KU Business Centennial Celebrations: Remembering Dean Frank T. Stockton
Stockton was first and longest-serving dean of KU School of Business
As the University of Kansas School of Business celebrates 100 years, we recognize an instrumental figure in the establishment of our school: Frank T. Stockton, the first dean of the KU School of Business. Stockton served the school from its beginning in 1924 until 1947. He was also the chairman of the Department of Economics and Commerce. Stockton remains the longest-serving dean in School of Business history.
Stockton was born in Crawford County, Pennsylvania, and received his Bachelor of Arts from Allegheny College in Meadville, Pennsylvania, and a doctorate in political economy from Johns Hopkins University.
As dean, Stockton played a crucial role in developing the Business Placement Bureau and the Bureau of Business Research, which helped students find jobs and focused on business and economic trends. He assisted in outlining curricula and secured a charter from the Beta Gamma Sigma, an international honor society for business students.
Within a year of being established, the school was admitted to membership in the American Association of Collegiate Schools of Business, currently known as the Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business (AACSB). The school and its accounting program still hold AACSB accreditations.
Stockton moved to become the first dean of University Extension in 1947, where he helped establish an extension center for southwestern Kansas in 1951 and northwestern Kansas in 1953. He retired as dean, became director of special projects of the University Extension, and in 1957, he retired as a faculty member from KU.
The University Extension was established to provide adult education programs for adults in rural areas on certain subjects without them needing to earn college credit in return.
Educational programs included correspondence study, lectures and lecture courses, short courses, conferences and more. Various engineering, science and management training programs were administered by KU during World War II and were directed by a member of the Extension staff. An operation was constituted entirely apart from Extension.
Stockton succeeded Director Harold G. Ingham, and the term “division” was dropped from the title with the administration change because “extension” had been given a rank at the university.
Stockton served on many state committees outside of KU. He was a member of the Governor’s Committee for Employment from 1931–32, the Kansas State Economic Council and the Governor’s Committee on Self-Help in 1933, along with many others. He was on the board of directors for the Lawrence Chamber of Commerce from 1941–43.
Prior to his service at KU, Stockton worked as an instructor at the University of Rochester, a professor of economics at Indiana University and the dean of the College of Arts and Sciences and department head of Economics at the University of South Dakota.
While serving as KU School of Business dean, Stockton declared that the business school should “never become static and shopworn. Rather may it always exercise some national leadership in the dynamics of education.”
His legacy remains in the current School of Business in Capitol Federal Hall where students continue to thrive in a dynamic environment.
Learn more about the history of the School of Business, submit a favorite memory of the school and more at business.ku.edu/100.
Source: University Archives
By Grace Ludes
