Campbell for O'Shea

A shoemaker's son born 50 years ago in the fishing village of Fraserburgh, Scotland was picked last week to head the world's largest public school system. To succeed aging William James O'Shea (TIME, Oct. 16) as Superintendent of its 36,000 teachers, its 1,130,000 pupils, New

York City's Board of Education named Harold George Campbell, Deputy Superintendent since 1930. Though reputedly favoring another man for the job, Mayor LaGuardia was chiefly interested in getting a superintendent who would help him push through a plan for reforming the city's schools. When he heard of the Board's selection of Harold George Campbell the Mayor cocked his jaw, remarked grimly: "I hope he'll cooperate. ... He should cooperate. . . . He will have to co-operate." Said Superintendent-designate Campbell: "It goes without saying. . . ." A past master of co-operation must be a Scotch-Presbyterian-Republican who could rise to power and a $20,000-a-year job in a school system ridden by Irish- Catholic-Democratic politics. Nobody is fooled by the independent location of the Board of Education's dingy old headquarters on Park Avenue at 59th Street some three miles north of City Hall. Brought to New York at the age of four, Harold George Campbell climbed the public school ladder rung by rung: pupil, grade-school teacher, high-school teacher, principal, associate superintendent. He has long been a close personal friend and ally of the Board of Education's Democratic President George Joseph Ryan. Democratic Superintendent O'Shea has often been pleased to call him "my right arm." Accepting the general estimate of Superintendent-designate Campbell as a person able man of considerable vigor and administrative competence, New Yorkers wondered whether he would prove more progressive than retiring Superintendent O'Shea, whose regime has by no means satisfied educational idealists. In 1928 he protested a birth-control exhibit at a city Parents' Exposition. Year after that he closed a high-school auditorium to a talk on free speech. In 1930 Dr. Campbell banned a history textbook which challenged the sanctity of U. S. institutions. Last week Dr. Campbell defended his history-teaching concepts, elaborated his educational philosophy thus: History: It wouldn't do, would it, to tell a boy of eight, nine or ten all the facts in the life of his own father? Then why get so confidential with him about historical characters? George Washington swore like a trooper. All right. Teach it to the children. But--wait until they're old enough to understand. Then it will increase their respect. Then they will say, "Gee, he was a regular guy!" Economics: No pupil hereafter must leave the high schools of New York unable to understand the front page of his newspaper. Vocational training: Our entire scheme . . . must be revamped. ... To this day we're teaching boys to be wood-workers. But are we training them to be steelworkers or experts in the fields of refrigeration, neon lighting, ultraviolet rays? We are not. Johnny Jones: Our schools today are enormous. In the DeWitt Clinton High School, for example, there are about 11,000 pupils. In that mass of youngsters we've got to get hold of Johnny Jones and fit him for his world and for his time.

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