The Two Towers: Main

When a man takes God at His word that no more is required of him than "to do justly, and to love mercy, and to walk humbly," the world stands puzzled, especially when a position of leadership is involved. Then one by one the brilliant and the eager, the backward and the diffident fall into the cadence of his step. Only afterwards, when they try to retrace the trail, do they wonder how they could have traveled so far with so few monuments to mark the way.

Ralph Earle came to Tech in its sixtieth year as its sixth president. By admission of persons who followed him most closely during his fourteen years at the school "Nothing of great note took place," "It was a day by day affair--a quiet time." Yet even while they speak, the mask of appraisal breaks up into fragments of remembering, and strong men speak words such as "love" and "affection."

The projects which materialized during Ralph Earle's presidency were largely other person's dreams; his own did not come true until after he was gone. There were tremendous changes in the country's concepts of technology and economy, but he had no part in their evolution except as he adjusted to them. There was a remarkable increase of Institute endowment--doubling in spite of the depression--but it was a growth which might have happened anyway, at least in part, without his indefatigable effort. The most radical of his plans, a limited admissions program, backfired because of an untimely introduction. His greatest writings were preserved on little memorandum slips in small cramped letters. His speeches were memorable because they were as painfully listened to as they were delivered.

Nevertheless, Ralph Earle was unique as president of Worcester Polytechnic Institute in the esprit de corps he was able to create not only on Boynton Hill but also among the alumni of the Institute and among its friends.

Everyone was completely disarmed by this man, who the first day on campus said with no embarrassment, "I am entirely new in this work," then set out by tireless schedule to learn the details of his job. Even the students restrained from the usual harrassment of freshmen simply because this mild-mannered new president asked them to. And later, during the economic crisis of the 1930's, the citizens of Worcester chose him for president of their reconstruction corporation, not because he was a financial expert, but because a whole community trusted him.

When Ralph Earle came to Worcester Tech in 1925, he literally came home, to be surrounded by many buildings on Boynton