Eliphalet Nott Potter

Background

He was born on September 20, 1836 at Schenectady, New York, United States. He was the son of Alonzo Potter by his first wife Sarah Maria (Nott) Potter.

Education

On his father's elevation to the episcopate and removal to Philadelphia, the boy entered the Protestant Episcopal Academy there, from which he passed to St. James College, Md. In 1861 he graduated from Union College, Schenectady. He spent a year at the Berkeley Divinity School, Middletown, Connecticut.

Career

He was ordained deacon by his father, June 22, 1862. For a short time during the Civil War he served as a chaplain in the army, but soon became rector of the Church of the Nativity, South Bethlehem, being ordained priest by his father on March 19, 1865. In Lehigh University, Bethlehem, which was chartered in 1866, he became the first professor of ethics and secretary of the board of trustees, retaining these two offices until after his removal in March 1869 to Troy, New York, where he became assistant minister of St. Paul's Church.

He was chosen the seventh president of Union College, of which his maternal grandfather, Eliphalet Nott, had been the fourth. Here Potter's organizing ability found full employment. He also brought the college into affiliation with the Albany Law School, the Albany Medical College, and the Dudley Observatory. He declined an election as bishop of Nebraska in 1884, but this same year resigned his position at Union.

Later he became president of Hobart College, Geneva, New York, where he displayed like energy and enthusiasm in developing the resources of the institution. Resigning in 1897, he became president of a newly founded institution of more problematical character - Cosmopolitan University, located at Irvington on the Hudson. The courses of this institution were conducted on the correspondence plan, which was just then being put into operation on a large scale. It soon got into difficulties with the regents of the University of the State of New York and its life was short. Before it collapsed, however, Potter had died.

Achievements

• Eliphalet Nott Potter was the seventh president of Union College. He also was the President of Hobart College and Cosmopolitan University. Under his administration the faculties were augmented, new buildings erected, and the equipment and endowment increased. Namely, he caused to be erected the Church of the Nativity and rectory at South Bethlehem, Grace Church at Allentown, and the Chapel of the Mediator at Allentown’s Furnace Street. Eliphalet also helped start the Sunday School in Allentown’s Sixth Ward in 1863. His publications were of slight importance, the most ambitious being, Washington a Model in His Library and Life, the Hoffman Library lecture. He also edited memoirs of Tayler Lewis and Isaac W. Jackson.

Works

More photos

• book

  • Washington a Model in His Library and Life

    (This book was originally published prior to 1923, and rep...)

Personality

He was a man of great energy and zeal. In his daily intercourse with his parishioners he was ever courteous, friendly and had a cheery word for all.

Connections

On April 28, 1870, he married Helen Fuller, daughter of Joseph W. Fuller, of Troy, New York.

Father:

Alonzo Potter

Mother:

Sarah Maria (Nott) Potter

Spouse:

Helen Fuller

father-in-law:

Joseph W. Fuller

Daughter:

George T. Smith

maternal grandfather:

Eliphalet Nott

References

• Discourses Commemorative of Professor Tayler Lewis, Delivered at Commencement, 1877; And of Professor Isaac W. Jackson, Delivered at Commencement, 1878