Henry Rand Hatfield

by Zeff

• ISBN13: 9780762306220
• ISBN10: 076230622X
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2000-12-27
• Publisher: Elsevier Science & Technology

Summary

This book is a biographical study of the first full-time accounting professor in a US university. Henry Rand Hatfield (1866-1945) was the first dean of the Chicago business school and the second dean of the Berkeley business school, and he was long regarded as the "dean of accounting teachers everywhere". His two textbooks, Modern Accounting (1909) and Accounting (1927), were among the most respected reference works in the first half century, and they and his articles continue to be cited today. His textbooks and carefully crafted articles were veritable annotations on the accounting literature and drew extensively on accounting and legal authorities in the US and overseas. He exemplified a principled approach to accounting debate and discussion, and he skewered sloppy and imprecise terminology and shoddy thinking. He did not propound any grand theories but was instead an astute critic of the literature, a delectable writer, and, above all, a consummate scholar. Hatfield was an authority on early bookkeeping history, and his essay, "An Historical Defense of Bookkeeping", has long been one of the most celebrated articles in the US literature. Professor Basil Yamey has written a commentary expressly for the book on Hatfield as a historian of accounting and bookkeeping. Stephen Zeff began his research in the 1960s, when he was granted access to Hatfield's extensive files of correspondence, notes and papers, and he proceeded to interview, or correspond with, many of Hatfield's former colleagues and students. The author also drew on the archives at the Northwestern University, the University of Chicago and the University of California, as well as the records of the American Accounting Association, of which Hatfield was a founder and President. The book is rich in references to primary sources. Many of Hatfield's unpublished and previously published papers are reproduced in the book, which also contains a complete list of Hatfield's publications, including his more than 50 penetrating book reviews.

