Alumnus/Alumna

Thomas M. Gunn was born in Shelbyville in Shelby County, Kentucky on March 17, 1840. He was the youngest son of William and Francis Adams Gunn. William Gunn, a presiding elder of the Lexington District of the Presbyterian Church, died when his son was only thirteen years old. Thomas Gunn was still able to enter Dickinson College in Carlisle, Pennsylvania in 1858 with the class of 1860. While at the College, he was elected to the Belles Lettres Society and graduated with his class in the early summer of 1860.

Straight from Dickinson and still only twenty years old, Gunn took the post of vice-president and professor of languages at McKenzie College in Clarkesville, Texas. He left teaching to enlist in the Union Army with the 21st Infantry of Kentucky in 1861 and served as chaplain in his unit. Following the war, Gunn embarked on a lengthy and extensive career as a Presbyterian clergyman. He was the pastor in Louisville, Kentucky in 1867. He then moved to Illinois, where he had congregations in Grand Ridge and Braidwood in the 1870s and served at Joliet from 1877 to 1885. In 1885, Gunn moved west to Walla Walla, Washington, where, in 1887, he became superintendent of missions responsible for certifying new congregations in Washington, Idaho, Oregon, and Alaska. He held this post until 1899 and then served again as a pastor in Cashmere, Washington from 1901 until his retirement.

Samuel Stehman Haldeman was born in Locust Grove, Pennsylvania on August 12, 1812, the eldest of what were to be the seven children of Henry and Frances Haldeman. He began his schooling at a local school on Conoy Creek. He also spent many hours in self-taught natural history during his spare time. When Haldeman was fourteen, he was sent to Dr. John Miller Keagy's classical school in Harrisburg and then went on to Dickinson College. He joined the class of 1831 but, with the college suffering the disruption that would lead to its temporary closing, remained only two years. Though he nurtured his emerging interest in biology and became a talented amateur scientist, he took over management of his father's new Chiquesalungo sawmill. His two brothers, Edwin and Paris, at the same time were starting an iron manufacturing business in the area and Samuel became a silent partner with them. He was always more involved in the science and the mechanics of both his businesses and continued during these years building up his impressive scientific acumen. In 1836, Henry Darwin Rogers, a former professor of Haldeman’s at Dickinson, asked him to take over the geology field operations in New Jersey that Rogers had to abandon on his being appointed the state geologist of Pennsylvania. Haldeman served in New Jersey for one year and, in 1837, came back to Pennsylvania to assist on the state survey there.

Edwin Forrest Hann was born on December 5, 1876 in Fairton, New Jersey, the son of John S. and Edith R. Hann. He prepared for college at the Pennington Seminary in New Jersey and originally entered Wesleyan University. By 1898 he was a member of the Dickinson class of 1901 and an active student in class and out. He was a member of the Beta Theta Pi fraternity, a valuable member of the Union Philosophical Society, serving as clerk of the society, and four year member of the campus YMCA. He graduated in 1901 with the Latin Scientific Section.

His sporting career at the College was outstanding. He was a three year letterman in football, captaining the 1899 team from his quarterback position. Fraternity feuding made for a difficult season that year but Hann was an able leader, running a kick-off back 90 yards in a 51-0 rout of Franklin and Marshall. Hann also played varsity baseball.

Birth: May 23, 1835; Port Republic, Rockingham County, Virginia

Death: September 19, 1862 (age 27); Loudoun County, Virginia

 Military Service: CSA, 1861-62

 Unit: Comapny I, Virginia 1st Calvary Regiment

Alma Mater: Dickinson College, B.A. (Class of 1856)

William Harnsberger was born on May 23, 1835 in Port Republic, Rockingham County, Virginia. As a member of the class of 1856, “Willie” was active in the Union Philosophical Society, Phi Kappa Sigma, and Zeta Psi. His brother, Henry, had been a member of the class of 1841. After receiving his bachelor of arts degree, William returned to Virginia, where he taught until the start of the Civil War.

