Arthur Ernest Morgan
Encyclopedia
Arthur Ernest Morgan was a civil engineer, U.S.
administrator, and educator. He was the design engineer for the Miami Conservancy District
flood control system and oversaw construction. He served as the president
of Antioch College
between 1920 and 1936. He was also the first chairman of Tennessee Valley Authority
from 1933 until 1938 in which he used the concepts proven in his earlier work with the Miami Conservancy District.
but his family soon moved to St. Cloud, Minnesota
. After graduating from high school, he spent the next several years doing outdoors work in Colorado
. During this time he learned that there was a dearth of practical understanding of hydraulic engineering
. He returned home and took up practice with his father, learning about hydraulic engineering by apprenticeship. By 1910 he had founded his own firm and become an associate member of the American Society of Civil Engineers.
in 1913, Morgan proposed a system of dry earthen dams to control the river systems above Dayton. His concepts were challenged because of his lack of formal engineering training, but eventually his plans were adopted and constructed, and the subsequent years proved the effectiveness of his concepts. Because of this success, he was chosen in 1933 to design and deploy the Tennessee Valley system of dams for flood control and electrification.
's Organic School in Fairhope, Alabama, a pioneering progressive boarding school. Morgan's first effort in education was to found the Moraine Park School, an experimental progressive school in Dayton, in 1917. In 1921, Morgan became the first president of The Association for the Advancement of Progressive Education, later renamed in 1931 as Progressive Education Association (PEA). In 1919, Morgan accepted the presidency of Antioch College to turn it around after a low point in the college's finances. Morgan replaced the existing board of trustees, which had been dominated by quarrelsome local ministers, with prominent businessmen such as Charles Kettering
, who had also backed Morgan's efforts at the Moraine Park School. Between 1921 and 1933, board members and their friends donated more than $2 million to Antioch. Kettering alone donated $500,000. Morgan reorganized the educational program to include cooperative education
and involved faculty in industrial research. The faculty, most personally chosen by Morgan, included not only academics but also architects, engineers, chemists, advertising executives, and government bureaucrats.
Until around the 1930s, Morgan was a member of the Unitarian Church
. In his later life, Morgan was a Humanist Quaker, a member of the Society of Friends in Yellow Springs, Ohio
, as was his son Ernest. After his departure from the TVA in 1938, Arthur Morgan was active in Quaker war relief efforts in Mexico and Finland. Among other accomplishments in the 1940s, he founded a non-profit organization to promote small communities (Community Service, Inc.), helped to set up a system of rural universities in India, and fought to protect Native American (Seneca) land from the flooding by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. Morgan was the author of more than twenty books. Two in the water field demonstrated his environmental orientation and his criticism of the Army Corps.
In 1962 Morgan's daughter-in-law, Elizabeth, with the help of his son Ernest, founded a progressive private school with humanist, Quaker, and Montessori influences, naming it the Arthur Morgan School.
’s Looking Backwards, Morgan gained a reputation as a Utopian dreamer. This interest in community living, coupled with Morgan’s belief in small towns and family life as the most virtuous form of living, led Morgan to participate in several projects that fostered rural community life.
As president of the TVA
, he not only directed the building of dams and provided power; he promoted community living as well. Morgan advanced a wide variety of cooperative enterprises and cottage industries and created a number of planned towns that followed the English garden city
model.
In 1937, Morgan founded Celo Community
, a land trust in the mountains of Western North Carolina. The community, which still exists today, is a self-governed land trust. Although Celo does not require members to accept any particular religious creed or ideology, it is built on cooperation between members and care for the natural environment. Today, Celo is home to 40 families who live on its 1000 acres (4 km²).
In 1940, Morgan went on to found two organizations for the promotion of community, Community Service Inc. (CSI) and the Fellowship of Intentional Communities (FIC). CSI was created to advance family life and small towns, which Morgan saw as the necessary ingredients for a positive American future. The organization was founded on Morgan’s belief in the importance of small towns to the rapidly urbanizing nation. Small towns, he argued, provided places for people to experience respect, cooperation, and personal relationships. In the same year, Morgan founded the Fellowship of Intentional Communities, an organization that fostered relationships between communal settlements. The FIC cultivated communication and the exchange of products between communities, promoted communication between communal settlements and the outside world, and advocated for the formation of new intentional communities.