Table of Contents

List of Illustrations	xi
Preview	xiii
Maurice Moonitz
Preface	xv
Henry Rand Hatfield: An Outline of His Professional Career	xx
Beginnings, 1866 to 1904	1	(58)
The Hatfield Family	2	(1)
Robert Miller Hatfield---God's Faithful Servant	3	(1)
Robert Miller Hatfield---Christian Abolitionist	4	(3)
Robert Miller Hatfield---The Final Years	7	(2)
The Spiritual Legacy	9	(1)
The Puritan Methodist Foundation of Economic Principles	10	(4)
Early Life and Education of Henry Rand Hatfield	14	(6)
Chicago in the 1890s---A Dynamic Commercial Landscape and a New University	20	(2)
Hatfield's Doctoral Studies at Chicago and Instructorship at Washington University	22	(10)
Courses Taken at Chicago, 1892-1893	22	(3)
At Washington University, 1894-1896	25	(1)
Back at Chicago, 1896-1897	25	(1)
Influence of Laughlin and Veblen on Hatfield	26	(2)
Completion of the Degree	28	(1)
Final Year at Washington University, 1897-1898	29	(3)
Hatfield on the Chicago Faculty, 1898-1904: The College of Commerce---and University Politics	32	(11)
Further Influences on Hatfield: The Roles of James and Schar	43	(4)
A Parting Touch: Double-Entry Bookkeeping as Mathematics	47	(12)
At Berkeley and in Washington, 1904 to 1919/1920	59	(52)
Arrival in Berkeley	59	(1)
The University and the College of Commerce, c. 1904	60	(2)
Hatfield's Initial Years at Berkeley, 1904-1909	62	(5)
Building the Accounting Curriculum and Ties with the Profession	63	(2)
Early Forays in the Accounting Literature	65	(2)
Hatfield's Activities in Berkeley and Washington, 1909-1920	67	(26)
Modern Accounting Makes its Debut	67	(5)
Hatfield's First Article on Bookkeeping History	72	(1)
On the Teaching of Bookkeeping	72	(3)
A House of His Own	75	(1)
Continued Academic and Professional Activity	75	(1)
Sabbatical in Europe	76	(1)
Address on International Accounting Practices at the AAPA's Annual Meeting	77	(1)
Continued Development of the Accounting Curriculum	77	(2)
Participation in the University's Literary Clubs	79	(3)
Administrative Assignments at Berkeley	82	(2)
Hatfield's Book Reviews	84	(1)
Beta Gamma Sigma, the AACSB, and the AAUIA: Hatfield as a Founder and Early Officer	85	(3)
Hatfield Heeds the Call to Government Service	88	(3)
Hatfield Feels Pressures to Move East	91	(2)
Appendix: Summary of Hatfield's Modern Accounting (1909)	93	(18)
``Historical Defense'' and Accounting, 1919/1920 to 1930	111	(42)
Administration, Teaching, and Lecturing: 1919-1920	111	(3)
Hatfield as Dean of the Faculties	114	(3)
Departmental Administration, Teaching, and Writing: 1921-1923	117	(2)
Events in 1923: An Honorary Doctorate from Northwestern, and The Berkeley Fire	119	(1)
Hatfield's ``An Historical Defense of Bookkeeping'': Its Origins and Its Reception	120	(3)
Hatfield's Sporadic Participation in the AAUIA	123	(1)
Hatfield's Interest in the Early History of Bookkeeping	124	(2)
Teaching, Administration, and Continuing Interest in Law: 1923-1930	126	(1)
Publication of Accounting and Its Reception	127	(5)
Hatfield's Teaching Philosophy	132	(1)
Beginnings of Another Textbook	133	(1)
Addresses, Articles, and Commentaries: 1927-1930	134	(3)
Book Reviews	137	(1)
A Summary of Hatfield's Critique of the Literature	138	(2)
Appendix: Summary of Hatfield's Accounting (1927)	140	(13)
The final Active Years, 1930 to 1945	153	(70)
1930-1945: Early Bookkeeping History and Sundry Writings	153	(9)
Continuing Interest in Bookkeeping History	153	(3)
Reviews, Other Published Writing, and Correspondence	156	(6)
1930-1937: Active Years Toward Retirement	162	(25)
A New Course: Recent German Accounting Theory	162	(2)
Ongoing Interest in Law and Accounting	164	(2)
Hatfield as a Creative Writer	166	(1)
Hatfield Seeks Position with the New SEC	167	(2)
``What They Say About Depreciation'': Hatfield Admonishes His Colleagues	169	(1)
Hatfield's Role in A Statement of Accounting Principles	170	(14)
An Unwilling Retirement	184	(3)
1937-1945: Retirement in Name Only	187	(21)
Paton as a Possible Successor to Hatfield	187	(2)
Hatfield's Only Accounting Doctoral Student at Berkeley	189	(3)
Hatfield s Attitude Toward Accounting Faculty Mix and Size	192	(1)
Montgomery as a Colleague-in-Arms	193	(1)
