Gaddis Smith to pen Yale's tercentennial text

By Emily Gold

Four years from now, Yale will celebrate its tercentennial anniversary. In honor of the birthday bash, the administration has commissioned history professor Gaddis Smith, PC '54, GRD '61, to write an original historical account of the University's last 100 years.

Smith, who has experienced Yale life as an undergrad, graduate student, and professor, will publish Yale and the External World in the year 2000. The book will examine the ways in which Yale was transformed by global events in the 20th century.

"For the first two centuries, Yale was largely unaffected by world affairs," Smith said. "But in the 20th century, developments in the world and the United States--war, peace, the rise of the federal government, and so on--have all had a huge impact on Yale."

Smith originally came up with the idea for this project when President Richard Levin, GRD '74, asked for his involvement in the University's anniversary celebration.

The history professor named immigration policies as one of the issues which has influenced Yale this century. "Asians were excluded from immigrating to this country until 1965," he said. "Now, 17 percent of the student body here is of Asian origin. They're the sons and daughters, or grandsons and granddaughters, of people who weren't allowed to enter the United States."

The administration hopes that the book will have an impact beyond New Haven. "It will be a book, I predict, which will be of interest to the nation and not simply to the university community," University Secretary Linda Lorimer, LAW '77, said.

Smith plans to reduce his course load by half for the next two years in order to focus on the book. In the fall of 1998, Smith will teach a lecture course on the book's topic in the hopes of getting feedback before its publication.

"It's an interesting subject, and if he's teaching it, I'm sure it'll be a great course," Laura Siegel, JE '98, said. "I'm sorry I won't be here to take it."

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