Reed College Centennial 1911-2011

fter having rocketed into the top tier of higher education with its audacious, iconoclastic launch, the college encountered financial difficulties during the Portland recession of the 1910s; its endowment, mostly in property and rents, plummeted to half its value.

The financial crisis became severe by 1919, and Foster turned to money raising.  Students petitioned to return academic focus to the traditional curriculum, away from the vocational. Foster resigned in December after realizing that his earlier pacifism had soured relations with Portland and that he had reached an impasse with the faculty. An interim administration—mostly faculty and Foster’s secretary, Florence Read—ran the college until 1921. The trustees appointed a board of trustees (1919-1951) to aid the administration. The student body delegated its informal responsibilities to an elected council, which became the student senate.  The honor principle, the “keynote of student control at Reed,” entered the constitution. Students undertook a brief foray into intercollegiate sports but abandoned it two years later.