Rudolph Daniel Lindquist

Director, University School 1932 to 1939

Biographical Sketch

Rudolph Daniel Lindquist was born on November '27, l888 in Oakland, California where his father was the minister of the Swedish Mission Covenant Church. He was the first child in a family of ten children.

His childhood was spent in the states of California and Washington where his father served as minister. When he entered high school the family was established in Minnesota, and in 1907 he was graduated from high school at Cannon Falls, Minnesota.

The following fall he began his career as an educator by teaching in the rural school at Dunnell, Minnesota. The years 1909 - 1911 he taught at Walden College, McPherson, Kansas.

In 1911 the family moved back to California - to Berkeley - and that fall he enrolled as a freshman in the University of California. While a student he taught English to foreigners in classes conducted in San Francisco by the San Francisco Y M C A. This work was very successful and satisfying and was carried on during most of his college career.

He was elected to membership in Phi Delta Kappa while at the University, and was very active in the chapter. He represented it at national meetings and served as national president from 1931 - 1935.

He graduated from the University in 1915 and that fall became a teacher of English and German in the Elko, Nevada high school. He also coached athletics. After two years of teaching here he resigned to enter the Y. M. C. A. War Service program at Camp Hearn, near San Diego.

In October, 1917, he was inducted into the 363rd Infantry Regiment of the 91st Division and received his training at Fort Lewis, Washington. In July, 1918, he was sent to France, serving as Sergeant Major. He was injured in action in the Meuse-Argonne Sector, but recovered and returned to his regiment.

When Rudolph D. Lindquist became the director of the Ohio State University School, a new venture of the College of Education of Ohio State University, he faced the formidable task of finding a staff which would foster pioneering experimental education. He combed the country for personnel; educators learned to respect his skill in selecting people, many of whom were embarking on their first very important educational experience. Individuals whom Rudolph Lindquist thus "discovered" and engaged for his new school included men and women who were later to become nationally known in education: Robert J. Havighurst, Harold Fawcett, Lou LaBrant, H.H. Giles, Rose Lammel, Oliver Loud, Frieda Heller, Beatrice Perham, Mary Aibright Giles, Paul Diederich, Guy Cahoon, Blanche Kent Verbeck, to name but a sampling.

It was this staff, under Rudolph Lindquist's direction, who pioneered in developing such educational approaches as the nature of proof, extended field trips, creative writing, and, most notably, the core curriculum. Few were the schools of the early 1930's experimenting with core curriculum, and much of its development traces to the experimentation of the staff of the Ohio State University School during the 1930's. One of the outstanding contributions of the school during Rudolph Lindquist's directorship was the book written by students of the school,

under the title of Were We Guinea Pigs?, an account of their educational experience which has become an educational classic.

Rudolph Lindquist was a master of the technique of permissive leadership. He was a great advocate of Justice Holmes' dictum of "free trade in ideas." He had the gift of being able to set men free for creative work in an environment of stimulating ideas. When he moved to new fields, his work at Cranbrook, he left behind a University School which he himself called into being and which remains as one of his greatest living memorials.

After the Armistice he stayed in France to teach Commercial English at the A E F University at Beaune. When the University closed, he returned to his home in Berkeley, California and was honorably discharged in July, 1919.

Though other opportunities presented themselves, he again chose to be an educator. He became the principal of an elementary school in Berkeley, working with zeal and enthusiasm to vitalize teaching. He enrolled as a graduate student at the University and attended Columbia University summer sessions. In 1922 he was granted a Master's Degree from the University of California.

He continued as an elementary school principal in Berkeley from 1919 - 1924. In recognition of his outstanding work he was invited to teach at the summer session of the University of California at Los Angeles. He taught at six summer sessions of the University of California, both in Berkeley and Los Angeles, between 1923 and 1931, and again in 1939.

In 1924 he became Associate Director of Teacher Training at the University of California. He held this position for one year and then became Director of Research for the Oakland Public Schools. He held this position from 1925 - 1927. In 1927 he became Assistant Superintendent of Schools for the City of Oakland, a position he held until 1931. ( See enclosed letter from Honorary Chancellor of Higher Education for the State of Oregon, Frederick M. Hunter, formerly Superintendent of Schools of Oakland. ) In 1931 he accepted the presidency of the Chico (California) State College, one of seven state regional four-year colleges. His stay was brief because Dean Arps of Ohio State University induced him to assume responsibility for organizing Laboratory Schools (University Schools) for that institution and to become Professor of Education, He was charged with selecting the staff and, with his faculty members, with determining policies and program of the schools. The schools were a part of the "Thirty Schools Experiment." ( See Dr. Van Til's letter. Dr. Van Til is Professor of Education at the University of Illinois. He was one of the teachers at University School. ) In 1936 Mr. Lindquist took a semester's leave of absence from his work at

Ohio State and completed the requirements for a Doctor's degree. This degree of Ed. D. was conferred upon him in 1936 by the University of California.

In 1938 he became Director of Cranbrook School in Bloomfield Hills, Michigan. While holding this position he was also Lecturer at the University of Michigan and taught in the summer sessions of the University in the years of 1941, 1942 and 1943. He was a trustee of the Student Aid Foundation of Michigan.

In 1943 Dr. Lindquist returned to his native California to become Superintendent of Schools for the City of Santa Barbara. He was greatly beloved and made a great contribution to the life of the community, not only as an educator but as a citizen. ( See editorial and newspaper articles. ) He served as:

‚ County Chairman of the Public Schools Redistricting Committee, charged with responsibility of working for voluntary unification of school districts; ‚ Vice-President of the Board of Directors of the Santa Barbara Museum of Art;

‚ Member of the Board of Directors of the Red Cross; ‚ Member of the City Recreation Commission; ‚ President of the Santa Barbara County Association for the United Nations; ‚ Member of the Board of Directors of the Scandinavian Foundation; ‚ Member of Rotary International; ‚ Member of the Boy Scout Council of Santa Barbara; ‚ Member of the Board of Directors of the Community Chest of Santa Barbara; ‚ Member of the Southern Council of the California Teachers Association by virtue of his chairmanship of the Commission on Intercultural Understanding; ‚ Head of the "Dollar A Month for China" organization in Santa Barbara; ‚ Member of the Advisory Board of the Santa Barbara County Tuberculosis and Health Association; ‚ Chairman of the Santa Barbara Citizens Food Committee during World War II; Member of the Advisory Board of Youtheatre.

Dr. Lindquist was also a member of the University Club of Santa Barbara, the Montecito Country Club, the Chamber of Commerce, the Commonwealth Club of San Francisco, the Santa Barbara Yacht Club, the County Bowl Associates, Phi Delta Kappa, and life member of the National Education Association.