Class of 1915

William Wilcox Edel was born on March 16, 1894 in Baltimore, Maryland. His mother was Annie Wilcox, and his father was John Wesley Edel, a prosperous dairy retailer. Edel attended high school at Baltimore City College and then entered Dickinson College, where he graduated in three years as a Phi Beta Kappa member of the class of 1915. While an undergraduate, Edel became a member of the Belles Lettres Literary Society and the Alpha Chi Rho fraternity. He also contributed illustrations to the 1915 Microcosm.

After graduation, Edel and six other members of the class of 1915 enrolled in the School of Theology at Boston University. Edel graduated from that institution in 1918. The outbreak of war caused him to enlist as a chaplain in the U.S. Navy on July 11, 1917. During his thirty-year career, Edel saw service at sea in the Atlantic, served as superintendent of education in American Samoa, and was area chaplain for the South Pacific during the Second World War. In 1935, he received an honorary Doctor of Divinity degree from his alma mater. Ten years later, Edel was nearing retirement as a captain, the highest rank then open to a naval chaplain. The Dickinson board of trustees, having been unable to secure other earlier choices, turned to Edel on June 7, 1946 and elected him as the twenty-second president of the College.

Hyman Goldstein was born on April 14, 1891 to Russian immigrant merchant Abraham B. Goldstein and Rebecca Berge in the coal mining town of Portage, Pennsylvania. He prepared at Conway Hall and entered Dickinson College with the class of 1915. He moved on to the Law Department and graduated with a law degree in 1917. While there he became a member of Iota chapter of Phi Epsilon Pi, then hosted at the Law School.

His sporting prowess gained him much of his out of class fame, however. He was a three year letterman catcher with the baseball team and a fine enough player to play semi-professional baseball in the Philadelphia Phillies organization. His true excellence was on the football field. He was four years quarterback of the varsity and captain in 1913. He played also while in the Law Department, starring in the 1917 team which had an unbeaten season brought to a premature end by the United States entry into the First World War. "Goldie" was much admired by both team mates and opponents, which included Jim Thorpe and his legendary coach Glen "Pop" Warner, both of whom termed him the cleverest quarterback they had ever faced.

James Gooding entered Dickinson in 1911 as a member of the class of 1915, but he withdrew in 1913. In the First World War, he enlisted in the U.S. Navy and died at Cape May, New Jersey.

Gilbert Malcolm was born in New York City on October 13, 1892 to Scottish immigrants, Mr. and Mrs. Thomas Duff Malcolm. Growing up in the city where his father was a well-known contractor, he attended the Horace Mann School. Among his young adventures was his notoriety as a very early motorcycle racer, setting a local record for an oval track of 70 miles per hour. He later suffered an accident while racing which ruled out any possibility of other athletic participation.

Malcolm entered Dickinson College in Carlisle, Pennsylvania in the fall of 1911. While an undergraduate, he began his long association with his fraternity, Beta Theta Pi and served as football manager. He had been expelled briefly during his sophomore year for breaching the College hazing regulations, but he graduated nonetheless in 1915. He graduated from the Dickinson School of Law in 1917 and took up employment as a journalist for the Harrisburg Patriot. During the First World War, he served in France with the 79th Division and was a delegate to the organizing meeting of the American Legion in Paris following the war. Malcolm returned to the newspaper, then worked for the Tax Audit Company in Philadelphia before returning to his alma mater in 1922 to begin a remarkable life of service to Dickinson.