Eleanor Sybil Ross, Dean of Women, was the brilliant architect of Middlebury's Women’s College. She presided over its growth for twenty-nine years, more than doubling its size. She created its atmosphere, and left the imprint of her ideals on generations of Middlebury women.
Born in Rutland, Vermont, on June 25, 1874, and prepare for college there, she graduated from Middlebury College in June 1895, A.B. Phi Beta Kappa. She taught English and Latin in high schools in Pennsylvania and Idaho, and in Rutland for ten years. President John Thomas brought her to Middlebury in 1914, first for a year teaching English, and then as Dean of Women until her retirement in 1944.
This was a period of tremendous activity in the nation—two world wars, the Great Depression, women’s suffrage, prohibition, and—on campus—three presidents, multiplying enrollments, dormitory expansion, the S.A.T.C. and Navy V-12 units, and wartime schedules. All these created many complex problems, including problems in the lives of the women on campus.
Dean Ross set for the College and for her role in it an ideal of Victorian gentility, standards of highest morality, of proper and exemplary conduct, coupled with high academic achievement. She set it as her task to require these strict standards of all whom she touched. She was stately, statuesque, lovely to look at; but no one ever thought of calling her “Eleanor.” She was “Miss Ross” to everybody. She kept that distance, somewhat intentionally.
Stories of her strict discipline are legendary. Two freshmen couples in early October went for a Sunday afternoon ride in a horse-drawn surrey, and were late for chapel—a double offense. The girls were “campused” until Thanksgiving—restricted to campus with the loss of all social privileges, even the telephone. A group of girls had a marshmallow roast after hours on the fourth floor fire-escape of Pearsons Hall. Discipline followed. All girls were required to be in their rooms by 10:00 P.M. A common crime was to slip out the back door early without signing out, and then crawl back in a window after hours. A subsequent summons to Dean Ross’ office struck terror.
Dean Ross was much more interested in encouraging academic achievement. Many a student, frightened by a summons, got a lecture on her grades, her study habits, and then strong encouragement for her ability to improve. Since the faculty was almost entirely male, the women students needed support in class participation, and Dean Ross provided that.
Eleanor Ross was above all a well-balanced person. Officially she was the essence of administrative dignity. But she was deeply human, with great personal compassion, and a great sense of humor perhaps too often concealed. An official scolding was frequently followed by an encouraging smile, a twinkle in the eye, and the warm assurance that she was your friend.
Miss Ross retired as Dean of Women in 1944, continuing to live in Middlebury. She had been awarded the honorary M.A. in 1927; in 1943 she was decorated with the degree of Doctor of Pedagogy. Former President Thomas, during whose term she had served for six years, was now a widower. He persuaded her to marry him in 1949, and she moved to his home in Mendon, Vermont. She died in 1953, a year after his death.
Dean Eleanor Ross was the true creator of our Women’s College.
Transcribed from a brochure by Stephen A. Freeman,
Vice President Emeritus and Professor Emeritus of French.