Willard W. Beatty, early 1920s |
Instead, Beatty was an urban
person of the West, having grown up in San Francisco during the critical years
between the 1906 Earthquake and the 1915 Panama-Pacific International
Exposition. He was naturally independent and open to the world. He could spend
his time as he chose.
Without a doubt, Beatty’s life’s
work reflected his enlightened youth in the Bay Area.
During the early 1930s when
the Depression deepened, he grew ever more convinced that anything could be
rebuilt from the ground up; he had seen San Francisco rise from the ashes.
If he railed against the Hearst newspapers for opposing academic freedom; well, he had already done that as managing editor of the progressive journal, California Outlook.
Having watched the Commonwealth Club set an agenda for change, Beatty believed in the power of advocacy through organization. With an activist uncle as his guardian, Beatty recognized that citizenship corresponded to action and education.
If he railed against the Hearst newspapers for opposing academic freedom; well, he had already done that as managing editor of the progressive journal, California Outlook.
Having watched the Commonwealth Club set an agenda for change, Beatty believed in the power of advocacy through organization. With an activist uncle as his guardian, Beatty recognized that citizenship corresponded to action and education.
“I believe that Dad’s
interest in education began when he was a student in Lick High School,” Willard
Beatty’s son wrote to me. “They had a rather novel idea that education should
be directed at the development of all aspects of an individual.”
San Francisco’s Lick High
School started life as the California School of Mechanical Arts.* Endowed by
the entrepreneur James M. Lick, a piano maker, in 1895, the school required
that students spend half of their time in a skilled apprenticeship. Therefore
Willard’s college preparatory work comprised equal parts manual training and
academic studies.
Willard Beatty Lick High School debate team, 1908 |
First in his high school
class, Willard appeared in Lick’s yearbook, The
Tiger, wearing the pince-nez popularized by Theodore Roosevelt. The
inscription beside his photo stated: One
who needs no eulogy, he speaks for himself.
Since Lick had a debating society, it’s no surprise that Willard led it. One of his nicknames was Willard Jennings Beatty.
Since Lick had a debating society, it’s no surprise that Willard led it. One of his nicknames was Willard Jennings Beatty.
“Fancy Beatty without words
bombastic,” cracked the yearbook editors, who also noted that Willard had
surprised his friends by performing the role of a bishop in the senior play:
“notwithstanding his natural inclinations, he did not appear at all out of
place in the clerical robes.”
One must assume that Willard disputed religion.
One must assume that Willard disputed religion.
And he had a great
imagination, possibly influenced by his uncle’s penchant for mystery novels. In
a short story entitled “The Lost Link,” Willard moves from New York to Egypt on
the trail of “the greatest archaeologist whom the world has ever known” who has
perished in an explosion at Beni Hassen. Descending into a cave, Willard’s
character finds his hero crushed behind a giant statue of the Aztec War God, Huitzilopotchli, clutching a torn piece of paper that would have provided proof
of a connection between the Egyptian and Mexican civilizations.
The story is very good.
In 1909, Willard graduated
from Lick and went off to Berkeley. He planned to become an architect.
Within a year or two, he fell in love with Elise Biedenbach, daughter of the longtime principal of Berkeley High School who was an early member of the Sierra Club and friend of John Muir. Charles L. Biedenbach’s parents “had come around the Horn in a sailing ship, fleeing as refugees from one of the oppressions in Prussia, and had landed in San Francisco and started a grocery store,” a grandson recalled in a 1993 interview. Both Charles and his wife, Lulu, graduated from UC-Berkeley. They were just a few years younger than Willard Beatty’s parents, also Berkeley alums.
Within a year or two, he fell in love with Elise Biedenbach, daughter of the longtime principal of Berkeley High School who was an early member of the Sierra Club and friend of John Muir. Charles L. Biedenbach’s parents “had come around the Horn in a sailing ship, fleeing as refugees from one of the oppressions in Prussia, and had landed in San Francisco and started a grocery store,” a grandson recalled in a 1993 interview. Both Charles and his wife, Lulu, graduated from UC-Berkeley. They were just a few years younger than Willard Beatty’s parents, also Berkeley alums.
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Elise Biedenbach engagement announcement, Oakland Tribune, November 28, 1913 |
By 1913, when Willard
graduated and married Elise, his interest had shifted from architecture to
education. He spent a year teaching at Oakland Polytechnic School. Then he
became managing editor of California
Outlook, which covered such issues as child labor, juvenile delinquency,
Indian education, and conservation.
“We don’t want too much dry stuff,” the journal’s
editor, Meyer Lissner, wrote to Beatty;
You
must look out for that. One fault with the paper is that it has been too heavy.
We must try to popularize it or treat scientific subjects in a popular manner.
. . What you say about the “Revolutionary Artists” sounds interesting.
The following year, Beatty joined
the faculty of the San Francisco State Normal School and launched his career in
education.
At that time he was invited to join the Commonwealth Club of California, where he addressed the group about the League of Nations and served on committees on education and city planning.
At that time he was invited to join the Commonwealth Club of California, where he addressed the group about the League of Nations and served on committees on education and city planning.
By his early 30s, Beatty had distinguished himself in at least one important way: he had wrestled with problems related to social justice,
urbanization, and acculturation long before entering the field of education,
whereas many of his contemporaries encountered these issues further on, by way
of their work in the schools. So he looked at things differently.
Unlike his peers, he never
spent time getting out from under God-fearing elders.
And very significantly, Willard Beatty actually experienced a truly progressive high school education.
*Lick
later merged with the Wilmerding School of Industrial Arts and the Lux School
for Industrial Training for Girls. Today it is called Lick-Wilmerding High
School.
https://www.throughthehourglass.com/2016/01/california-days.html
See also: November 11, November 29, December 2, 2015; January 12 + August 3, 2016.
See also: November 11, November 29, December 2, 2015; January 12 + August 3, 2016.
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