Professors discuss Pitt’s founder

Pitt’s founder, Hugh Henry Brackenridge, did not like to get his clothes wet. So when it…Pitt’s founder, Hugh Henry Brackenridge, did not like to get his clothes wet. So when it rained while he was traveling, he would remove his clothes, placing them with his other luggage until the weather calmed.

“Our founder was an eccentric,” Jean Ferguson Carr, Pitt’s director of women’s studies, said on Friday to about 40 people in the Frick Fine Arts auditorium.

Carr, along with professor of law Bernard Hibbitts and assistant professor of English Courtney Weikle-Mills had gathered for a panel discussion on Brackenridge’s 18th century novel, “Modern Chivalry.” The event was part of Pitt’s 225th anniversary celebration.

The book follows the fictional misadventures of Captain John Farrago and his servant Teague O’Regan as they explore the politics of their day through life on the frontier.

“Modern Chivalry” reflected Brackenridge’s pragmatic view of education. His protagonist is a well-educated man who knows little of the real world. The story centers around his search to better understand the people of the frontier.

Brackenridge himself was educated through experience. In addition to founding the Pittsburgh Academy — now the University of Pittsburgh — Brackenridge was a notable writer, state legislator, educator and Pennsylvania Supreme Court justice. He was also the founder of The Pittsburgh Gazette — now the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette — and a lawyer. But he never went to law school; instead, he studied through an apprenticeship.

“His standing as a lawyer explained his other pursuits. Law, for Brackenridge, was reason,” Hibbitts said during his talk about the role of law in “Modern Chivalry.”

Brackenridge was not only a well-educated man with varied interests, but he also had quite a sense of humor, according to Weikle-Mills, who shared an anecdote about a dinner Brackenridge once had with George Washington. Washington would not laugh at Brackenridge’s stories, so Brackenridge told them repeatedly with increasing gusto throughout the night.

After the dinner, or so the story goes, Brackenridge could hear Washington releasing his pent-up laughter in the bedroom next door.

“Such was the prudence of Washington and the humor of Brackenridge,” Weikle-Mills said.

The discussion was accompanied by a display from Pitt’s Darlington Collection, featuring books, maps and articles published in Pittsburgh during Brackenridge’s time. Guests perused the collection before and after the discussion just outside the auditorium in the cloister.

Hibbitts ended his talk with a quote from “Modern Chivalry”.

“Do justice, love mercy, walk humbly,” he said. “Hugh Henry Brackenridge died almost 200 years ago, but there is still time for us to become Brackenridge’s heirs.”