Harnsberger enlisted in the Confederate States Army soon after the outbreak of the war, joining Co. I, Virginia 1st Calvary Regiment. He was killed on September 19, 1862 in Loudoun County, Virginia.

A member of the class of 1919 from Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, Samuel Harris pursued the Classical course, and was a member of Beta Theta Pi. Thereafter information on Harris becomes sparse. It is known that he was gone from the College by May 1917.

Harris joined the U.S. Army as a private, and rose to the rank of sergeant before taking his officer training at Camp Meade, Maryland. He was promoted to first lieutenant and lost his life in the course of the First World War.

John Hart was born in Syracuse, New York, on October 20, 1916. He entered Dickinson in 1934, but did not complete his degree. He was a member of Phi Kappa Sigma fraternity.

He enlisted in the peacetime Naval Reserve in early 1941 and trained as an aviator in Jacksonville, Florida, earning his wings and an ensign's commission in April 1942. He flew anti-submarine PBYs in the Caribbean and the South Atlantic before being assigned to North Africa in November 1942.

In April 1943, he suffered severe injuries when his aircraft crashed and burned in Morocco. He then embarked on a thirteen month battle for life at hospitals in Boston and St. Albans, New York. On May 6, 1944 he was able to walk out of his ward and report for duty at the Naval Air Station in New York. He was then assigned to Pearl Harbor. However, on May 19, 1945, Lieutenant Jack Hart lost his life in the crash of an aircraft on a routine flight from Oahu.

Samuel Harvey was born in Long Branch, New Jersey in 1923 and grew up in Red Bank, New Jersey, graduating from high school there with honors. He entered Dickinson with the class of 1946 and became a member of Kappa Sigma fraternity.

Harvey enlisted in the army after the fall and winter terms of his freshman year and trained in Texas and Mississippi. He was assigned to the 301st Infantry Regiment of the 94th Division, Third Army while fighting in Europe, serving as runner and French interpreter. On February 20, 1945, PFC Samuel Harvey was killed in action in Germany. He is buried in the American Cemetery in Luxembourg.

Alexander L. Hayes was born in Kent County, Delaware on March 7, 1793, the son of Manlove and Ziporrah Laws Hayes. He entered Dickinson College in Carlisle, Pennsylvania with the class of 1812 and after graduation studied law with Henry Moore Ridgely of Dover, Delaware. Hayes passed the bar in Delaware in 1815 and began practice in the state.

Continuing to practice law, Hayes moved to Philadelphia in 1821 and then to Reading, Pennsylvania in 1822. In 1827, he relocated again to Lancaster when he was appointed an assistant judge of the District Court of Lancaster and York Counties. Hayes was made president judge of that court in 1833. He served another fifteen years before retiring in 1849 to concentrate on his Lancaster practice and to venture into business, notably as the president of the Conestoga Steam Mill Company. Hayes was also very active in civic affairs; he served as the president of the board of school directors in Lancaster and as a trustee of the Millersville Normal School, today's Millersville University. He also served on the board of trustees for Dickinson College between 1837 and 1841. In 1854, he was persuaded to once again sit on the judge's bench, this time for Lancaster, and being reelected regularly, served until 1874.

Hayes was married, and he and his wife had several daughters. Alexander Laws Hayes died in 1875 in Lancaster. He was eighty-three years old.

John Hays was born in Carlisle, Pennsylvania on February 2, 1837 the youngest of two sons and a daughter of John and Eleanor Blaine Hays. On both sides of his family, the young John Hays was descended from old and highly respected central Pennsylvania stock. He was educated in the common schools of Carlisle and at the Plainfield Academy and entered Dickinson College in 1852. After a time away from his studies, he re-entered the College in 1854 and joined the class of 1857. He was a member of Phi Kappa Sigma and was elected to the Belle Lettres Society. Following graduation with his class, he entered law studies in Carlisle with Robert Henderson.

