Herbert Eugene Bolton_Historian of the American Borderlands

by Albert L. Hurtado

  Bolton consolidated his power in the history department by hiring historians who would support him. The presence of his students Priestley and Chapman on the history faculty was helpful, but he could not fill the ranks entirely with Bolton men. When he added medievalist Louis Paetow to the department in 1921, Thomas Maitland Marshall assured him that Paetow knew “which way to jump” and would be “loyal”—qualities that would ensure Bolton’s domination of history in coming years.18

  Student placements on important faculties bespoke Bolton’s professional influence outside the university. The University of Chicago called J. Fred Rippy.19 Arthur Aiton went to the University of Michigan, and John Lloyd Mecham joined the Columbia faculty.20 These prestigious appointments demonstrated Bolton’s clout and the growing visibility of his California school of history. As these young professors marched up through the ranks, they would acquire position and influence in the profession, but the success of one Bolton student did not always please the others who wanted plum positions. Marshall had wanted Aiton’s spot at Michigan and complained when he did not get it.21 Like race horses jostling out of the gate, each man strove to move to the head of the pack. They all needed Bolton to get them there.

  Professional recognition came to Bolton in other ways. In 1922 he lectured to Hispanic-American historians at the annual AHA meeting; in “Two Types of Courses in American History” he argued for a general hemispheric course like the one he taught at Berkeley. “My position seemed to be approved quite generally,” Bolton concluded. “No one took issue with me.”22 At the luncheon conference on the general course in American history, Bolton sat at the head table next to Turner. Again Bolton argued for his Americas course, but most of the other professors merely wanted to add “a little more detail here, or a little more drill without changing the scope of the course one whit.” Turner smoked his cigarette and made no comment. As usual Bolton believed that silence and assent were synonymous.

  Nevertheless, the meeting reminded Bolton that Turner and other older historians still controlled the historical profession. Most of the leaders in Turner’s cohort were only about seven to ten years older than Bolton, but to him they seemed far more senior and deeply entrenched. “Jameson, Turner, Haskins, [Charles McLean] Andrews, and…the rest of the Old Guard still look old to me.” Bolton understood that younger historians regarded him as one of the older generation. “Now I find myself surrounded in the hotel lobbies by young instructors and assistant professors who apparently regard me as quite venerable, or perhaps antique.” If Bolton was a bit wistful about the tender regard that comparative youngsters had for him, he was also a little jealous of the “Old Guard” who were “like a sore thumb, ‘always on hand.’”

  The 1922 meeting also encouraged Bolton’s ambition to be AHA president. His old mentor Charles Homer Haskins was president that year. He mentioned Bolton in his presidential address as one of “his ‘boys’ who had reached the top of the profession,” Bolton recalled. Haskins’s boys called him the Duke. When Bolton congratulated him on the presidency, Haskins replied, “Well Bolton, I expect to take part in such an affair for you some day. Your students are already scattered all over the country.” Bolton was flattered, but Haskins’s comment merely reflected the political reality of ascending to the highest office in the profession. Connections mattered. Numbers mattered. “He perhaps knew,” Bolton observed, “that my students are my most precious professional ‘jewels.’ Long live the Duke!”

  Now in his early fifties, Bolton’s academic reputation was secure even without the AHA presidency. But other presidencies were available to a successful academic, especially one with administrative experience. Early in Bolton’s career he and his brother had been courted for small-college and normal school presidencies. They had chosen to head programs at universities as smaller fish with a much bigger pond to swim in. In 1912 Fred moved to the University of Washington, where he became dean of the school of education.23 Fred still had the presidential bug and asked his brother to keep an eye out for opportunities in the West, but Bolton’s love of his borderlands field seemed to have entirely driven out the presidential itch.24 Then in September 1923 came an unsettling event in the form of a natural catastrophe. The summer heat had parched the Berkeley hills to a sere brown when a broken power line caused the dry grass to ignite. Fire blazed up and roared down the hillsides chasing Berkeley’s inhabitants towards the bay. The inferno missed the university but in only a few hours devoured block after block of homes north of campus. News of the disaster flashed around the country.25

