That which we call Stockton, by any other name would smell as sweet

[This is a second post on the naming of Stockton College]

One of the documents that we have seen, and which we will need to post to the main website, is a page listing names that were proposed for the college at its founding.  The list includes names like Pinelands, and Southern New Jersey State, and many others.  Whether or not Richard Stockton is on the sheet, I don’t recall now, but this name seemed to make its appearance in a somewhat unique way.  In other words, the name may be on the sheet if the document is the complete list of all the suggested names, but once the name of Richard Stockton was conjured up it seemed almost immediately to displace and make the others irrelevant. 

 

On the surface the name, Richard Stockton, had a lot going for it.  It was tied to a historically prominent family in the state of New Jersey, the third person in the family bearing this name being a signer of the Declaration of Independence.  That same gentleman had also been important in the history of Princeton (the College of New Jersey), as an alumnus and member of the Board of Trustees, and as the person largely responsible for bringing John Witherspoon to the United States.  The fact that several among the creators of the college in Pomona wished it to be, in effect, a “public Princeton” or a “Princeton in the pines”, with some ideas from that ivy league establishment (e.g., collegia and preceptorials) being carried over to the new college, meant that this connection to Princeton would be considered a good thing.

 

So Stockton held sway and carried the day, but the origin of the name itself is a question.  Several people have made claims to be the originators of the suggestion that the college should be called after Stockton.  Joan Bjork, the wife of the first President, claims that her husband was out in his yard when the son of a neighbor came over to him and suggested two names of people after whom the college might have been named (who that other person might have been is not recounted).  Richard Bjork was taken with the name Stockton immediately, largely for the reasons mentioned, but also because it would give the college an identifier that wasn’t tied to the region.

 

There are at least two other claimants to the position of originator.  Many attribute the name to Elizabeth Alton, and at least one other person on the Board of Trustees at the time seems to have made the claim that they were the key to its adoption.  However, it may be that there is a distinction between coming up with the name and being responsible for shepherding it through the selection process.  Certainly, any member of the Board, along with the President, would have to be given credit for the latter, so all the claims may indeed fit together.  One wonders, though, if the story about Bjork’s neighbor is true, why the child's name was not remembered or taken note of; but that will have to remain a mystery.

 

What was unfortunate in this process, however, was that no one actually took the time to vet Richard Stockton, to see whether he was truly up for the job of having a college named after him.  Being a signer of the Declaration was certainly a positive, as was the Princeton connection, but a cursory examination would have turned up some disquieting facts.  Stockton, after all, was the only signer to recant and to later sign an oath of loyalty to King George III.  He was also a slave owner who didn’t free his slaves, in spite of being the father-in-law of Benjamin Rush, one of the most prominent anti-slavery advocates of the revolutionary era.  In the aftermath of the civil rights struggle, and at a time when African American studies was becoming a significant force in the academy, the awareness of this connection to slavery might have been sufficient to condemn Stockton’s candidacy.

 

But since no one inquired about the matter, Stockton’s positive credentials remained intact and the college now bears his name.  One man who wasn’t really considered was another signer, Francis Hopkinson.  He was a more well rounded person compared to the lawyer, Stockton.  A veritable renaissance man, a musician and intellectual, Hopkinson perhaps best represented the character of the college that was to be created. 

 

But this was not to be.

Rob