910), a set of books consisting of 50 volumes and commonly known as "Dr. Eliot's Five-Foot Shelf of Books." The books were specifically designed to supply a broad literary background to those who were not college trained. In his lectures and writings he condemned the standardization of education and industry.

In his later years Eliot served as Ambassador to England, and then fought against societal ignorance of the diseases, Gomorra and syphilis. He published works on both inorganic chemistry as well as on educational reform. Among his compatriots was Thomas Hepburn MD (Katheryn Hepburn's father) and Jane Addams (reformer and pacifist who won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1931).

Books

The Durable Satisfaction of Life

The Conflict Between Individualism and Collectivism in a Democracy