  Bolton had been on campus when his neighborhood was engulfed by flames. Gertrude and the children were safe, but the Bolton home on Scenic Avenue was a total loss. Before fleeing, she had managed to load their Hupmobile with their clothes and silver service, but Bolton’s personal library of several thousand books lay in ashes.26 Unfortunately, the home had not been fully insured. Letters from concerned friends came from around the country. “I hope I know the worst when I see that your house is listed as lost,” wrote Guy Stanton Ford, Bolton’s old fraternity brother and now dean of the University of Minnesota graduate school. Hackett sent a check for thirty dollars, as “a sort of second wedding present.”27 Bolton put a bold face on his family’s traumatic loss. “Yes, we were in the path of the flames,” he told to one well-wisher, “and they cleaned us up nicely.”28 His sister Grace complimented him on taking the “loss in a most beautiful spirit,” but it must not have been easy to lose all of the personal things the Bolton family had accumulated.29 The impact of the fire on Gertrude must have been immense. For the next ten years the Boltons would move from one rented house to another.

  In one sense the fire had been liberating. The destruction of the Bolton house meant that there was one less tether to Berkeley. In early 1923 Robert Vinson resigned the presidency of the University of Texas in order to head Western Reserve University in Cleveland.30 Vinson’s resignation immediately raised the specter of political influence in the selection of the next president. Texas governor Pat M. Neff, who was rumored to want the presidency, made recess appointments to name seven new members of the Board of Regents.31 Eventually the legislature would have to confirm the governor’s designees, but in the meantime Neff’s regents controlled the board. If Neff wanted the presidency, he could have it.

  The Texas faculty, of course, wanted a new president with academic credentials. “Don’t be surprised if our offer drops on your door step some day,” Barker told Bolton, “and don’t kick it off without careful consideration.” Barker predicted that the regents would authorize a salary of $10,000 to $12,000 with an official residence thrown in. He promised Bolton the unanimous support of the faculty, at least in the beginning.32 He even told his old friend, perhaps too optimistically, that he could devote half of his time to research and writing.

  It is difficult to gauge Bolton’s interest in the Texas presidency in the summer of 1923. Several of his students nominated him for the job, possibly at his request.33 Perhaps he thought of using the offer as a lever to advance his salary at Berkeley. One suspects, however, that the incineration of his home caused Bolton to seriously consider the prospect of moving back to Texas. The projected salary was handsome; the provision of a presidential residence might have seemed downright providential. As the search process in Austin developed, Bolton became a very interested observer.

  Bolton had two trusted sources of Texas intelligence: Barker and Hackett.34 Given the political situation, Hackett was not sure whether congratulations or condolences would be in order if Bolton got the position. The university was likely in the future to become rich from oil revenues derived from its two-million-acre West Texas tract. At the moment, however, retrenchment and meager salaries were the rule, and the Texas regents ran roughshod over faculty and the acting president.35

  Other worrying news came from Hackett’s pen. The University of Texas owned the García collection, which included a Hernán Cortés document that Bolton reckoned was worth $100,000. The
university had decided to sell it for $50,000. Would Bolton be interested in acting as agent for a 10 percent fee?36 Perhaps oil wealth would come to the university eventually, but in the meantime the library might have to sell its archival riches.

  As the situation developed, Barker continued to advise Bolton about his prospects. “If you ever have a meeting with [chairman of the Board of Regents J. Lutcher] Stark,” Barker advised, “act as if you really respected his opinions.” Barker hoped the regents would select Bolton, though he knew they were concerned about the religious beliefs of presidential candidates. He hoped that Bolton was not “a sincere pagan.”37 Bolton was probably not exactly a pagan, but he had long since sworn off church attendance. At Berkeley his Sunday services were in the Bancroft.