Possible Revision of A Statement of Accounting Principles	194	(2)
Hatfield's Address to the Institute's 1939 Annual Meeting	196	(1)
Hatfield s Support for Sweeney's ``Stabilized Accounting''	197	(1)
Elementary Accounting Textbook with Sanders and Burton 1940	198	(3)
Honorary Doctorate from the University of California	201	(1)
Possible Revision of Accounting	202	(1)
Hatfield's Dickinson Lecture on ``Surplus and Dividends'' in 1942	202	(4)
Teaching during Retirement	206	(1)
A Life Ends	207	(1)
Posthumous Election to the Accounting Hall of Fame	208	(15)
Hatfield's Contributions	223	(32)
Part I	223	(20)
Accounting Textbooks	223	(4)
Contributions to Journals	227	(2)
Opposition to Doctoral Students in Accounting	229	(1)
Current Value and General Price-Level Accounting	229	(1)
An Internationalist	230	(2)
Hatfield's Discomfort as an Authority Figure	232	(3)
Appeal to Practitioners	235	(1)
The Sanders, Hatfield, and Moore Monograph	236	(1)
Failure to Appreciate the Increasingly Important Role of Accounting	237	(1)
Hatfield as a Leading figure in Academic and Professional Institutions	237	(2)
An Assessment	239	(3)
His Legacy	242	(1)
Part II: Henry Rand Hatfield: Historian of Bookkeeping and Accounting	243	(12)
Basil S. Yamey
The Personal Hatfield	255	(40)
Hatfield in 1898---The Man Through his Letters	256	(14)
His Relationship to Ethel	256	(1)
Hatfield Anticipates His Appointment at Chicago	257	(1)
Hatfield's Emergence as an Academic	258	(1)
Hatfield's Views of Ethel's Career Opportunities	259	(2)
Hatfield's Early Religious Views	261	(2)
Hatfield's Attitude Toward Teaching	263	(4)
Hatfield's Attitude Toward his Family	267	(1)
Hatfield's Views of his Experience with S.A. Kean & Co.	268	(1)
Hatfield as Seen in Later Letters	269	(1)
The Later Hatfield---Perspectives of Colleagues and Students	270	(15)
Hatfield the Socratic: The Eternal ``Why?''	270	(2)
Erudition Cloaked in Humor, Satire, and Wit	272	(3)
Punctilious Scholar, Kindly Teacher	275	(3)
The Absent-minded Professor	278	(2)
The Hatfield Home on Le Conte Avenue	280	(2)
A Trail of Anecdotes	282	(3)
Devotion to Church	285	(1)
Hatfield and the Development of Accounting	285	(7)
Hatfield's Paradoxical Stance on Accounting	286	(2)
Henry Rand Hatfield---A Classical Educator and Humanist	288	(4)
Appendix: Henry Rand Hatfield's and Ethel Adelia (Glover) Hatfield's Parents, Siblings, and Children and Grandchildren (First Generation Only)	292	(3)
Hatfield's Papers	295	(172)
Unpublished Short Papers	297	(13)
Remarks to a Group of San Francisco CPAs, c. 1905-1906	297	(4)
Eulogy at the Funeral of Ramon Pohli, an Undergraduate Student, 1913	301	(2)
Eulogy at the Funeral of Solomon Blum, a Department Colleague, 1926	303	(1)
Remarks upon the Inauguration of Henry Suzzallo as President of the University of Washington, 1916	304	(3)
Presidential Address at the 4th Annual Meeting of the American Association of University Instructors in Accounting, 1919	307	(3)
Unpublished Longer Papers	310	(83)
``Some Heretical Views on the Method of Teaching Bookkeeping,'' 1913	310	(9)
``Corporations and the Public,'' 1918, Including an Earlier Paper on Corporations, 1910	319	(13)
``Experiences with the War Industries Board,'' c. 1920	332	(16)
``The State University and the Body Politic: The Southern Branch of the University of California,'' 1922	348	(8)
``A Professor Looks at Germany,'' 1933	356	(12)
``Moriturus Vos Saluto,'' 1937	368	(15)
``A Critique of the Tentative Statement of Accounting Principles Underlying Corporate Reports,'' 1937	383	(10)
Previously Published Papers	393	(63)
``Some Variations in Accounting Practice in England, France, Germany and the United States''	393	(15)
Introductory Note to the fifth edition of The Philosophy of Accounts	408	(6)
Charles E. Sprague
``An Historical Defense of Bookkeeping''	414	(16)
``What Is the Matter with Accounting?''	430	(14)
``Meditations of a Student in Commerce 7, A Course in Advanced Accounting Theory (after reading 'The Raven')''	444	(2)
``A Fable''	446	(1)
``What They Say About Depreciation''	447	(9)
Appendix A: ``The Unpublished Papers''	456	(6)
Maurice Moonitz
Appendix B: ``Recollections of Henry Rand Hatfield''	462	(5)
Maurice Moonitz
List of Hatfield's Publications	467	(6)
Index	473