Maud Babcock

Maud May Babcock (May 2, 1867 – December 31, 1954) was the first female member of the University of Utah's faculty. She taught at the university for 46 years, beginning in 1892. While there she established the University Theater, originated the first college dramatic club in the United States, directed over 800 plays and occasionally taught.

Schooling

Babcock was born in East Worcester, New York to William Wayne Babcock and Sarah Jane Butler.[1] She was educated in the public schools of New York then received degrees from Welles College in New York, Philadelphia National School of Oratory and, in 1890, the American Academy of Dramatic Art.

Professional life

Babcock was studying and teaching at Harvard University when she met noted Utahn and daughter of Brigham Young Susa Young Gates who, impressed by Babcock's work as a summer course instructor in physical culture, convinced her to move to Salt Lake City. She established UU's first physical training curriculum, of which speech and dramatics were part for several years. After a separate speech and drama department was formed, she headed that.

At other times in her professional life, she studied at the University of Chicago and schools in London and Paris; served as president of the National Association of Teachers of Speech; and, for twenty years, a trustee for the Utah State School for Deaf and Blind.

She wrote five books on speech and elocution, and was a renowned traveler and lecturer. In addition to her professional interests in drama and elocution, she was also a crusader against wasp-waist corsets. She was also famed in Utah for her success in bringing big-name talent to the state.

She joined The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and served for several years on the general board of the Young Women's Mutual Improvement Association.

Death

She died at the age of 87.

Honors

References

  1. ↑ Leonard, John William, ed. (1914), Woman's Who's Who of America: A Biographical Dictionary of Contemporary Women of the United States and Canada, 1914-1915, New York: American Commonwealth Company, p. 62.

The information in the article is taken from two obituaries clipped intact but without dates from two newspapers, one the Salt Lake Tribune and the other, apparently, the Deseret News

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