1948
Gandhi was assassinated on January 30. Dr. Duggar produced aureomycin. The 200-inch
telescope on Mt. Palomar and Idlewild International Airport (later renamed for John F.
Kennedy) were dedicated. Land invented the polaroid camera. Harry Truman was reelected
president. Dick Button won gold in figure skating at the Olympics in St. Moritz. Merck
Company announced the isolation of vitamin B-12. The US and Britain thwarted the Russian
blockade of Berlin by airlifting supplies into the beleaguered city. Israel became an
independent country on May 14. Mauri Rose won his second Indianapolis 500 at an average
speed of 120 mph. New York subway fare rose to 10 cents. President Truman signed into law
the draft act requiring men from 19 through 25 to serve in the military. Citation won the Triple
Crown of horse racing. The US won 38 medals at the London Olympics. America's Robert
Mathias won the Olympic Decathalon at age 17. Kinsey's report on
The Sexual Behavior of the
American Male
startled America. T.S. Eliot won the Nobel Prize for Literature. Among the
more than 135 million paperback books sold, the best sellers included Alan Paton's
Cry The
Beloved Country
, Norman Mailer's
The Naked and the Dead
, and Graham Greene's
The Heart
of the Matter
; Laurence Olivier's
Hamlet
won the Oscar.
• New President
• Starting Salaries
• Prof. Weiss Died
• Curriculum
• Personnel
• Pep Rally
• CCT Featured on Radio
• Iron Lung
• Campus Activities
• Graduate and Research
• New Laboratory Building
• Three-Semester Schedule
• New Hockey Coach
• Future in the Air"
• Strange Score
• Health Plan
New President.
On June 15, 1947, upon the resignation of John Ross, Jr., Jess Harrison Davis
was appointed acting president. Dr. Ross resigned effective October 1, 1948, but in recognition
of his service to the College, the Board of Trustees granted him a year's leave of absence from
June 15, 1947, until October 1, 1948. Davis was inaugurated on October 8 as Clarkson's eighth
president.
A native of Columbus, Ohio, Mr. Davis earned his bachelor of mechanical engineering
degree in 1928 at Ohio State University before joining the Clarkson faculty as a member of the
mechanical engineering department in 1929. While at Clarkson, he was working on his master's
degree at Ohio State. His thesis concerned specific heats of oils and other liquids. In 1944, he
accepted the post of head of the mechanical engineering department at the University of
Louisville, Kentucky, but returned to Clarkson as dean of Administration in 1946.
Prof. Weiss Died.
Referred to affectionately by the students as "Herbie," Prof. Herbert Weiss,
head of the mechanical engineering department since 1940, collapsed in his office on March 12
and died three days later on March 15, 1948. He had come to Clarkson in 1929 following seven
years at Cornell, and several years each at Georgia Tech and the University of Rochester. Born
in 1889, he received both his bachelor's degree in 1912 and his master's in 1931
from Cornell.
