Mason Welch Gross

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Mason Welch Gross (1911-1977)

Mason Welch Gross (11 June 1911 – 11 October 1977) was an American television quiz show personality and academic who served as the sixteenth President of Rutgers University, serving from 1959 to 1971.

[edit] Biography

He was born in Hartford, Connecticut in 1911 to Hilda Frances Welch (c1880-1962) and Charles Wells Gross (1877-1957). He had two siblings: Spencer Gross (1906-1982) and Cornelia Gross (1914-?). Charles Gross was an attorney.^[1] He started in the Hartford public grade school system and two years at Hartford High School. He then entered the Taft School, a preparatory school in Watertown, Connecticut in 1925. In 1927 he became ill following his inoculation for scarlet fever. He missed a year of school and spent part of the year at a ranch belonging to his mother's cousin in Arizona.

Mason earned his Bachelors of Arts in 1934; and Master of Arts degree in classics in 1937, at Jesus College, University of Cambridge.

He returned to the United States and studied at Harvard University under Alfred North Whitehead, earning his Doctor of Philosophy in 1938. He taught at Columbia University from 1938 to 1942, where he met Julia Kernan, a Vassar graduate, and they married on September 6, 1940. They had four children together: Ellen Clariss Gross who married Frank A. Miles, Katherine Wood Gross who married Clayton H. Farnham, Charles Wells Gross, and Thomas Welch Gross.

He then served in World War II in the Army Intelligence Corps, and was assigned to a bomber group based in Italy. Gross earned the Bronze Star, and was later discharged as a Captain.

He then became Assistant Professor of Philosophy and Assistant to the Dean of Arts and Science at Rutgers University in 1946. In 1947 he was promoted to assistant dean and associate professor, and in 1949 was appointed to the newly created position of provost to take over the duties of the ailing Robert Clothier who took a leave of absence. Clothier resigned his office in 1951 and Gross continued as provost under the newly appointed Lewis Webster Jones. He was then given the additional title of vice president in 1958. Jones resigned the presidency in August of 1958, and in February of 1959, Gross was chosen as president. On May 6, 1959, he became the sixteenth president of Rutgers University.

From 1949 to 1950 he was a panelist on the television quiz show, Think Fast. He was also a judge for the show, Two for the Money from 1952 to 1955. [1]

He oversaw large-scale development on all the University's campuses, including the development of Livingston College from the Army's former Camp Kilmer. Gross served during turbulent times with student protests over the Vietnam War, and race riots in Newark, New Jersey in 1969.

During this time, Gross received recognition for refusing to dismiss Eugene Genovese, a professor who early during the Vietnam conflict publicly supported the Viet Cong and welcomed their victory in Southeast Asia. During his tenure Rutgers University acquired the Center for Alcohol Studies in 1963, formerly housed at Yale University since the 1920s, and established a medical school.

In 1971, after 25 years of service, 12 as the university president, he retired. He then became the director of the Harry Frank Guggenheim Foundation and served until his death in Red Bank, New Jersey, at age 66 in 1977. The School for the Creative and Performing Arts at Rutgers was renamed as the Mason Gross School of the Arts in 1975 in his honor.

Gross served on the board of directors for Vassar College, Taft School, and Robert Wood Johnson University Hospital.

[edit] References

^ Mason Gross; 1920 US Census; Hartford, Connecticut

New York Times; August 8, 1954, Sunday; Dr. Mason Gross Judges Quiz Player's Answers. The quiet-spoken, scholarly gentleman seated adjacent to the Quizmaster on C. B. S. television's "Two for the Money" show is Dr. Mason Gross, Professor of Philosophy at Rutgers University, and a one-man television brain trust. ...
New York Times; February 28, 1959; Gross Named Rutgers President; Scholar Once a TV Personality; Arbiter of Quiz Show Joined Faculty in 1946. Taught Classes in Philosophy. Dr. Gross Named Head of Rutgers. Joint Announcement Noted as Speaker. New Brunswick, New Jersey, February 27, 1959; Dr. Mason W. Gross, a 47-year-old scholar, philosophy professor and former television personality, was named today as the sixteenth president of Rutgers University. ...
New York Times; May 7, 1959, Thursday; The new president of Rutgers University, Dr. Mason Welch Gross, is known on the campus at New Brunswick, New Jersey, as a man of unflagging ability. He has demonstrated it in many ways. ...
New York Times; October 12, 1977; Mason Gross, Ex-Head of Rutgers.