Award of the George Sarton Medal to Lynn ThorndikeSource: Isis, Vol. 49, No. 2 (Jun., 1958), pp. 107-108Published by: The University of Chicago Press on behalf of The History of Science SocietyStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/226923 .

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Lynn Thorndike receiving the George Sarton Medal from Henry Guerlac

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Award of the

George Sarton Medal

to Lynn Thorndike [The following gives the substance of the informal remarks made by Professor

Henry Guerlac on the occasion of awarding the George Sarton Medal to Dr. Lynn Thorndike at the luncheon held on 28 December I957 at the Hotel Gover- nor Clinton in New York.]

IT is now my very pleasant duty to make the presentation of the History of Science Society's highest award: the George Sarton Medal. When Dr.

Sarton retired from Harvard, and later when he relinquished the editorship of Isis, we often spoke of finding some special way of honoring him for his tire- less service to the history of science. A medal struck in his honor, to be awarded for outstanding contributions to the history of science, and by example to foster its study, was proposed by the Council as a fitting memorial. Through the interest and generosity of a famous pharmaceutical concern, the Charles Pfizer Company, our hope was made a reality, and we were able to present the first medal to Dr. Sarton himself at our annual meeting in I955. It was a moving occasion many of us will never forget. Last year the medal was awarded at the Florence Congress to that wonderful husband-and-wife team of historians of science, Charles and Dorothea Waley Singer. Today we are privileged to pre- sent the medal yet a third time: to one of our most distinguished American scholars and teachers, a Foundation Member of our Society and a Past Presi- dent, and the recipient of many other justly deserved academic honors: Dr. Lynn Thorndike.

Everybody present knows, or ought to know, something of Dr. Thorndike's rich and varied accomplishment in our field of study. Each of us has read, or at least consulted with great profit, his monumental series of green-bound volumes on The History of Magic and Experimental Science, that almost unique example of sustained - indeed of stubborn - scholarly accomplish- ment.

I shall not enumerate, even if I could, his many other books and articles, nor retrace in his presence the steps in his distinguished career. Much of this you will find in Dr. Kibre's opening paper of the volume of Osiris dedicated to Dr. Thorndike.

Instead, I should like to speak briefly of two aspects of his career, less familiar to some of you and yet of special interest to a gathering such as this: his role as a great teacher of graduate students, and his contribution to the founding of our own Society.

In I924 Lynn Thorndike was called from Western Reserve University to become Professor of History at Columbia, the great institution which had awarded him his doctorate some years before. He was already esteemed both as a medievalist and as a pioneer historian of science, having published in I9I7

his excellent one-volume History of Medieval Europe and in I923 the first vol- ume of his Magic and Experimental Science, the last volumes - or should I

107

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I o8 AWARD OF THE GEORGE SARTON MEDAL TO LYNN THORNDIKE

say the most recent volumes? - of which are due from the press at any mo- ment. At Columbia Dr. Thorndike had through the years a succession of gifted graduate students; some of these have made a name for themselves in medieval history, like Professor Kenneth Setton and Professor George Fowler, while others have made their mark in the history of science. Of these last, the best known to you are here at the speaker's table today: Dr. Pearl Kibre, Dr. Doris Hellman, and our two Vice-Presidents, Marshall Clagett and Carl Boyer.

Dr. Thorndike's interest in the history of science dates from his years of graduate study at Columbia under the eminent James Harvey Robinson. How much the interest was due to Robinson himself, I do not know, but I suspect a great deal, for the story of the growth of science had an important place in the syllabus of Robinson's famous course on "The Intellectual History of Europe." At all events young Dr. Thorndike's interest in the history of sci- ence became if anything more intense as he began his teaching career at Western Reserve.

As yet, so far as I know, there was no formal teaching of the history of science in this country, and, perhaps more important, there existed no group or society where the enthusiasts of this new field could discuss their problems and present the results of their research. It is more than a footnote to our history if I remind you that Dr. Thorndike organized and took part in the earliest meeting devoted to the history of science to be held, so far as I know, in these United States. It took place in Cleveland in December I9g9 at the annual Christmas meeting of the American Historical Association. In this and other respects it foreshadowed the later meetings of the History of Sci- ence Society. Like your meeting today, it was presided over by a Cornell pro- fessor, George Lincoln Burr. Among those who took part were a number of men whose names are familiar to you: Louis Karpinski, Henry Crew, Charles Homer Haskins, and Lynn Thorndike. Dr. Thorndike's paper dealt with a medieval scientist, Peter of Abano. After the papers were read, the discussion centered on the possibility of introducing courses in the history of science into the university curriculum. There was a surprising degree of optimism, and Haskins, then Dean of the Harvard Graduate School, spoke briefly but en- thusiastically of the pioneer course recently instituted at Harvard by the great physiologist, L. J. Henderson. Professor Thorndike, I should add, was the rapporteur of the meeting, and the facts I have given you are taken from the brief account he published two months later as a note in Science.

Just four years after this historic meeting - in January I924 - our Society was officially established. The initiative, to be sure, was taken by David Eugene Smith, but Dr. Thorndike was one of the small group of scholars to whom Professor Smith wrote during the preliminary consultations, and he be- came one of the most active Founding Members.

You will agree, perhaps, that from our point of view these are very special, if little known, credentials, to be added to those other accomplishments for which Dr. Thorndike is respected throughout the scholarly world.

It is now my privilege to present on behalf of the History of Science Society to Dr. Thorndike the George Sarton Medal, an award he richly deserves for the range of his attainments as a scholar and historian, for his enrichment of our field by the gifted students he has trained and - by no means last from our special point of view - for his sustained loyalty to the Society he helped set upon its way.

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