JEAN CHARLEMAGNE BRACQ
1853 - 1931;
Jean Charlemagne Bracq, who died December 18, l934
at his home in Keene, New Hampshire, at the age of
eighty-one, had served Vassar College with distinc-
tion fro 1891 to 1918, at first as John Guy Vassar
Professor of Modern Languages, afterwards as head
of the Department of Romance Languages and Professor
of French. Although he came to America at the age of
eighteen, he remained always a loyal son of France in
his sympathies and in all his varied activities. He
took an especially warm interest in the little town
of Bertry near Cambrai which was his birthplace, keep-
ing in touch with its schools and its library, which
he had helped to found. One of its streets now bears
his name in recognition.
A graduate of the McGill University and of the Newton
Theological Seminary, he carried on further theological
study in Edinburgh and in Paris at the Sorbonne. He
was secretary of the McAll Association in Philadelphia
for six years before coing to Vassar. Later in life
he received honorary degrees from Colgate and McGill.
In his twenty-seven years at Vassar he built up from
small beginnings a strong department of Romance Lan-
guages, in which the study of French was transformed
from the mere learning of a language to the study of
a civilization by modern methods. He was eager to
interpret the spirit of France to young Americans and
readily placed the resources of his learning at the
disposal of American research students in France. As
an anti-militarist he worked untiringly to further
international understanding and was three times a
delegate to international peace conferences.
In his book, France Under the Republic (1910), he
showed himself an enthusiastic defender of the Third
Republic and of governmental policy in French colonial
expansion. His paper on French Ri hts in Newfoundland
furnished the historic basis for tée settiement of oer
tain long disputed questions concerning the Newfound-
land fisheries, and he took a prominent part in defend
ing the French government at the time of the separation
of church and state. He lectured and wrote on a variety
of subjects and published articles and pamphlets too
numerous to be listed in this place.
JEAN CHARLEMAGNE BRACQ (Continued)
Many honors came to him: he lectured before the
Lowell Institute; was decorated Officer of Public In-
struction and Chevalier of the Legion of Honor; he
was elected Laureate of the French Academy and Laure-
ate of the Academy of Moral and Political Sciences,
Paris. When he retired in 1918, he was subsidized
by the Canadian Government to travel and study French-
Canadian history and social life, the fruit of which
research was another important work, The Evolution of
French Canada (l924), which was later translated Into
French and for which he was awarded a gold medal by
the Franco-American Society. A tireless worker, he
left unfinished at the time of his death a very con-
siderable manuscript.
In his life as a member of the Vassar community, his
friends remeber best the ordered dignity of his home,
where he and Mrs. Bracq dispensed a gracious hospital-
ity. A neighbor recalls that it was because of his
activity on behalf of the motormen and conductors of
the Poughkeepsie Street Railway that the Company en-
closed the car platforms. The same neighbor relates
how some twenty years ago, he sent to Keene for a
number of young pine trees, which he presented to the
householders along Proessors' Row. He was meticulous
in performing his social duties as a citizen.
The Faculty of Vassar College wish to record their
sense that, in the death of Professor Emeritus Jean
Charlemagne Bracq they have lost a member who reflecte
honor upon the group by his persistent industry in re-
search of importance, his loyal service to three
countries, and his very real achievement as teacher
and author. And they desire that this minute be sent
to Mrs. Bracq with the most sincere expression of
sympathy in her bereavement.
Amy L. Reed
Henry S. White
Florence Donnell White
IX - 237