William Preston Few was the first president of Duke University and the fifth president of its predecessor, Trinity College.
Background
He was born in Sandy Flat, Greenville County, South Carolina, the second son and second of five children of Benjamin Franklin Few, a physician, and Rachel (Kendrick) Few. His paternal ancestors were among the Quakers who came to America with William Penn; three of them were prominent in the Revolution. His father had served as assistant surgeon in the Confederate Army.
Introspective and handicapped by poor health, he was devoted to his mother, and she became his first teacher.
Education
He attended some sessions of a neighborhood school and, when his family moved to Greer, South Carolina, entered the local high school.
There he came under the influence of J. W. Kennedy, later president of Presbyterian College in Clinton, South Carolina, and John Matthews Manly, later professor of English in the University of Chicago, who inspired Few's early interest in scholarship.
After graduating in 1889 from Wofford College (Spartanburg, S. C. ), where he had been a superior student, Few taught for a year at St. John's Academy, Darlington, South Carolina, and for two years at Wofford College Fitting School.
In 1892 Few began graduate study at Harvard University, where he took the degrees of A. M. in 1893 and Ph. D. in 1896, both in modern languages.
This small Methodist-affiliated college, respected in educational circles for its progressive policies and its emphasis on Christian education, had moved from Randolph County to Durham in 1892 as the result of gifts from citizens in that town and a donation of $85, 000 from the tobacco industrialist Washington Duke.
Career
Few's one-year appointment became permanent; in 1902 he became the first dean of the college, and in 1910 he was appointed president.
Shortly after he came to Trinity, Few won the friendship of the Duke family, which in succeeding years contributed generously to the financial needs of the college, Benjamin Newton Duke, son of Washington Duke, being a particularly heavy benefactor.
In 1924 James Buchanan Duke, guided by the example of his father and his brother and by the ability of Few and his associates, set up the Duke Endowment, which, along with other philanthropies, provided for the transformation of Trinity College into Duke University with multi-million-dollar resources.
Few became the first president of the new university and steadily persisted in fulfilling the terms of the indenture: to establish schools with superior faculties, and to select gifted students interested in becoming, first, ministers, teachers, lawyers, and physicians, and secondly, scientists and scholars. For sixteen years, during which the enrollment rose from 400 to 3, 500 and the faculty from 40 to 400, he guided the organization and growth of the university's schools.
His deepest satisfaction came from the building of the university chapel, which to him was the heart of the university. He received ten honorary degrees from colleges and universities.
He died of a coronary thrombosis in the Duke Hospital.
His body was the first to be placed in the crypt of the Duke chapel.
Achievements
In 1924, he presided over the transformation of Trinity College into Duke University, and was president of the renamed university until his death in 1940.
During his 30 years as president, Few oversaw an expansion of the institution that is difficult to compare in modern terms. He worked with James B. Duke to make The Duke Endowment a reality and led the school’s growth from a college of 363 students and 32 faculty in 1910 to a university consisting of nine schools, 3, 716 students, and 476 faculty. Much of the growth occurred during the Great Depression, which brought hard financial times to most universities.
Accepting many responsibilities beyond his official duties, Few was co-editor of the South Atlantic Quarterly from 1910 to 1918, wrote for many publications, served on philanthropic and other organizations, and as a loyal Methodist was for years a lay leader.
Views
Called a "practical idealist, " sometimes accused of lack of ability, and criticized for the slowness of his decisions, Few had a shy manner that hid a determined will. Although he generally avoided controversy, he could be stern in matters adversely affecting the university and its benefactors, and in 1903 he drafted a statement, which was adopted by the trustees, in defense of the faculty's right of free speech, following a controversy created by Prof. John Spencer Bassett, who had criticized race relations in the South.
Membership
William Few was a member of The Order of the Red Friars, a Duke University secret society.
He was a member of the Chi Phi Fraternity in the Wofford College.
Personality
Few understood and liked students, and their appreciation of his interest and gentle humor increased as he grew older. During his last years he was somewhat "Lincolnesque" in appearance, the spareness of his tall figure indicating delicate health.
Connections
He was survived by his wife, formerly Mary Reamey Thomas of Virginia, whom he had married in 1911, and by four sons, William, Lyne Starling, Kendrick Sheffield, and Randolph Reamey; another, Yancey Preston, had predeceased him.
Father:
Benjamin Franklin Few
mother
Rachel (Kendrick) Few
Wife:
Mary Reamey Thomas
son
William Few
son
Lyne Starling Few
son
Kendrick Sheffield Few
son
Randolph Reamey Few
son
Yancey Preston
