Potter Memorial Lecture

The Frank Fraser Potter Lecture brings an internationally known philosopher to Washington State University to share their vision with students and the community. Previous lecturers have included Noam Chomsky, Bernard Rollin, and Daniel C. Dennett.

The Lectureship

The Frank Fraser Potter Memorial Lectureship was initiated shortly after Frank’s death in 1959 by an anonymous gift from a former student.

This generous donation supported the initial lecture, given in 1961 by Antony Flew of Oxford University, as well as several succeeding addresses by equally outstanding philosophers.

Today, the lectureship is sustained by an endowment and generous donations by the friends and colleagues of the Potters.

Frank Fraser Potter (1879–1959)

Before joining the faculty in 1912 at then-Washington State College, Frank Potter earned his doctor of philosophy degree from the University of Michigan and taught in New York and Kentucky. At WSC, he taught philosophy as well as Latin, Greek, and Italian. In 1949, shortly before his retirement, he was instrumental in the creation of the Department of Philosophy.

Frank Potter is especially remembered for his concern for students. The home of Frank and Irene Potter was the gathering place for groups of students and faculty who met to discuss issues and ideas, listen to music, and share their experience of the liberal arts.

Particularly notable was Professor Potter’s preparation of students applying for Rhodes Scholarships. Ten of his students won that most prestigious award, a unique achievement for which the International Rhodes Scholarship Office cited the Potters.

Professor Potter stood firmly in the Greek tradition in his conviction that logical analysis and clear thinking are the tools of wisdom, in his tracking of an idea to its ultimate presuppositions, in his conception of reality as a stately edifice of timely essences, in his moral seriousness tempered with irony, in his opposition to whatever is fragmentary and provincial in thought, and in his insistence that life should form a unified whole.