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
administrator, and educator. He was the design engineer for the Miami Conservancy District
Miami Conservancy District
The Miami Conservancy District is a river management agency operating in Southwest Ohio to control flooding of the Great Miami River and its tributaries. It was organized in 1914 following the catastrophic Great Dayton Flood of the Great Miami River in March 1913, which hit Dayton, Ohio...
flood control system and oversaw construction. He served as the president
President
A president is a leader of an organization, company, trade union, university, or country.Etymologically, a president is one who presides, who sits in leadership...
of Antioch College
Antioch College
Antioch College is a private, independent liberal arts college in Yellow Springs, Ohio, United States. It was the founder and the flagship institution of the six-campus Antioch University system. Founded in 1852 by the Christian Connection, the college began operating in 1853 with politician and...
between 1920 and 1936. He was also the first chairman of Tennessee Valley Authority
Tennessee Valley Authority
The Tennessee Valley Authority is a federally owned corporation in the United States created by congressional charter in May 1933 to provide navigation, flood control, electricity generation, fertilizer manufacturing, and economic development in the Tennessee Valley, a region particularly affected...
from 1933 until 1938 in which he used the concepts proven in his earlier work with the Miami Conservancy District.
Early life
Arthur E. Morgan was born near Cincinnati, OhioCincinnati, Ohio
Cincinnati is a city in the U.S. state of Ohio. Cincinnati is the county seat of Hamilton County. Settled in 1788, the city is located to north of the Ohio River at the Ohio-Kentucky border, near Indiana. The population within city limits is 296,943 according to the 2010 census, making it Ohio's...
but his family soon moved to St. Cloud, Minnesota
St. Cloud, Minnesota
St. Cloud is a city in the U.S. state of Minnesota and the largest population center in the state's central region. The population was 65,842 at the 2010 census. It is the county seat of Stearns County...
. After graduating from high school, he spent the next several years doing outdoors work in Colorado
Colorado
Colorado is a U.S. state that encompasses much of the Rocky Mountains as well as the northeastern portion of the Colorado Plateau and the western edge of the Great Plains...
. During this time he learned that there was a dearth of practical understanding of hydraulic engineering
Hydraulic engineering
This article is about civil engineering. For the mechanical engineering discipline see Hydraulic machineryHydraulic engineering as a sub-discipline of civil engineering is concerned with the flow and conveyance of fluids, principally water and sewage. One feature of these systems is the extensive...
. He returned home and took up practice with his father, learning about hydraulic engineering by apprenticeship. By 1910 he had founded his own firm and become an associate member of the American Society of Civil Engineers.
Engineer
After the disastrous Great Dayton, Ohio FloodGreat Dayton Flood
The Great Dayton Flood of 1913 flooded Dayton, Ohio, and the surrounding area with water from the Great Miami River, causing the greatest natural disaster in Ohio history...
in 1913, Morgan proposed a system of dry earthen dams to control the river systems above Dayton. His concepts were challenged because of his lack of formal engineering training, but eventually his plans were adopted and constructed, and the subsequent years proved the effectiveness of his concepts. Because of this success, he was chosen in 1933 to design and deploy the Tennessee Valley system of dams for flood control and electrification.
Educator
Always interested in progressive education, he sent his son Ernest to Marietta JohnsonMarietta Johnson
Marietta Pierce Johnson , educational reformer, was born in St. Paul, Minnesota in 1864 and moved with her family to Fairhope, Alabama in 1902. In 1907 she founded a progressive school called The School of Organic Education, .Mrs...
's Organic School in Fairhope, Alabama, a pioneering progressive boarding school. Morgan's first effort in education was to found the Moraine Park School, an experimental progressive school in Dayton, in 1917. In 1921, Morgan became the first president of The Association for the Advancement of Progressive Education, later renamed in 1931 as Progressive Education Association (PEA). In 1919, Morgan accepted the presidency of Antioch College to turn it around after a low point in the college's finances. Morgan replaced the existing board of trustees, which had been dominated by quarrelsome local ministers, with prominent businessmen such as Charles Kettering
Charles Kettering
Charles Franklin Kettering was an American inventor, engineer, businessman, and the holder of 186 patents. He was a founder of Delco, and was head of research for General Motors for 27 years from 1920 to 1947. Among his most widely used automotive inventions were the electrical starting motor and...
