Mason Hammond

Mason Hammond

Picture of Mason Hammond

Mason Hammond was born in Boston on February 14, 1903, the son of Samuel Hammond, Class of 1881, and Grace Learoyd, and died in Cambridge on October 13, 2002, four months short of his one hundredth birthday. Nearly all of his professional life was devoted to Harvard. Prepared at St. Mark’s School, to which he later rendered service including as chairman of the Board of Trustees, in 1921 he achieved the highest score of all those who sat for examinations for admission to the Harvard Class of 1925, and he achieved Rank List I for each of his undergraduate years. He was elected to Phi Beta Kappa in his junior year, graduated summa cum laude, and gave the Latin Oration at Commencement. From 1925 to 1928, he studied at Oxford University as a Rhodes scholar where, a member of Balliol College, he earned a second B.A., and a B.Litt.

In 1928, Mason Hammond returned to Harvard, where he began his career in the Classics and History departments. From 1937 to 1939, 1951 to 1952, and 1955 to 1957 he was in charge of classical studies at the American Academy in Rome, and he served two appointments as acting director of the Villa I Tatti, Harvard’s Center for Italian Renaissance Studies. In 1950 he succeeded his mentor, Arthur Stanley Pease, as Pope Professor of the Latin Language and Literature, retiring in 1973, and in the year following he served as Visiting Professor of the Classics at the University of Wisconsin. Professor Hammond enjoyed a long and fruitful retirement, during which he devoted himself to the history of his College and University. He was awarded the Harvard Medal by the Harvard Alumni Association in 1987, and in 1994 the University conferred upon him the honorary degree of Doctor of Letters. When presenting him to the president, the University Marshal said of him, “Few of her children, Mr. President, have had as long or as loving a relationship with this University as our next honorand.”

Continue Reading
Image: Rutger’s Database of Classical Scholars

 

People Categories