Early Years and Education
Barker was born near Riverside in Walker County in east Texas. As a young man, he worked in the railroad shops in Palestine in Anderson County. When he arrived at UT as a student in 1895, he was still a night mail clerk for the Missouri Pacific Railroad. Barker received the bachelor of arts and the master of arts from UT in 1899 and 1900, respectively. He procured his Ph.D. from the private University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia, founded by Benjamin Franklin. He also studied at Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and taught for a time there at Radcliffe College.
In 1940, Barker received an honorary LL.D. from Transylvania College in Lexington, Kentucky, the ‘’alma mater’’ of Stephen F. Austin, whom Barker considered to have been the most important person in Texas history. Barker was elected to Phi Beta Kappa and was a member of the Phi Delta Theta social fraternity.
Read more about this topic: Eugene C. Barker
Famous quotes containing the words early, years and/or education:
“In the early days of the world, the Almighty said to the first of our race “In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread”; and since then, if we except the light and the air of heaven, no good thing has been, or can be enjoyed by us, without having first cost labour.”
—Abraham Lincoln (1809–1865)
“When Prince William [later King William IV] was at Cork in 1787, an old officer ... dined with him, and happened to say he had been forty years in the service. The Prince with a sneer asked what he had learnt in those forty years. The old gentleman justly offended, said, “Sir, I have learnt, when I am no longer fit to fight, to make as good a retreat as I can” —and walked out of the room.”
—Horace Walpole (1717–1797)
“The study of tools as well as of books should have a place in the public schools. Tools, machinery, and the implements of the farm should be made familiar to every boy, and suitable industrial education should be furnished for every girl.”
—Rutherford Birchard Hayes (1822–1893)