He was called to the Cumberland County bar in August 1859 and entered practice locally. In August 1862, he was commissioned a second lieutenant and then first lieutenant in the newly raised Company A of the 130th Regiment of Pennsylvania Volunteers. The 130th was one of the undrilled and untrained new regiments thrown into the action that culminated in the battle of Antietam. The unit later fought with heavy losses in the classes at Fredericksburg and Chancellorsville where Hays, now adjutant of the regiment, was wounded in the right shoulder by a musket ball. He also served as adjutant to General William Hays for a time at brigade headquarters of the 2nd Brigade of the Third Division. He mustered out with his regiment on May 21, 1863 and returned to Carlisle, entering Henderson's law firm.

Raphael Smead Hays was born on June 27, 1876 in Carlisle, Pennsylvania, the son of John Hays and Jane Van Ness Smead. A sixth generation Dickinsonian, his father was a Civil War veteran and a prominent lawyer who was president of the Carlisle Deposit Bank and of the Frog, Switch, and Manufacturing Company, where he was also cofounder and chairman of the board. Raphael attended Dickinson College Preparatory School before entering the College in 1890. During his college years he focused on the study of classical arts, especially in Greek and Latin. He was an avid tennis player, worked on the Microcosm, and was a member of Sigma Chi fraternity. He graduated from Dickinson College in 1894 with a bachelor of arts degree.

Upon graduation, Hays acted for a time as secretary to President George Reed. Following a short stay in Philadelphia working for the E. T. Smith Company, he returned home to work for his father at Frog and Switch. Beginning in an entry-level position, he quickly rose through the ranks, eventually becoming superintendent and later vice president. He is credited with introducing the steel foundry to the company, which allowed it to modernize and produce a considerably greater profit. Upon his father's death he took over complete control of Frog and Switch.

Edgar Rohrer Heckman was born on February 11, 1875 to Isaac and Annie T. Heckman, in Ennisville, Pennsylvania. He attended the Williamsport Dickinson Seminary and then enrolled at Dickinson College in Carlisle, Pennsylvania in the fall of 1894. He quickly became an active student. By 1896, he was the recording secretary of the Belles Lettres Literary Society and was selected as a member of Phi Beta Kappa, focusing his academics in Latin and history. He was also a successful athlete -- as a junior he stood at 5' 11" and 185 pounds -- and played four years on the football team. He was captain of his class baseball team, and an enthusiastic gymnast. Nicknamed "Heck," he also became a member of the fraternity Phi Kappa Sigma.

Heckman received his A.B. in 1897 and took a post for three years as a teacher of Latin and history at the Dickinson Preparatory School. In 1900 he became the Methodist pastor at Town Hill, Pennsylvania. This heralded a series of appointments which included district superintendent of the Harrisburg area and minister to the Allison Church in Carlisle from 1929 to 1932 and the Pennsylvania State College. His last post before his retirement was at the Methodist Home for the Aged in Tyrone, Pennsylvania from 1937 to 1947. He received an honorary D.D. from Dickinson in 1917.

George Hemminger was born on his family's farm west of Carlisle, Pennsylvania on September 8, 1840, the youngest son of twelve children of John and Eliza Heagy Hemminger. He went to local schools and to the Gleason Academy in West Pennsboro Township and then to Pennsylvania College at Gettysburg in 1861. Before he enrolled for his sophomore year, however, he went to Harrisburg with seven classmates to enlist as a private in what was to become Company B of the 138th Pennsylvania Volunteer Infantry, then recruiting in several counties, including Adams.

Hemminger mustered in with his company at Camp Curtin on August 16, 1862 and his unit arrived in the Washington area soon after to guard communication lines and transport stores. Later, in 1863, the 138th began to engage in serious fighting and sustain casualties at Brandy Station, Mine Run, and Locust Grove. The following year saw even heavier action at the Wilderness, Spotsylvania, and Cold Harbor. In defense of Washington at Monocracy, Maryland, Private Hemminger was among twenty-one men of his unit Confederate forces captured on July 9, 1864 and soon found himself in a prison camp at Danville, Virginia. He was transferred to the notorious Libby Prison in Richmond in February 1865 and was paroled in March 1865. He returned to his company in time to celebrate the end of the war and participate with the 138th in the grand victory parade in Washington on June 8, 1865.

