Word: gropius
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Dates: during 1950-1959
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During the thirteen years he spent at the University, Walter Gropius became almost a spiritual leader of the Graduate School of Design. To the outside world he was the school; to much of the faculty, he, not Dean Joseph Hudnut, set the policy; and to the students, he was the ideal architect, the master mold into which they poured their talents...
...When Gropius resigned this fall, many felt the school had lost its heart. But behind the facade of Gropius there existed and still exists a vigorous school with some excellent teachers; perhaps none approximated the master, but most of them do not need his presence to function. Gropius, himself, did not consciously attempt to engulf the school with his beliefs; he encouraged his students to disagree with him, but many kept trying to emulate and become carbon copies of him. It was only a matter of time until the dean would begin to resent Gropius' presence, to envy his popularity...
...faculty watched the Hudnut-Gropius disagreements seethe and finally erupt into a bitter personal feud. After the lucrative post-war years, when the G.I. bill swelled the school's enrollment, inflation began to slice the endowment. Hudnut rearranged his program, dropping some courses and firing some instructors, mostly Gropius' friends. Finally, he turned to Gropius' own pet course, Fundamentals of Design, which had been running on a special Corporation grant. As soon as the money ran out Hudnut discontinued the course. With this gone and the general prospect of forced economy, Gropius left the school, leaving behind the dregs...
...Gropius' resignation was not the only blow to the school's morale. Hudnut retired officially last spring, and President Conant has delayed choosing a successor. Today students and faculty wait uneasily, unsure of who the new head will be and how he will reorganize the curriculum. Besides this, there is a deficit of about $10,000 a year for the school to erase. It has necessitated many one-year appointments, and a corresponding number of insecure instructors. Some on tenure spend little time teaching, concentrating on private practice, while the rest bear heavy teaching loads with inadequate salaries...
President Conant, who carries the main responsibility for selecting a dean, has delayed for two years in his search for a perfect administrator-artist. Burned once by the Gropius-Hudnut clash, he has shied from trying a similar combination. For many years, however, Design's faculty worked together smoothly, and the school led its field. It broke down, not basically because of personalities, but mainly because of a mounting deficit which forced Hudnut to slash Gropius' teaching program...