Thomas F. Crane

Thomas Frederick Crane, known to alumni and undergraduates of Cornell University as “Tee Fee” and held by them in the affection of which nicknames applied to members of a Faculty are conclusive proof, had one remarkable distinction in the educational field. A Princeton man himself, he filled his place on the Cornell Faculty without interruption, from the organization of the University in 1868 until his own retirement from active instruction in 1909. During that forty-year period he had been dean of the University Faculty and at one time acting president. Professor Crane taught the modern languages, especially Spanish and Italian, and his writings in that field were of high and enduring quality. He was a careful scholar; his edition of the Sermons of Jacques de Vitry is an important book and his “Italian Social Customs of the Sixteenth Century” displayed great research and originality. These are the achievements of many educators; the college teacher who becomes a personal tradition, whose presence and individuality are as much of a landmark as College Hill itself, is a rarer institution in these days. But every alumnus knows how college memories cluster around such men.

Alexander Dana Noyes
1928 Century Association Yearbook