Birth: March 11, 1827; North Middleton, Pennsylvania

Death: January 26, 1906 (age 78); Carlisle, Cumberland County, Pennsylvania

Military Service: USA, 1861-65

Unit: Company A, 7th Pennsylvania Reserve Infantry "Carlisle Fencibles"

Alma Mater: Dickinson College, B.A. (Class of 1845)

Robert Miller Henderson was born in North Middleton near Carlisle, Pennsylvania on March 11, 1827 to William Miller and Elizabeth Parker Henderson. He was prepared at Carlisle High School and entered Dickinson College in 1841. He was an active member of the Belles Lettres Society and graduated with the class of 1845. He studied law with Judge Reed and was admitted to the Carlisle bar on August 25, 1847 though only twenty years old. He served two terms between 1851 and 1853 as an equally youthful Whig state legislator in the Pennsylvania house of representatives.

Andrew Dousa Hepburn was born the eldest son of Samuel and Rebecca Williamson Hepburn in Williamsport, Pennsylvania. His family moved soon after to Carlisle, Pennsylvania so that his father could complete his legal training under Judge John Reed at the local Dickinson College. Andrew grew up in Carlisle where his father became a district judge. He himself enrolled as an undergraduate at Dickinson in 1845 with the class of 1849. He was elected to the Union Philosophical Society but left the College to enroll at Jefferson College in western Pennsylvania where he graduated in 1851. He then attended the University of Virginia and finally went on to complete seminary studies at Princeton Theological in 1857.

A native of the Harrisburg, Pennsylvania area, David Hepford graduated from Lower Paxton High School and entered Dickinson College in Carlisle, Pennsylvania as a member of the class of 1937 in the fall of 1933. He participated in a variety of activities ranging from golf to singing third tenor in the Glee Club.

He edited the Dickinsonian in his senior year, served as president of the Middle Atlantic States Collegiate Newspaper Association, and represented the United States in the League of Youth Conference held at Geneva in Switzerland in the summer of 1937. During that travel he interviewed various public figures, including Benito Mussolini in Rome. In all, he became one of the most outstanding journalists in Dickinson's extra-curricular history.

Hepford enlisted in the army at the outbreak of war and was stationed for two years as a sergeant in Harrisburg at the Selective Service Headquarters. During this time he was active in civic matters and was vice president of the Junior Chamber of Commerce. He was killed in an automobile accident on April 11, 1943, crossing the street in front of his home.

John Herdic graduated from high school in Williamsport, Pennsylvania. He entered Dickinson with the class of 1944 but withdrew to enlist in July 1942. Before leaving he became of member of Chi Phi fraternity. Herdic trained in Texas as a bombardier, earning his wings and commission in June 1943. He then trained as a navigator in New Mexico before being assigned to overseas duty in early 1944.

Herdic joined General Claire Chenault's command in the Burma-China theater, flying a B-25 as a bombardier and navigator. On his penultimate mission before completing the fifty which would see him serve out his combat tour, Herdic's aircraft was lost in action on January 19, 1945.

David Benjamin Herman was born in Silver Spring Township in Cumberland County, Pennsylvania on December 29, 1844. He entered Dickinson College in nearby Carlisle and graduated with the class of 1865. While at the College, Herman had been active in the Belles Lettres Society and was a member of Phi Kappa Sigma. He studied law in Carlisle with his elder brother, Michael Christian Herman of the Dickinson class of 1862, and was admitted to the Cumberland County bar in January 1867 although he left for the western territories that same spring.

