Reed Gwillim Law

Born: ♂ Reed Gwillim Law

January 19, 1921

Hartford, CT

Died: December 25, 1975

Northport, NY

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Spouses: Jean Inglis Law (m. January 13, 1943); Bobbie Winifred Law (m. Jan., 1961)

Children: Reed Gwillim Law Jr., Steven Inglis Law, Zachary Law, Zebulon Law, and Bronwyn Merhige

Step Children: Susan Elizabeth Smith and Michael Ralston

Parents: Harry Nathan Law and Bessie Gwillim Law

Early Life

See Oral history given to Gwillim Law. (Reed Gwillim Law, Jr. remembers—) Grammy told me that he was a picky eater, preferring peanut butter sandwiches. One summer when he was in his early teens, they sent him off to a farm in Massachusetts, in hopes that the work would make him so hungry that he would eat a greater variety. Whether or not that trick worked, in later life he had much broader tastes.

When he was at Wilbraham, his favorite teacher was Robert Taylor, with whom he maintained a lifelong connection. Taylor retired to a property called "Big Boulder" in Peterborough, NH, where we visited more than once.

Education

• Wilbraham Academy, Wilbraham, MA
• Wesleyan University, Middletown, CT: B.A. 1942
• Yale University, New Haven, CT: Ph.D. 1950

Career

• Army Air Corps, 1st lt., 1943-46: navigator on missions from British base
• Cortland State Teachers' College, Cortland, NY, 1949-62: professor of foreign languages, department chairman
• Sabbatical study in Madrid, Spain and Montpellier, France: 1955-56
• University of Libya, Tripoli, with US-AID (Agency for International Development), 1962-63
• University of Oregon, Eugene, OR, 1963-64: visiting professor
• C. W. Post College, Greenvale, NY, 1964-75: professor, dean of humanities

Accomplishments

• Author (with Bobbie) of "From Reason to Romanticism," Big Mountain Press, 1965
• I believe he was a member of the Exchange Club in Cortland, NY (c. 1955-61)
• Played piano; played mandolin

Reminiscences

Reed Gwillim Law Jr. remembers: My overall impression is that he was not interested very much in children's activities. To have a relationship with someone, he needed to be able to discuss deep thoughts with them. That meshed well with his teaching career, at least with students who were open to that kind of relationship. On the other hand, he was less deeply involved in his own children's lives.

His sense of humor tended to the irreverent. I think he liked to say things that were a bit provocative, but not hurtful.

He was strongly opposed to bigotry. When he was in flight training in the south, he got very disturbed at the unjust and arbitrary ways in which he saw blacks' actions were restricted. It is vaguely possible that he himself had prejudices against the stereotypical southerners who acted so cruelly, without always distinguishing individual differences.

Once he told me, "When you love someone, you do things for them." I think that time he was urging me to write Grammy (Bessie) a letter.

Anecdotes

From 1964 until his death, he and Bobbie owned a home on Eaton's Neck, Long Island, facing Northport Harbor, which had been built for William Howard Taft.

Health

• Started smoking while in the Air Corps, and never fully broke the habit. In later years used a cigarette holder with a replaceable filter
• Died of pancreatic cancer

Faith

I think his faith suffered from his wartime experiences. In Cortland, he attended a Unitarian Universalist Church.

(Source: Directory of American Scholars, Part 3, 5th Edition. I have the typescript they sent for verification.)