Harvie Branscomb
Bennett Harvie Branscomb (born December 25, 1894 in Huntsville, Madison County; died July 24, 1998 in Nashville, Tennessee) was a New Testament scholar and Chancellor of Vanderbilt University.
Branscomb was the son of Methodist minister Lewis Capers Branscomb and his wife, the former Nancy McAdory. He graduated from Birmingham College and won a 1914 Rhodes Scholarship to Oxford, where he was awarded the Greek Prize and First Honors in Theology. His research focused on the cultural and religious roots of early Christianity and he authored four books on theology between 1925 and 1937, and another on pedagogy in 1940.
While at Oxford, Branscomb undertook a covert mission on behalf of President Hoover's Commission for Relief in Belgium, smuggling a letter of encouragment from Cardinal Mercier to Belgian clerics through German lines. He and his companion, O. C. Carmichael, were awarded the Medaille du Roi Albert, Medaille de la Reine for their perseverance.
After completing his studies at Oxford, Branscomb was commissioned a lieutenant in the 5th field artillery at Fort Gordon, Georgia and sent to Louisville, Kentucky for officer training school, where he was still stationed at the war's end. He accepted a faculty position at Southern Methodist University in Dallas, Texas in 1919 and married Margaret Vaughan, daughter of a Texas judge. He was fired from SMU for publicly supporting a colleague who had been terminated over a theological dispute, but quickly landed a job at Duke University's Divinity School. In 1923 he took a sabbatical to complete his Ph.D. in philosophy from the Union Theological Seminary at Columbia University.
In 1925 Branscomb joined the faculty of the Duke University School of Divinity. He served a Guggenheim Fellowship in 1931–32 and became Director of Libraries and eventually Dean of the School.
In 1946 Branscomb was appointed the fourth Chancellor of Vanderbilt University in Nashville. As chief executive he oversaw changes to the recruitment of trustees and faculty which elevated the prestige of the university. He oversaw large increases in the student population and the first admission of African-American students in 1952. His record on Civil Rights, however, was tainted by his expulsion of a Black divinity student who had been arrested for participating in sit-ins in defiance of local segregation laws. The incident provoked the resignation of several faculty members and the ouster of the Divinity School dean who had supported his student.
Branscomb pushed for the rebuilding of the university's school of medicine, which had earlier been recommended for closure. At his retirement in 1963 Vanderbilt was ranked for the first time among the top 20 private universities in the United States. After being succeeded by Alexander Heard, he maintained an office on campus as Chancellor Emeritus.
Branscomb was also active in diplomatic efforts. As chair of the American Library Association's Mission to Brazil in 1945, he helped to reorganize that country's National Library, for which he was made a member of the Order of the Southern Cross. He was appointed chair of the first United States Advisory Commission for Education Exchange in 1947 and served on the Commission on Education and International Affairs of the American Council of Education from 1955 to 1958. Later he was a consultant on education for the World Bank and chair of the US Commission for UNESCO. He was a delegate to international conferences in Paris, Tehran, Geneva and Buenos Aires.
Branscomb died in 1998 at the age of 103. He was survived by three sons; Harvie Jr, Ben, and Lewis; nine grandchildren and nine great-grandchildren.
Publications
- Branscomb, Harvie (1925) The Message of Jesus. Nashville, Tennessee: Cokesbury Press
- Branscomb, Harvie (1930) Jesus and the Law of Moses. Hodder and Stoughton
- Branscomb, Harvie (1931) The Teachings of Jesus
- Branscomb, Harvie (1937) The Gospel of Mark
- Branscomb, Harvie (1940) Teaching with Books
References
- Honan, William H. (August 1, 1998) "Harvie Branscomb, a Shaper of Vanderbilt U., Dies at 103." The New York Times