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ALEXANDER CROMBIE HUMPHREYS was born
in Edinburgh, Scotland, March 30, 1851. His mother was Margaret McNutt, of
Prince Edward Island, his father, Edward B. Humphreys, a doctor of laws
and medicine and an accomplished classical scholar. The family came to
Boston in 1859, where the father conducted a private school for many
years, in which Alexander Crombie Humphreys continued his education. At
the age of fourteen he received an appointment and passed preliminary
entrance examinations for the United States Naval Academy, but it was then
found that he was too young to enter, and soon afterward he secured
employment in an insurance office in Boston. In 1866; he entered the
office of the Guaranty & Indemnity Company, New York, and advanced through
several responsible positions to that of receiving teller and assistant
general bookkeeper. Here he received a thorough grounding in accountancy,
the value of which he never has failed to impress upon his engineering
students. During a part of this time he was Secretary to the building
committee of the Bayonne & Greenville (N. J.) Gas Light Company, and upon
the completion of the works in 1872 he
was
asked to become the Secretary and Treasurer of the company. Shortly
thereafter he was made Superintendent.
A few years as manager of the gas
company brought a realization of the great help to be secured from an
engineering education, and he entered the regular course in Stevens
Institute of Technology, Hoboken, N. J. He was able to attend classes only
two days in the week, but he put such energy and determination into the
work that he completed the course in the prescribed four years and was
graduated in the class of 1881. So remarkable was this accomplishment that
the faculty passed a formal resolution congratulating him upon his
success. In addition to his business duties and the care of his family
during this period, he was a member of the
Vestry
and Treasurer of Trinity Episcopal Church,
Superintendent of the Sunday School, a member of the Bayonne Board of
Education, and Foreman of the Bayonne Fire Department.
For about four years after his
graduation from Stevens he was Chief Engineer of the Pintsch Lighting
Company, New York, becoming in 1885 superintendent of construction of the
United Gas Improvement Company, Philadelphia, and within a few months
General Superintendent and Chief Engineer. He was in charge of the
contracting and purchasing departments of all the company’s gas and
electric properties, which increased during his incumbency from ten to
about forty. He rebuilt and reorganized many of the plants and inaugurated
a plan of centralized management. At the same time he directed a large
contracting business in connection with the erection of water-gas plants
and during its reorganization was manager of the Welsbach Incandescent Gas
Light Company. In 1892, with Arthur G. Glasgow, he established the firm of
Humphreys & Glasgow, London, England, for the erection of water-gas plants
and apparatus. In 1894, he resigned from the United Gas Improvement Co.
and became the active head of Humphreys & Glasgow, New York. In 1909, the
New York firm was incorporated and in 1911, when Alten S. Miller entered
the firm, was changed to Humphreys & Miller, Inc. Dr. Humphreys has since
withdrawn from partnership in the London house. The firm has had a most
successful and honourable career in the consulting field and Humphreys &
Glasgow gas plants have been installed all over the world.
As President of Stevens Institute of
Technology, to which he was called in 1902, his life has been given its
greatest opportunity for service. He brought into his administration a
large fund of practical experience and under his progressive guidance the
Institute has grown to be one of the very first technical schools in the
country. The recent acquisition of adjoining property and the raising of a
large endowment by Dr. Humphreys insure the future for which he has ably
planned.
The president of a progressive
educational institution of to-day must ably administer existing affairs,
and add to its equipment; he must not alone live in the midst of his books
and his students, but must be their representative to the public, must
know what financial recommendations are to be made, must appeal in the
right way for endowments. He must be able as a financier, skilled in the
handling of men, and an expert in education.
His monumental work as President of
the Institute is well known. The course was always a practical and common
sense one, but Dr. Humphreys has made many changes and additions. The
principles of accountancy and of the law of contracts are taught and the
whole course is shaped to meet the actual conditions of life that will be
met by the students after graduation. The professors and instructors are
encouraged to do work outside of their Institute duties so that they may
be as far as possible in touch with current business and professional
problems. Under these influences the student is not only taught many
useful subjects not ordinarily considered part of an engineering course,
but what may be even more important, is taught his own limitations and the
advisability of securing advice on subjects that he does not fully grasp.
Dr. Humphreys received the degree of
Sc.D. from the University of Pennsylvania in 1903, and that of LL.D. from
Columbia, 1903, New York University, 1906, Princeton, 1907, Rutgers, 1914,
and Brown, 1914. He is Past-President of the National Society for the
Promotion of Industrial Education, of the American Society of Mechanical
Engineers, the United Engineering Society, the American Gas Light
Association and the American Gas Institute; a Fellow of the American
Institute of Electrical Engineers; and a member of many other technical
and scientific societies. He is Past-President of the Engineers’ Club, New
York, a life member and first Vice-President of St. Andrew’s Society of
the State of New York, a member and Past President of the New York
Canadian and New York Burns Societies, and a member of many clubs. As a
trustee and member of the executive committee of the Carnegie Foundation
for the Advancement of Teaching, his influence is distinctly felt in every
higher institution of learning in the United States. He is author of many
papers and lectures on technical and engineering subjects, and his book,
The Business Features of Engineering Practice, is widely known.
It is easy for one who has had even
a brief association with Dr. Humphreys to understand how he is able to
accomplish so much more than the average man. He has an almost unlimited
capacity for work, together with a magnificent physique, which enable him
to undergo physical and mental strain that few men could endure. His
force, high standards and personal magnetism attract all who know him, and
inspire others to work for him as they would not work for themselves. He
has the courage of his convictions, recognizes no obstacle, and never
takes a step without fully understanding where it will lead. He has an
infinite grasp of detail and never takes up any subject without going to
the bottom of it.
Dr. Humphreys makes his home at
Castle Point, Hoboken, N.
J. He married, April 30, 1872, Eva, daughter of
Dr. Emile Guillaudeu, of New York. In memory of his son Harold, the first
son of a Stevens alumnus to graduate from the college, he endowed the
Harold Humphreys Scholarship in 1902, and in memory of Crombie, who was
drowned with Harold in the Nile in 1901, the Crombie Humphreys Scholarship
in 1904. |