, who had also backed Morgan's efforts at the Moraine Park School. Between 1921 and 1933, board members and their friends donated more than $2 million to Antioch. Kettering alone donated $500,000. Morgan reorganized the educational program to include cooperative education
Cooperative education
Cooperative education is a structured method of combining classroom-based education with practical work experience. A cooperative education experience, commonly known as a "co-op", provides academic credit for structured job experience...
and involved faculty in industrial research. The faculty, most personally chosen by Morgan, included not only academics but also architects, engineers, chemists, advertising executives, and government bureaucrats.
Until around the 1930s, Morgan was a member of the Unitarian Church
Unitarian Universalism
Unitarian Universalism is a religion characterized by support for a "free and responsible search for truth and meaning". Unitarian Universalists do not share a creed; rather, they are unified by their shared search for spiritual growth and by the understanding that an individual's theology is a...
. In his later life, Morgan was a Humanist Quaker, a member of the Society of Friends in Yellow Springs, Ohio
Yellow Springs, Ohio
Yellow Springs is a village in Greene County, Ohio, United States, and is the location of Antioch College and Antioch University Midwest. The population was 3,487 at the 2010 census...
, as was his son Ernest. After his departure from the TVA in 1938, Arthur Morgan was active in Quaker war relief efforts in Mexico and Finland. Among other accomplishments in the 1940s, he founded a non-profit organization to promote small communities (Community Service, Inc.), helped to set up a system of rural universities in India, and fought to protect Native American (Seneca) land from the flooding by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. Morgan was the author of more than twenty books. Two in the water field demonstrated his environmental orientation and his criticism of the Army Corps.
In 1962 Morgan's daughter-in-law, Elizabeth, with the help of his son Ernest, founded a progressive private school with humanist, Quaker, and Montessori influences, naming it the Arthur Morgan School.
Community Organizer
Morgan was a leading community organizer in the postwar period. He was deeply committed to community and greatly interested in community settlements. Heavily influenced by Edward BellamyEdward Bellamy
Edward Bellamy was an American author and socialist, most famous for his utopian novel, Looking Backward, set in the year 2000. He was a very influential writer during the Gilded Age of United States history.-Early life:...
’s Looking Backwards, Morgan gained a reputation as a Utopian dreamer. This interest in community living, coupled with Morgan’s belief in small towns and family life as the most virtuous form of living, led Morgan to participate in several projects that fostered rural community life.
As president of the TVA
Tennessee Valley Authority
The Tennessee Valley Authority is a federally owned corporation in the United States created by congressional charter in May 1933 to provide navigation, flood control, electricity generation, fertilizer manufacturing, and economic development in the Tennessee Valley, a region particularly affected...
, he not only directed the building of dams and provided power; he promoted community living as well. Morgan advanced a wide variety of cooperative enterprises and cottage industries and created a number of planned towns that followed the English garden city
Garden city movement
The garden city movement is a method of urban planning that was initiated in 1898 by Sir Ebenezer Howard in the United Kingdom. Garden cities were intended to be planned, self-contained communities surrounded by "greenbelts" , containing proportionate areas of residences, industry and...
model.
In 1937, Morgan founded Celo Community
Celo Community
Celo Community is a communal settlement in the Western mountains of North Carolina, located in Yancey County. It was founded in 1937 by Arthur Ernest Morgan. Celo is a land trust with its own rules of taxation and land tenure that runs its internal government by consensus...
, a land trust in the mountains of Western North Carolina. The community, which still exists today, is a self-governed land trust. Although Celo does not require members to accept any particular religious creed or ideology, it is built on cooperation between members and care for the natural environment. Today, Celo is home to 40 families who live on its 1000 acres (4 km²).
In 1940, Morgan went on to found two organizations for the promotion of community, Community Service Inc. (CSI) and the Fellowship of Intentional Communities (FIC). CSI was created to advance family life and small towns, which Morgan saw as the necessary ingredients for a positive American future. The organization was founded on Morgan’s belief in the importance of small towns to the rapidly urbanizing nation. Small towns, he argued, provided places for people to experience respect, cooperation, and personal relationships. In the same year, Morgan founded the Fellowship of Intentional Communities, an organization that fostered relationships between communal settlements. The FIC cultivated communication and the exchange of products between communities, promoted communication between communal settlements and the outside world, and advocated for the formation of new intentional communities.