Thomas Clap
| Thomas Clap | |
|---|---|
| 5th President of Yale University | |
|
In office 1745–1766 |
|
| Preceded by |
Elisha Williams as rector |
| Succeeded by |
Naphtali Daggett as pro tempore |
| Personal details | |
| Born |
June 26, 1703 Scituate, Massachusetts |
| Died | January 7, 1767 (aged 63) New Haven, Connecticut |
| Alma mater | Harvard College |
Thomas Clap, also spelled Thomas Clapp (June 26, 1703 – January 7, 1767), was an American academic and educator, a Congregational Minister, and college administrator. He was both the fifth rector and the earliest official to be called "President" of Yale College (1740–1766). He is best known for his successful reform of Yale in the 1740s, partnering with the Rev. Dr. Samuel Johnson to restructure the forty-year-old institution along more modern lines. He convinced the Connecticut Assembly to exempt Yale from paying taxes. He opened a second college house, and doubled the size of the college; Yale graduated more students than Harvard beginning in 1756. He introduced Enlightenment math and science and Johnson's moral philosophy into the curriculum, while retaining its Puritan theology. He also helped found the Linonian Society in 1753, a literary and debating society and one of Yale's oldest secret societies. He personally built the first Orrery in America, a milestone of American science, and awarded his friend Benjamin Franklin an honorary degree.
His educational accomplishments were marred by many political, theological, and polity conflicts, with first the New Light faction in Connecticut, then the Anglicans, then the Old Light faction. He fought with the Connecticut Assembly, the Yale board, and finally, with his own tutors and students. He was forced to resign as President of Yale in 1765, and died soon after.
He was born in Scituate, Massachusetts, and studied with Rev. James McSparran, missionary to Narragansett from the "Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in Foreign Parts", and with Rev. Nathiel Eells, of Scituate. He entered Harvard University (then known as Harvard College) at age 15, graduating in 1722. He preached at Windham, Connecticut, in 1725 and was ordained to succeed the Rev. Samuel Whiting as minister there in 1726, marrying Rev. Whiting's daughter Mary in 1727, and remaining 14 years, with a ministry marked by a rather severe orthodoxy (he once traveled to Springfield to oppose the ordination of a minister accused of Arminian tendencies).
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