Herman quickly engaged himself in the cattle trade in Iowa and expanded his operations into Nebraska with the opening of the territory during those years. The natives of the Plains did not submit without a fight, and in the climactic year of the wars that followed, 1876, David Herman was killed by hostile Lakota Sioux on the North Platte River on May 20, just a month before Crook's defeat at the Rosebud and Custer's disaster at the Little Big Horn. Family information indicated that he was intending to end his business and return to Carlisle. He was killed on December 29, 1876. He was thirty-one years old.

Martin Herman was born on February 14, 1841 on the farm his German immigrant great-grandfather had cleared in 1771 near New Kingston, Pennsylvania. He was one of the six children of Martin and Elizabeth Wolford Herman. He prepared for college at the York County Academy under George Ruby and entered the class of 1862 at Dickinson College in September 1858. His brother, David Herman, was a member of the class of 1865. While at the College, Martin was a member of Phi Kappa Psi and active in the Belles Lettres Society, for whom he was chosen to deliver the 76th anniversary oration in 1862; he also received the Silver Junior Prize Medal for oratory the year before. He graduated with his class and entered the study of law with William Miller of Carlisle.

Herman was called to the Cumberland County bar in January 1864 and opened a practice in Carlisle. While still in his thirties, he was elected as the president judge of the Ninth Judicial District of Pennsylvania taking office in January 1874 and serving till 1884. After this he continued his lucrative practice in Carlisle.

Martin Herman married Josie Adair of Carlisle on June 5, 1873 and the couple had four children. He also served a term on the board of trustees of Dickinson from 1877 to 1878. In late 1895 he suffered a stroke while in court and died at home in Carlisle after a lingering illness on January 18, 1896. He was fifty-five years old.

Francis Herron was born on June 28, 1774 near Shippensburg in Cumberland County, Pennsylvania. He enrolled at nearby Dickinson College and graduated in 1794. He was determined on a career in the Presbyterian ministry, and so studied theology under his pastor Robert Cooper, and was licensed by the Carlisle Presbytery in October 1797.

His immediate work began as a missionary, moving through Pittsburgh and then west through the backwoods of Ohio as far as present day Chillocothe. He also made a name for himself by camping several nights with the Native Americans, who were then numerous around what is today the town of Marietta, Ohio. Despite being asked to lead several congregations in the west, Herron eventually was installed as pastor of the Rock Spring Church, closer to his home, in April 1800. After ten years of service in Cumberland County, he did return, however, as he was appointed as pastor of the First Presbyterian Church of Pittsburgh in June 1811. The remainder of his service was spent in that city.

Birth: September 20, 1832; Flourtown, Montgomery County, Pennsylvania
 

Death: May 11, 1874 (age 42); Bridgeville, Delaware

Military Service: USA, 1863-65

Unit:  6th Regiment of Delaware Volunteers

Alma Mater: Dickinson College, B.A. (Class of 1860)

Charles Heydrick was born in Flourtown, Montgomery County, Pennsylvania. While  at Dickinson he was a member of Belles Lettres Society and after graduating took a teaching position in Oakland, Maryland and then in Bridgeville, Delaware. After relocating to Delaware, he married Sarah "Salllie" P. Cannon, the sister of William Laws Cannon, a fellow dickinsonian who had graduated with him, on January 21, 1863.  

On July 1, 1863, at the age of 30, he joined the United States Army as a captain of the 6th regiment of Delaware Volunteers. He died on May 11, 1874 in Bridgeville, Delaware.

For more information the Delaware State Archives, Division of Historical and Cultural Affairs, Dover, Delaware, 19901 contains Heydrick's diary and small manuscripts mostly dealing with agriculture.

Samuel Dickinson Hillman was born to Samuel and Susan Dickinson Hillman of Blackwood, New Jersey, on January 18, 1825. Not much is known of his life before he entered the Dickinson College Grammar School in Carlisle, Pennsylvania in 1845. A member of the Belles Lettres Literary Society, Hillman graduated from the College in 1850, and received his master's degree two years later. While working towards this degree, he taught in West Chester, Pennsylvania from 1850 to 1851. Hillman was then appointed principal of the Grammar School, an office he would occupy for nine years.