  The regents did not act as quickly as Barker had hoped. In May they offered Governor Neff the presidency, but he turned it down. Neff recognized that there was substantial opposition to his appointment from the faculty and the influential university alumni organization, the Texas Ex-Students Association. The Texas-exers included some of the state’s most prominent and powerful people. Even though Neff did not accept the offer, faculty and students were outraged that the presidency would be treated in such a cavalier way. Two regents immediately resigned in protest. The remaining regents, who were overwhelmed and surprised at the depth of the anger directed at them, turned to a respected academic nominee, but it was not Bolton. His friend Guy Stanton Ford got the nod because of his impressive administrative credentials as dean of the Minnesota graduate school.38 Ford could read the Texas political situation as well as anyone and instantly declined.39

  Events were now moving swiftly. On May 19 Barker and another professor called on regent Joe Wooten and made the case for Bolton. Wooten disclosed that the regents “had gotten the impression that” Bolton was “sort of a sissy.” How or why this rumor got started is anyone’s guess. Perhaps ascribing effeminacy to Bolton was a form of negative campaigning. Barker argued that nothing could have been further from the truth, and assured Bolton that he had “described [his] masculine qualities.” He also trumpeted Bolton’s administrative experience as department chair and as adviser to Wheeler and Barrows, and his position on the California Historical Survey Commission. Wooten was convinced. He called Stark, and the regents offered the presidency to Bolton. The board would be “carried away by any constructive plan,” Barker advised Bolton. “Any vision of possibilities will beget a glow.” The alumni would flood the regents with petitions for Bolton’s appointment. He also told Bolton that the Texas-exers planned to unseat the board by stymieing their confirmation in the legislature. He assured Bolton that he did not have to worry about the removal of the board that elected him, but also admitted that “it will be no holiday task for the first year.”40

  The Texas faculty and alumni were desperate to get Bolton. If he turned them down, after Ford’s quick refusal the regents were unlikely to look outside Texas again. And Neff was not entirely out of the picture. He could still exercise a controlling influence over the board. On May 28 the regents unanimously elected Bolton president with a $10,000 salary and a residence. “I know the man who gets it will for a time have a little taste of Hell,” Barker frankly stated, “but if he’s the right sort I’d want him to take it.” “You can come here & virtually dictate your terms,” Hackett wrote.41

  Barker had prepared a brief résumé for the edification of the regents. After stressing Bolton’s scholarly attainments and administrative talent, Barker added this short paragraph: “He is a Democrat, a Christian, and, we believe, a church member. Certainly he is in hearty accord with the church as a great uplifting social force.”42 “There may be some question of the propriety of this,” Barker apologized to Bolton. Religious and political association “ought to have nothing to do with the matter, but it has with the Board, and on careful reflection I put it in.” In truth, Bolton’s California political affiliation in 1924 was “Declines to State”; he registered Republican in 1916, 1922, 1926, and 1934. Except for 1918, when he registered as a Progressive, in all other years he declined to state a party affiliation.43 Gertrude and the eligible children consistently registered Republican. It seems likely that Bolton’s political views fell somewhere on the progressive side of the Republican spectrum but that he preferred not to publicly affiliate himself with the party. As with religion, Bolton believed that the less said about politics the better, but he was a practical man. Had he taken the Texas presidency, he might well have registered as a Democrat and joined a church simply to satisfy Texans who thought such things were important.

  Brother Fred’s advice was emphatic: “I hope you accept and believe you will.” Fred assured his brother that he would not have to abandon his scholarly work as long as he had an adequate staff. In Texas Bolton would be able to “control the situation,” in contrast to California, “where there are apparent mean jealousies.”44 It all looked good to Fred, who would have accepted the Texas presidency had it been offered to him. Fred’s career had been all about educational administration, but Herbert’s commitment to active scholarship was deeper than his older brother’s. Early in Bolton’s career the journey from farm boy to college president seemed the logical narrative arc for the story of Bolton’s life, the attainment of the pinnacle of professional success that would punctuate his rise in society. In 1924, with the Texas presidency in his grasp, it was no longer so simple. Bolton worked nights, weekends, and holidays in the Bancroft, not because he needed to, but because he wanted to. The events and characters of the past completely consumed whatever time was not required for other matters. Bolton’s only complaint was that there was not more time to devote to his missionaries and explorers. Family considerations also mattered. Gertrude was not in the best of health. Moving would be hard on her and she did not like the Texas climate.

