Campus Loses Louis A. Strauss By Death


LOUIS A. STRAUSS, Professor of 
English and until recently Chair
man of the English Department
 at the University of Michigan, died
 in his sixty-sixth year on the evening 
of September 27. His death followed
 a heart attack shortly after returning
 from a golf game on the Barton Hills 
golf course. The day before, in appar
ent good health, he had met his classes
 on the first day of the semester.


Entering the University as a student
 in the fall of 1890, Professor Strauss
 received his B.L. in 1893. He received
 
his Ph.M. and Ph.D. from Michigan 
in 1894 and 1900 and later spent a
 year in further study at the University 
of Munich. 


His teaching career began imme
diately after finishing his undergrad
uate work, when he was appointed
 Assistant in English in the College of 
Literature, Science, and the Arts. In
 1911 he was made Professor of Eng
lish, and, following the retirement of
 Professor Isaac Newton Demmon in
1920, he was appointed Chairman of 
the English Department. This position 
he held until a year before his death, 
 when he resigned the Chairmanship to 
devote his entire time to teaching. 


The services of Professor Strauss to 
the University were not limited to his
 duties as a member of the English Department. He served many years on 
the Committee of Student Affairs, and
 the Board in Control of Student Pub
lications. Succeeding generations of
 
Professor of English
 students who either served with him
 on these committees or were affected
 by the Committees' decisions will re
call his unfailing reasonableness at all 
times. His keen sense of justice, com
bined with an equally keen sense of
 the obligations of students to the University, made him an invaluable mem
ber of committees entrusted with the
 regulation of student affairs. 


He contributed also, and to an increasing degree as the years went by, 
 in the formulation of the educational
 and administrative policies of the College and the University. 


Professor Strauss was one of the
 most highly esteemed men at the Uni
versity and will be remembered by
 Faculty and alumni alike for his devotion to the interests of his alma
 mater over a period of forty-two years
 of active service. As a teacher he was 
known for his warm, liberal and humane outlook. He held a civilized 
point of view towards everything. In
evitably he was a liberal in politics. He knew with Browning, his favorite 
poet, and made his friends know,


"How good is man's life, the mere 
living! how fit to employ

All the heart and the soul and the
 senses forever in joy!"


He was no advocate in scholarship 
of Teutonic specialization, but fol
lowed the older, more liberal, humane 
tradition of the Renaissance. By long
 study of the best that had been thought 
and said, he was able to influence his
 students to form for themselves sound 
critical standards. He will be longest
 remembered by his friends for "his
 little, nameless, unremembered acts of 
love and kindness."