Finished Engines

At any time of day, Yale students had a way of finding out where salty Professor Herbert L. Seward might be. In his office in Strathcona Hall stood the engine-room telegraphs that had once relayed orders from the bridge of the S.S. Leviathan. If the professor was going to class, he rang up "Full Speed Ahead." "Dead Slow" meant out to lunch; "Full Speed Astern" meant a faculty meeting. At the end of each day the professor signaled "Finished Engines."

To students admitted to his classes in naval architecture and marine engineering, this sort of thing seemed quite natural. Professor Seward liked to say that he chose them for "the salt in their veins"; they in turn called him "the Skipper." The son and grandson of sea captains, Skipper Seward had come to know as much about ships as any man could. He had stood on the deck of the German-built Leviathan on its trial run after World War I, had been called in to advise on the raising of the Normandie. He was special wartime consultant to Navy Secretary Frank Knox, reorganized the curriculum of the U.S. Coast Guard Academy at New London.

In his 42 years at Yale, he taught thousands of students (12,035 by his own careful log) how to be seawise as naval architects, engineers and shipping-line executives. His classroom itself was a ship, with the Skipper forward on his bridge, pounding the deck until class was over and it was time for all hands to go ashore. Last week, at 64, the Skipper announced that he would soon set the telegraph for good at "Finished Engines," and retire. Without him, Yale thought, it would give no more courses in naval architecture and marine engineering.

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