  Not everyone was enthusiastic about the prospect of a presidency for Bolton in Texas. When the news got to Santa Barbara, Bolton’s old friend Father Engelhardt wrote, “I hear you are going to leave California for Texas, K.K.K.dom!” The good father feared that history would lose “a valiant knight,” because President Bolton would be preoccupied with university affairs.45

  Bolton was wise enough to seek counsel from someone who knew what it was like to be president of a university in turmoil. David Barrows at first encouraged him to consider the position, but after thinking it over for a few days, wrote him a letter. “I want to express to you my final advice, not to accept this presidency nor any other.” Barrows’s main reason for this conclusion was Bolton’s research agenda. Barrows assured Bolton that he would neither have time for scholarship nor be able to recover the intellectual ground that he would lose while serving as president. Bolton had created “a school of Western American History and your leaving it will mean its dissolution.” As for the rewards and burdens of the presidency itself, Barrows gave a succinct summary based on his own experience:

  A university president has little or no personal freedom. He can not count his time his own, nor can he make his own arrangements, [or] choose his own associates. These are all done for him by the interests of the institution which he serves. There is practically no spare time. One has to abandon reading, reflection, the intimacies of family and friends and give a hundred per cent of time, energy, and devotion to a task that after all is mainly a mere resolution of minor difficulties. I do not believe that you would find that it would pay.46

  Barrows thought that the University of California could not afford to lose Bolton. He was not alone. The Native Sons of the Golden West issued a resolution commending Bolton for his contribution to California history. It would be an “irreparable loss to the cause of Pacific Coast and Southwestern American History” if he went to Texas.47 After fifteen years in California Bolton had become a fixture, almost an institution in the state. Texas, he perhaps realized, was a part of his past that he had romanticized. He had built an almost ideal situation for himself in California, including a library, faculty, graduate stude
nts, and a significant amount of institutional power within and outside the university. Why should he give it up for what Barker called “a little taste of Hell” in Texas?

  Bolton turned down the Texas presidency, citing his “reluctance to leave scholarship for administration—it would cost me the struggle of my life.” But that was not the end of it. Barker, Hackett, and his other friends urged him to reconsider. A swarm of Texas telegrams descended on Bolton’s Berkeley residence. They begged him to come to Austin to save the university. He could not resist the temptation. Bolton agreed to go to Austin to advise “the regents and ex-students what I think to be the great needs of the Texas University,” as he told a reporter for the Austin Statesman.48 Bolton may have thought he was going to Texas to offer salutary advice, but the regents and everyone else thought he was there to negotiate the terms of his appointment to the presidency.

  The notes that he made—there were three drafts—suggest that Bolton gave the regents a stirring speech.49 “Texas is the University of Destiny,” he jotted on a telegram blank. There followed a lesson in borderlands history that described Texas as the keystone from its Spanish beginnings up to the Civil War. Then he outlined some problems. Changes had to be made. Religion and politics should not be injected into university matters, he indicated on one draft, though not on others. Security of tenure and academic freedom found their way into his notes. Texas had an opportunity to be a great university, but the legislature had to increase support, “not niggardly, but big,” he added. New buildings, higher salaries, library support, more graduate assistants were all needed. “Will you do it?” he asked the regents? A new medical school and a university press were needed. The wealthy people of Texas had to step up and fund buildings, fellowships, professorships, and a press to the tune of a million dollars. Draw a line on a map from Baltimore to Berkeley, he told the regents. There was not one great university south of that line. Texas had the opportunity to be the first great university in the southern region. It was all very uplifting stuff, especially to the alumni and faculty. After his one-day visit to Austin, they wanted Bolton more than ever.