Robert Hall Llewellyn
1917-2007
My mother’s family was rather interesting. My memories of Uncle Bob are numerous. We were members of the Cheltenham Monthly Meeting of the Society of Friends and saw each other weekly my first eleven years. They lived in the same house for probably close to fifty years in Wyncote, PA. That community is where the poet, Ezra Pound, grew up. Bob and Jane had four boys, so it was a very lively household. We had many family gatherings over those years. My mother and he were fairly close back then. He was the oldest of the four siblings, and Mom was the youngest. We both lived in close proximity to their parents in Hatboro. Dad told me when Mom sent him letters when he was away at university he would correct them in red pencil for grammatical errors, and she actually enjoyed that! It puzzled my father.
Uncle Bob gave us books as children and encouraged us to read. I still have a copy of short stories by Saki (pseudonym of H.H. Muncro) that he gave me when I was a teenager, and a few others that he gifted to our family. He and Aunt Jane had a nice house on the beach at Cape May Point in New Jersey, and we spent time there in the summer. He also had the ability to make his hands ‘squeak’ by cupping his palms and using pressure to make a ‘fart’ noise we thought was very funny. Somehow I have also managed to figure out how to do this amazing feat! Evidently he was a very good English professor at Temple University. I found the first page online of his Ph.D. dissertation on Old Norse suffixes and I also have a copy of his book he co-authored on English grammar. https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/00224545.1947.9918900
Their house was a rather old, Victorian three story with a basement and had a neat kitchen with a wrap-around bench and table. Under the bench were his old 78 rpm records of classical music. He had quite a collection.
My four cousins were into nature and photography and I remember they had a wire strung across their bedroom on the second floor with a huge hornet or wasp nest hung up. It was very impressive. They never had a garage, and Uncle Bob was very frugal. I was told he stopped his engine at traffic stops, which was pretty ingenious now that we have that feature in newer vehicles. Once when we were stupid kids we played gas station and ignorantly and innocently put leaves in his gas tank! I think that made quite a mess and we told them what we did. He almost exclusively drove big Buicks, which I suppose was due to his father’s conviction that they were the best car to have.
Robert Llewellyn was born on May 29, 1917, the oldest of four children of Ella H. and Walter T. Llewellyn. He and his siblings (Walter, Mary and Ellen) grew up in Hatboro, Pennsylvania. Bob was a graduate of Friends Select School, Westtown School, Dickinson College and Harvard University. Work on his doctorate at Harvard on Old Norse Literature and his specialization in Icelandic suffixes took him to Iceland and to Oxford University in Cambridge, England.
Bob was active in Cheltenham Friends Meeting, serving in many capacities, including Clerk. During World War II, Bob served with the Civilian Public Service sponsored by Quakers, Mennonites and others as an alternative for conscientious objectors to participating in the war. He worked in North Dakota doing farming and in Williamsburg, Virginia in a mental hospital.
From 1947 until his retirement in 1984 Bob taught English at Temple University. He presided over the Faculty Senate during a successful union organizing drive in the 1980s.
Bob had a dry sense of humor and was a stickler for the proper use of the English language, as can be seen in Basic Writer and Reader, the book he co-authored with Irwin Griggs. He always had a dictionary at hand and, as many of us will recall, was eager to help us correct our mispronunciations and misuse of the language. His love of English is reflected in his large book collection and in his skill in anagrams, which he and Jane played virtually every evening after his retirement. He liked music, was a Phillies fan and a great walker in his Wyncote neighborhood.
Bob and Jane Hosmer Foss were married in Ithaca NY in 1948. In addition to Jane's son Ernest Foss III, Bob and Jane had three sons - Mark, Robert and Philip. Philip died in 1993. In addition to trips to Jane's home town of Ithaca, New York, the family enjoyed many summers at their house in Cape May Point, New Jersey.
Bob is survived by his wife Jane Hosmer Foss Llewellyn, children Ernest Foss III of Philadelphia, Mark Llewellyn of Brooks, Maine and Robert Llewellyn of Logsden, Oregon. He is also survived by his grandchildren Chelsea Llewellyn, Matthew Llewellyn and Jesse Llewellyn and by his siblings, Walter Llewellyn of Louisiana, Mary Sager of Florida and Ellen Shoun of Michigan.
You never know what a goofy boy that makes funny faces for the camera will turn out to be! (that’s Uncle Bob on the right with the hat, with brother Walter and new sister Ellen and parents, William T. and Ella H.)
Here is link to an announcement in the 1939 Dickinsonian newspaper that he received a full tuition scholarship to Harvard University to work on his doctorate.
https://www.flipsnack.com/cisproject/dickinsonian-1938-1939.html
From the Dickinson Alumnus, Feb. 1946, Vol. 23, No. 3
Robert H. Llewellyn has received the degree of doctor of philosophy in English from Harvard University. He is continuing his studies at Harvard this semester, where his address is Lowell House, M-34, Cambridge
From the Dickinson Alumnus, Dec. 1946 Vol. 24, No. 2
Dr. Robert H. Llewellyn sailed from New York during the late summer to spend a year in study and travel} abroad on a fellowship from Harvard University. He spent the months of September and October in Iceland where he was studying the Icelandic sagas, and is now at Oxford University.
From the Dickinson Alumnus, Sept. 1947, Vol. 25, No. 1
Dr. Robert H. Llewellyn, who returned home last spring from a year's study at Oxford University, is teaching English at Temple University.
From the DIckinson Alumnus, Dec. 1948, Vol. 26, No. 2
Dr. Robert H. Llewellyn has been advanced from the rank of instructor to that
of assistant professor of English at Temple University. He received his Ph.D. degree
from Harvard in 1946.
From the Dickinson Alumnus, February 1948, Vol. 25, No. 3
Class of 1939 Graduate
Dr. Robert H. Llewellyn was married on February 7 to Mrs. Jane Hosmer Foss, widow of Captain Ernest Foss, Jr., United States Army Medical Corps, at the home of the bride's parents, Professor and Mrs. Ralph S. Hosmer in Ithaca, N. Y. Mrs. Llewellyn was graduated in 1939 from Smith College and received the degree of master of social sciences from the Smith College School of Social Work
in 1941. The couple now reside at 240 Brookdale Ave., Glenside. Llewellyn is instructor in English at Temple University.
Uncle Bob was a bibliophile, a lover of books. This is a peek into his personal library on their third floor of their home at 3 Greenwood Place, Wyncote, PA, where he studied. After his death, cousin Terry Foss contacted a local rare book bookseller to deal with the 6,000 volume collection. It turned out he had been one of Uncle Bob’s students! He wrote a neat series of articles about it and included these photos. Since Uncle Bob almost never allowed anyone else to go up there we have no photos of him in this special place. Here are links to that series of articles.
https://chestnuthilllocal.com/stories/the-professors-house-another-bookmans-adventure-part-1,2594
https://chestnuthilllocal.com/stories/the-professors-house-another-bookmans-adventure-part-2,2625
No comments:
Post a Comment