Today, some of his best students work with Gropius in his own firm, the Architects Collaborative, which designed the Graduate Center two years ago.

Even without direct contact with the entire student body, Gropius did give Design a point of view. He was an innovator in educational techniques and he backed his own theories of architecture. Many say that Hudnut, on the other hand, never actually made his philosophy of art clear. His disagreements with Gropius seemed to most completely personal.

It is not difficult to trace the beginnings of the animosity. Hudnut came to the school in 1933 with a distinguished reputation, not as a great innovator, but as a sound thinker and writer. He was responsible for integrating the three separate departments, Architecture, Landscape Architecture and Regional Planning into a single School of Desing. He brought Gropius to the school in 1937, when Gropius was one of the world's most famous architects and educators, the man who developed multiple dwellings and expanded a new concept of functional beauty in the Bauhaus at Dessau, Germany, from 1922 to 1928.

In 1938, Hudnut also arranged the creation of the undergraduate architectural science program. And later, he, together with George H. Perkins, then chairman of Regional Planning and now Dean of the Pennsylvania Design school, created the integrated first year program for concentrators in the three Design departments.

Developed School

It is no wonder, then, that Hudnut felt responsible for much of the school's success. He had taken over a poor school with little reputation, and he had strengthened the faculty and enlarged the program. The school's planning department, the first of its kind in the United States, had grown and the architecture departments were run by some of the best teachers in the world.

But when Hudnut realized that Gropius was receiving all the credit for the school's success and that the master was obscuring him more and more, it was natural for the dean to resent the other's presence. At times he would make statements such as "learning should be a matter of experience rather than purely a matter of authority," and everyone knew, of course, who the authority," and everyone knew, of course who the authority was. But for the most part, the faculty reports, the Gropius Hudmnt battle was more a cold war than anything else, creating at times an unbearable tension in faculty meetings. Finally, Hudnut began to rule the school by divide and conquer. He played one member of the faculty against another, never making it clear who enjoyed his favor. He fired and hired without consulting his faculty, sowing the seeds of insecurity and inter departmental university.

George T. LeBoutillier, assistant professor of Design, felt the faculty was waiting for a real ideological argument, "If they would have argued that way, we might have had an interesting discussion." Instead, only Gropins aired a coherent viewpoint, and Hudunt never seemed to answer him directly.

Gropins was alarmed at "today's complete separation of design from the execution of buildings, of the drafting board from the building site." "This," he said while at the University and repeats now, "is artificial, and has led the architect to a dead cud mad."

He wanted the architect's education to prepare a man not only to design buildings but to "Take part as a legitimate equal with the engineer and the scientist in the conception, design, and execution of component parts of building."

For this reason, he pressed a more practical program in the Design School. "Architecture is so strongly tied up with practicalities and technicalities that building architects should have practical experience." He accuses the Design program of being "too theoretical and bookish," and there are many architects who agree with him.

Gropius, while at the University, encouraged his students to work on construction projects during the summers. The "Fundamentals of Design" course, which for two-years was a requirement in the school, was the further attempt to familiarize students with materials. By working with colors, metals, and organic media, Design students would begin to understand the builder's problems. He would learn what materials and colors snit certain constructions, and which figures are the best for particular forms of space.

When Hudnut discontinued the course, he commented that it was "a good general introduction to design courses, but not a necessary one."

Most members of the faculty agreed with Gropius in his desire for such a basic course. The point of view was a good one, but the actual course produced a large number of critics, mostly among the Hudnut supporters.

Students, however, were practically unanimous in their praise of the course. The point of view was a good one, but the actual curse produced a large number of critics, mostly among the Hudnut supporters.