In 1860, Hillman was selected by the College to serve as professor of mathematics and astronomy. Two years later he became the treasurer for the Board of Trustees, and he would remain so until 1868. By April 1868, Hillman was residing in West College as the senior faculty member; however, President Herman Merrills Johnson died suddenly at that time, and Hillman was selected to serve as president pro tempore due to his seniority.

Like William Henry Allen before him, Hillman was a temporary replacement not to be considered a candidate for the presidency. When a special trustee meeting of September 8, 1868 selected Robert L. Dashiell as president, Hillman returned to his position as professor. He would remain with the College for another six years.

Charles Francis Himes was born in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania on June 2, 1838 to William D. and Magdalen Lanius Himes. He attended the New Oxford Collegiate and Medical Institute in Adams County, Pennsylvania, before entering Dickinson College in the spring of 1853 as a sophomore. He was a founding member of the College's Phi Kappa Sigma fraternity. After graduating in 1855, Himes taught mathematics and natural sciences at the Wyoming Conference Academy in Wayne County, Pennsylvania. A year later he moved to the Midwest to teach at public schools in Missouri and Illinois, but shortly thereafter returned to the east to accept a position at the Baltimore Female College.

In 1860, he was appointed professor of mathematics at Troy University in Troy, New York, teaching there for three years. Himes enrolled at the University of Giessen in the Hesse region of Germany in 1863, earning his Ph.D. after two years of study. Upon his return to the United States, he was named professor of natural science at Dickinson College, a position which he would hold for three decades.

William Alexander Himes was born in New Oxford, Pennsylvania on November 27, 1851 the son of William and Magdalen Lanius Himes and the younger brother of Charles Francis Himes. He went to local schools first and then to Nazareth Hall in Nazareth, Pennsylvania from where be began his undergraduate education at Moravian College in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania. After two years at Moravian, he entered the junior class at Dickinson College in Carlisle, Pennsylvania where his older brother was teaching science. He was elected to the Belles Lettres Society and followed family tradition in joining the Phi Kappa Sigma fraternity before graduating in 1871. Also, like his brother, he went west after graduation to make his fortune in real estate, this time in Minneapolis, Minnesota. He soon returned and entered his father's business in New Oxford.

Himes opened a retail lumber and coal business in New Oxford in 1878 and took up the management of several farms in the area. He also involved himself in other civic and commercial roles in the town, becoming a director of the York Trust Company and the Adams County Telephone Company. He served as a city council member and oversaw the construction of the New Oxford water works. He worked on the borough school board and was active in local Republican politics.

Franklin Hollinger was born in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania on March 26, 1925. He grew up in Mechanicsburg, Pennsylvania where he was an outstanding student at the local high school, excelling in chemistry, the orchestra, and chess.

Hollinger entered Dickinson College in nearby Carlisle for the winter session in January 1943, taking the scientific course; his ambition was to be a chemist. He left the College soon after for the armed services.

He went overseas in September, 1944 with Company B, 112th Infantry Regiment of the 28th Division. He was reported missing in action during the Battle of the Bulge, having been captured on December 20, 1944. A year later his parents were informed that he had died in a German prisoner of war camp on March 3, 1945, three weeks before his twentieth birthday.

John Hopper was born in 1923 in Camp Hill, Pennsylvania, and attended Camp Hill High School. In 1941, he entered nearby Dickinson College in Carlisle as a member of the class of 1945. In his second semester, he volunteered to join the Army Air Corps at the encouragement of his roommate, Vincent Schafmeister. He served as a fighter pilot in the European theater of war. He returned in 1945 as a sophomore and graduated in 1948. He was well involved in the College, being a member of many organizations, such as the Beta Theta Phi fraternity, Omicron Delta Kappa honors society, and Raven's Claw. He was also an outstanding varsity basketball player, and in 1972 was inducted into the Dickinson Sports Hall of Fame.