University of Pennsylvania Fires Scott Nearing Over Radical Economic Views
The University of Pennsylvania on this day fired Professor Scott Nearing, an economist with the Wharton School of Business, because members of the Trustees were upset over his radical views on economics.
Nearing then taught at the University of Toledo, but was fired in 1917 because of his vocal opposition to U.S. participation in World War I.
Over the next 66 years, until his death, Nearning became a noted freelance political radical, prolific writer, speaker, and environmentalist. In 1970 he and his wife Helen published an acclaimed book, Living the Good Life: How to Live Sanely and Simply in a Troubled World. Nearing died in August 1983, at the age 100 years and 18 days.
In 1973, the University of Pennsylvania retroactively reversed its dismissal and made him an Honorary Emeritus Professor of Economics.
Read: Scott Nearing and Steve Sherman, eds., A Scott Nearing Reader: The Good Life in Bad Times (1989)
Read more: Scott Nearing, The Making of a Radical: A Political Autobiography (1972)
Watch a documentary on Helen and Scott Nearing, Living the Good Life: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Czr3iJBY4z0
Learn more about Scott Nearing: Scott Nearing and Steve Sherman, eds., A Scott Nearing Reader: A Good Life in Bad Times (1989)