Princeton University recently decided to keep U.S. President Woodrow Wilson's name on its School of Public and International Affairs. The name had been challenged by a group of black students who cited Wilson's racism. This reminded me that President Wilson had multiple connections to Arkansas, and at one point he seriously considering moving here to join the faculty of what would become the University of Arkansas.
Thomas Woodrow Wilson was born on Dec. 28, 1856 at Staunton, Va., to Joseph R. Wilson, a Presbyterian minister, and Jessie Woodrow Wilson. Though enlightened and progressive in many ways, Wilson's father was a slave owner who supported the Confederacy during the Civil War. Young Woodrow grew up in a culture where racism was part and parcel of everyday life.
Woodrow was educated at various Presbyterian colleges, receiving his undergraduate degree from Princeton University in New Jersey. He then studied law, but he practiced only briefly before entering graduate school at Johns Hopkins University in 1883, where he took a doctorate in history and government.
Not long after entering Johns Hopkins, Wilson began searching for a full-time college faculty position. When no position offered itself, Wilson enlisted his family in the effort. Both his father--who was still supporting his 27-year-old son--and his sister, Marion Wilson Kennedy, joined the employment search.
Marion was married to Rev. Ross Kennedy, a prominent minister of Second Presbyterian Church in Little Rock, who had previously served pastorates in Batesville, Cotton Plant, and Augusta. Woodrow had visited the Kennedys in 1876 while they were living in Augusta, his introduction to Arkansas.
In April 1884, Marion Kennedy wrote her brother advising him of possible employment at the Arkansas Industrial University. She described the university and noted that "Fayetteville . . . is in the mountains of upper Arkansas, and is not only a beautiful but very healthy portion of the country. You need fear no malaria there."
The late historian Willard B. Gatewood has written that "Wilson displayed considerable enthusiasm about the prospect of going to Arkansas." But his fiance, Ellen Axson of Rome, Ga., also the child of a Presbyterian minister, was not enthusiastic about moving. She promised, however, to think "nothing dismal . . . of the prospect of going away beyond the Mississippi."
In the end, no offer came from Arkansas and Wilson continued at Johns Hopkins. He became professor of jurisprudence and political economy at Princeton in 1890, where he excelled. He also used his academic position to get on with what he called his "immortal work"--meaning elective politics.
While Wilson might have felt let down by Arkansas, his eventual election as president was due in large part to an Arkansan. William F. McCombs, a native of Hamburg in Ashley County, entered Princeton in 1894 where he studied under Wilson. After graduating from Harvard Law School in 1901, McCombs opened a law practice in New York City. But he spent much of his time promoting the political career of his old professor.
McCombs helped Wilson win the governorship of New Jersey in 1910, and immediately he predicted that "Princeton has produced the next president of the United States." In early 1911, McCombs began laying the groundwork necessary for Wilson to win the Democratic presidential nomination.
McCombs and Wilson had their work cut out for them. The 1912 Democratic campaign was crowded, including Gov. Judson Harmon of Ohio and U.S. Representatives Oscar Underwood of Alabama and Champ Clark of Missouri. As speaker of the House, Clark was an early favorite.
McCombs must have been nervous when the Democratic national convention opened in Baltimore on June 25, 1912. No candidate had the needed two-thirds majority, but Clark led in the early balloting. However, on the 14th ballot the three-time former presidential nominee William Jennings Bryan threw his support to Wilson.
The balloting droned on, but McCombs was busy behind the scenes cutting deals with various state delegations. Indiana switched to Wilson on the 28th ballot after McCombs promised the vice presidential nomination to Gov. Thomas R. Marshall, Indiana's favorite son candidate.
On the 46th ballot Wilson won the nomination. Wilson visited Arkansas during the campaign, probably as a personal favor for McCombs. In November, he prevailed over President William Howard Taft and former President Theodore Roosevelt, who ran on a third-party ticket.
Surprisingly, McCombs' star began to dim not long after Wilson's election. He began suffering both physical and mental afflictions. He grew jealous of those close to the president and was deeply offended when not offered a cabinet post. In 1916, McCombs lost a senatorial election in New York, and soon afterward he became estranged from President Wilson and never reconciled.
McCombs died of heart failure in 1921. He was buried at Roselawn Cemetery in Little Rock.
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Tom Dillard is a historian and retired archivist living near Glen Rose in Hot Spring County. Email him at Arktopia.td@gmail.com.
Editorial on 04/10/2016