The Reverend Dr. Wallace Buttrick was an American clergyman and educator. He was acknowledged by the Rockefeller business world and played diverse roles within the Rockefeller Foundation where he served as a trustee, and was also noted for his philanthropic work.
Background
Wallace Buttrick was born on October 23, 1853 in Potsdam, New York. His father, Charles Henry Buttrick (1823 - 77), was a direct descendant of William Buttrick who came from Kingston-on-Thames in 1640 and settled at Concord, Massachussets His mother, Polly Dodge Warren (1828 - 1919), was descended from Richard Warren who came over in the Mayflower in 1620.
Education
Buttrick attended Ogdensburg Academy and the Potsdam Normal School between 1868 and 1872. Subsequently he entered the Rochester Theological Seminary and was graduated there in 1883.
Career
After serving as a pastor of the First Baptist Church of New Haven, Connecticut, Wallace Buttrick then accepted a call to a pastorate in St. Paul, Minnesota, and after three years there became pastor of a Baptist church at Albany, New York.
Ten years later he was invited to become secretary and executive officer of the General Education Board which had just been established by Mr. John D. Rockefeller for the promotion of education in the United States.
While money had been provided by Mr. Rockefeller for the administrative needs of the new organization, no endowment funds had then been received, the policy of the Board and its founder being to make first of all a thorough survey of the educational needs of the country with a view to discovering the strategic points to which the efforts of the Board could be most wisely directed, and the methods by which private funds could best be used, so as to stimulate the efforts and the self-reliance of each community.
To the study of this great problem Buttrick devoted himself with wisdom, tact, and assiduity. Although he neither possessed nor claimed to possess the formal qualifications of an educational expert, his firm grasp of the essential purposes of education, his abundant common sense, and a remarkable understanding of human nature, equipped him admirably to take a fresh view of the educational field and to discover the points at which reinforcement was needed.
While the work of the Board, soon supported by generous endowment, covered many aspects of education, its main efforts were exerted in two directions: first, to promote the better endowment of those colleges in different parts of the country which, by reason of their location, by the evidences of vitality already manifested, and by their possession of constituencies capable of carrying the main burden of future support, gave promise of permanent usefulness; the second point to which the Board directed its attention was the general condition of education in the Southern states.
While the needs of higher education in this section were not overlooked, the improvement and extension of primary and secondary schools were recognized as of more urgent importance. Economic development was the indispensable means of providing the resources necessary for education. Accordingly, Buttrick's efforts turned in the direction of popular education to increase the productivity of the land through the demonstration on a wide scale of improved agricultural methods.
Fortunately, a beginning had been made by Dr. Seaman A. Knapp of the Department of Agriculture. In cooperation with that Department, farm demonstration was extended and maintained for many years under the guidance of the General Education Board. The merit of this work, however, was that while it entailed a moderate expense in the employment of agricultural experts and demonstrators, the chief contribution was that of guidance and stimulus.
With land, equipment, and labor furnished by the farmers themselves, the expense incurred by the Board was insignificant as compared with returns in increased productivity of the land. While these efforts were under way, the Board, through its agents, was studying the problem of secondary education in the South so that, with gradually increasing resources, improvements in the number and quality of schools could be financed by the Southern communities themselves.
Buttrick lived to see these improvements largely realized. The special problems of African-American education, as well as those which the African-Americans shared with the whites, also largely engaged his attention, and he contributed much to their solution, exhibiting a tact, sympathy, and understanding which won the confidence of both races.
In his later years he turned his attention to the needs of education for the professions, especially in medicine; and his Board assumed large responsibilities in this field for the expenditure of the sums placed at its disposal by Mr. Rockefeller.
In 1914 he assumed the direction of the China Medical Board of the Rockefeller Foundation in addition to his activities as executive officer of the General Education Board. He spent some weeks of the year 1917 in Great Britain, meeting leaders of public opinion, addressing large popular gatherings on the subject of American participation in the war, and interpreting to the British public the sentiments and aims by which that participation was inspired.
He died in Baltimore on May 27, 1926.
Achievements
Religion
Wallace possessed a desire to enter the ministry from an early age. Following his dream, he received education in Theological Seminary and became a pastor of the First Baptist Church of New Haven in 1883.
Personality
Wallace Buttrick's personal qualities that he would bring to his responsibilities included to the great extend great wisdom, a passionate devotion to his work, an ever-present sense of humor, geniality, and a kindliness that found spontaneous expression in his close personal relations with men of every station and calling.
Connections
On December 1, 1875 he married Isabella Allen of Saginaw, Michigan.