HARRY F. CORBIN PAPERS

Finding Aid

Size: 29.75 linear feet

Literary rights:
Literary rights were granted to the Wichita State University. When permission is granted to examine the manuscripts, it is not an authorization to publish them. Manuscripts cannot be used for publication without regard for common law literary rights, copyright laws and the laws of libel. It is the responsibility of the researcher and his/her publisher to obtain permission to publish. Scholars and students who eventually plan to have their work published are urged to make inquiry regarding overall restrictions on publication before initial research.

Restrictions: None

Content note:
The Harry F. Corbin Papers contain administrative files covering Dr. Corbin's tenure as President of the University of Wichita from 1949 to 1963. The collection includes reports, speeches, correspondence, budgetary information, and miscellaneous materials pertaining to the responsibilities of the President's Office.

Biographical note:
Harry Finch Corbin was born February 7, 1917 in Latham, Kansas. He moved to Wichita with his family in 1921 and attended Park Grade School, Central Intermediate and North and East High Schools.

Corbin was the University of Wichita’s candidate for a Rhodes Scholarship in 1937, but his father’s death forced him to leave school to run the family oil brokerage business in Mattoon, Illinois.

Three years later, he returned to Wichita and completed his undergraduate work, receiving a bachelor of arts degree in 1940 and enrolling in law school at Stanford University. He married fellow Stanford student Sally Hyde in 1940 and transferred to the University of Chicago, where he earned a bachelor of divinity degree.

After a three year stint on active duty as a lieutenant in the Navy’s Chaplain Corps, he left the service and earned a law degree from the University of Kansas in 1949.

Dr. Corbin joined the faculty of the University of Wichita in 1946 first as an assistant professor, then as an associate professor of political science and philosophy. His appointment to the presidency came in 1949. He was at that time the youngest college president of the United States.

Among the accomplishments of his tenure as president were the addition of 14 new buildings to campus, including the Frank Lloyd Wright designed College of Education building, tying the university to the community, establishing the Urban Research Center, brings educational television to Wichita, taking the university from an enrollment of 3,300 to close to 6,000 and the driving force behind the admission of the University of Wichita into the Kansas Regents system in 1964.

Dr. Corbin stepped down as president in 1963 but continued to teach and be an active member of the Wichita State University faculty until his death in 1990.

Acquisition: Gift from Dr. Harry F. Corbin to Wichita State University

Processed by: CAW, 6-23-1978; SMC, 7-19-1999