For Immediate Release

Contact: 	
		Director, Public Relations
		(909) 621-8219
		nina_mason@pitzer.edu


John W. Atherton, 85; Pitzer College's Founding President

Claremont, Calif. -- Oct. 31, 2001 -- John W. Atherton, the founding president of Pitzer 
College and a former dean at Claremont Men's College (now Claremont McKenna), died on 
Oct. 30; he was 85.

Dr. Atherton was founding president of Pitzer College, the youngest of the undergraduate 
Claremont Colleges, from 1963 to 1970.  During his tenure as Pitzer's president, the faculty 
grew from 13 to more than 50 members, the student body from 150 to 650, and the campus 
was completed.

Founded in 1963, Pitzer College is a nationally ranked undergraduate college of the liberal arts 
and sciences.  A member of The Claremont Colleges, Pitzer offers a distinctive approach to a 
liberal education by linking intellectual inquiry with interdisciplinary studies, cultural immersion, 
social responsibility and community involvement. 

"Pitzer College owes a great deal to Dr. Atherton's leadership and vision, demonstrated not only 
in his presidency but also in his invaluable support in subsequent years," said Marilyn Chapin 
Massey, Pitzer's current president. "He will be greatly missed."

Dr. Atherton resigned his presidency in June 1970 to return to teaching college English "where 
my basic interests have always been." In July 1970, he joined the faculty at the State University 
of New York at Brockport as professor of English and chairman of the English Department.  
Dr. Atherton later served as dean of humanities and dean of liberal studies at SUNY Brockport.  
He also lectured internationally, as a Fulbright Lecturer in American literature at the University 
of Malta, Msida (1976-77), as a visiting professor of English and American literature at 
Loughborough University in England (1980-81) and as a Fulbright Lecturer in American 
literature at Ain Shams University, Cairo, Egypt (1984).  He was a Fulbright Lecturer in 
American Literature at the Tokyo University of Foreign Studies in 1955-56.

He returned to Claremont after retiring from the Brockport faculty in 1985.

Prior to his appointment as president of Pitzer, Dr. Atherton served as dean of faculty and 
professor of English at Claremont Men's (now Claremont McKenna) College from 1961 to 
1963.  He joined the CMC faculty in 1949.  He also taught at the Claremont Graduate School 
from 1956 to 1970 and served as provost of The Claremont Colleges in 1966-67.  He began 
his academic career as an instructor at Iowan State College in Ames in 1941.

Outside of academia, Dr. Atherton served as a U.S. Naval Reserve officer for many years, 
performing active duty as a torpedo and gunnery officer during World War II.  He studied the 
Russian language in the Navy School of Oriental Languages in Boulder, Col., in 1945. A poet 
and the author of several short stories, Dr. Atherton writings were published in the Saturday 
Review, New Yorker, Yale Review and various anthologies.

Dr. Atherton graduated from Amherst College magna cum laude and Phi Beta Kappa with a 
B.A. in English in 1939.  He held an M.A. degree in English and American literature (1940) and 
a Ph.D. in English literature (1952) from the University of Chicago. Dr. Atherton is survived by 
his wife, Virginia Richards Atherton, and three children: John, Jr., Thomas and Carolyn.

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