Profile Major Works Resources

William Watts Folwell, 1833-1929.

American historical economist and educator, first president of the University of Minnesota.

Originating from Romulus, New York, William Watts Folwell was educated at Hobart College, receiving his degree in 1857, and staying as a mathematics lecturer.  In 1860, Folwell decamped for an academic tour of Germany, studying in Berlin.  He returned to the US to enlist and fight in the US Civil War.  After his discharge, Folwell resumed his calling as a teacher at Kenyon College in Ohio.

In 1869, then merely 36 years old, W.W. Folwell became the first president of the University of Minnesota. The university had received a charter from the state of Minnesota back in 1851, but had to wait until the end of the Civil War to begin implementation.  Folwell submitted an ambitious plan to design the university of Minnesota along the line of the German model, with research-oriented graduate degrees, but this was resisted by the trustees, who preferred the Anglo-Saxon classics model.  Nonetheless, the plan was ultimately accepted, however implementation would take a much slower pace. 

From his assumption, W.W. Folwell taught economics at Minnesota. Impressed by the German Historical School, Folwell wrote several papers on the methodology of economics, espousing the historical method.  Welcoming the "new generation" of young American historicists, Folwell was one of the few elder statesmen present at the beginning of the American Economic Association. 

Folwell resigned the presidency in 1889, remaining professor of political economy and head of the department at Minnesota, until his retirement in 1907.

 

  

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Major Works of William Watts Folwell

  • "Inaugural Address", 1870, The Addresses at the inauguration of William W. Folwell as president of the University of Minnesota, Wednesday, December 22, 1869, p.9
  • "The True Method of Political Economy", 1882, Bull of Minnesota Academy of Natural Sciences (v.2, Dec), p.239 [hth]
  • "The Effect of Correct Analysis on Doctrine in Political Economy", 1889, Pub AEA (Sep), p.377 [js]
  • "A Syllabus of Political Economy", 1891, Pub AEA (Jan-Mar),  p.96 [js]
  • "Weakness and Danger of the Single Tax", 1891, The Century (v.42), p.792
  • "The New Economics", 1893, Pub AEA (Jan), p.19 [js] [repr. 1918, Econ Addresses, p.91]
  • "Discussion of Giddings's Idea and Definition of Value", 1893, Pub AEA (Jan) p.95 [js]
  • The Wages Question: Outline of six lectures, 1894-95 [hth]
  • "Discussion of Carver's Ethical Basis of Distribution", 1895, Pub AEA (Mar-Supp),  p.98 [js]
  • "The Single Tax", wr.1899 [pub. 1918, p.49]
  • "Trusts", wr.1900 [pub. 1918: p.31]
  • "The Ethics of Business", wr. 1905 [pub.1918, p.3]
  • Minnesota: the north star state, 1908 [bk, av]
  • University Addresses, 1909 [bk, av]
  • "The Five Million Loan", 1911, Minnesota Historical Society, [av]
  • "The Sale of Fort Snelling, 1857", 1915, Minnesota Historical Society, [av]
  • "Socialism True and False", 1918, in Economic Addresses, p.73
  • Economic Addresses, 1918 [av, bk, bk]
  • A History of Minnesota, 1921-30  1921: v.1 [av1], 1924: v.2 [av2], 1926: v.3 [av3], 1930: v.4 [av4]
  • William Watts Folwell; the autobiography and letters of a pioneer of culture, (ed. S.J. Buck) 1933, [hth]

 
HET

 
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Resources on W.W. Folwell

  • The Addresses at the inauguration of William W. Folwell as president of the University of Minnesota, Wednesday, December 22, 1869, 1870 [bk] 
  • "Dr. Folwell on Trusts", 1899, Ariel (Dec 5), p.138
  • Article on W.W. Fowell's youth at Seneca, NY [pdf]
  • W.W. Folwell page at UMN office of the president
  • Wikipedia

 

 
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