Eclectic Bronco-Buster

"You could well examine your own motivations for taking a course in Criminology," Dr. William McCord tells the one hundred and fifty students at the beginning of the course more commonly called "Cops and Robbers." When asked what is responsible for his own interest in the criminal mind, he replies with refreshingly characteristic frankness: "I suppose my primary interest in crime is the sublimation of aggression; to vicariously participate in violence without feeling guilt. Also, of course, the outlaw has as much attractiveness to me as to the rest of American culture." He adds with his engaging smile, "I liked aggressive sports when I was at Stanford: I played soccer, football and coached boxing."

In addition to athletics, editing the college literary magazine, and being class president, McCord also developed his interest in criminality while at Stanford. "I took a job at San Quentin as a psychologist for sex offenders. Nobody else wanted to handle them so there were no qualifications. In fact this was not even my major in college; I majored in history and humanities." While working at San Quentin he counseled a man who had written the TV and radio show Dragnet until he was arrested for forging a $50,000 check.

While talking about his college, I commented that Stanford was a natural school for the academically-oriented Westerner. "That certainly is true," he smilingly replied, "but I attended for a much better and more rational reason. My future wife wanted to go to Stanford; when we graduated from high school I went with her. My grandfather would have been upset if he had been alive. He was a sheriff in California and was asked by Leland Stanford to run for Senator. He lost Stanford's support when he came out against Federal grants for the Union Pacific and was consequently defeated."

McCord himself grew up on a ranch outside Tucson, Arizona, where his main activity was bronco-busting. "We made most of our money from chickens and turkeys, however," McCord added.

Upon graduation from Stanford in 1952, McCord came to Harvard to work with Professors Sheldon Glueck and Gordon Allport. Shortly after his arrival he became a section man in Social Sciences 6, later directed a section Social Sciences 112--Human Relations. He received his Ph. D. in 1955, and since then has been teaching courses in Criminology, in Modern Social Thought, and seminars on group conflict and theories of conscience. In addition to his teaching, he has handled extensive administrative jobs, at present being Assistant Secretary of General Education and Head of the Board of Tutors in Social Relations.

During his stay at Harvard, McCord has found time to work at the Norfolk Prison, at the Wiltwick School for delinquents, and in the Cambridge-Somerville Project. From the latter experience, he published papers on alcoholism and Negro intelligence and is presently preparing a book based on the Project. He and his wife, Joan McCord expanded and revised his Ph. D. thesis which was published in 1956 as "Psychopathy and Delinquency."

His book is very highly respected in the field; as Professor Glueck noted, McCord has done invaluable work in defining the concept of the psychopath, a concept which was very unclear before. McCord's work with the psycopath, a person with very little conscience, is closely linked to his other major interest, that of the development of conscience. He plans to do his "magnum opus" on the latter subject within the next ten years.

Allport, who directed McCord's thesis, observed that "McCord is remarkably productive, having done far more research than is customary for his age. He also has extensive administrative talents as well as scholarly ones." Both of these fields of ability will be useful when McCord becomes Assistant Dean of the Faculty and Assistant Professor of Sociology at Stanford at the end of this term.

"Intellectually, Harvard is the best place in the world, it was a hard choice to make." The Social Relations Department is noted for its few positions of tenure. There is a great deal of regret in the Social Relations Department over McCord's leaving; some students even found McCord's courses one of the major reasons for concentrating in the department.

The Social Relations Department, in many ways, provided the perfect home for a man of McCord's intellectual curiosity and scope. McCord terms himself a social psychologist, but as he points out, social psychology is a diffuse field. Others find more trouble categorizing him, Allport describes him as "A very broad-gauged fellow, I don't know what to call him. He demonstrates the goal of the department."

To have made such a reputation by the age of twenty-seven, is indeed a remarkable achievement. But as McCord points out, "This is a new field. A scholar is not limited to pedantic trivial subject matter to uncover fresh knowledge. Even an undergraduate can make an original discovery." McCord is an example of the new scholarship, a man whose youth and consequent lack of preconception about human behavior, help him examine society by eclectically drawing from all fields of social thought in order to better understand and help the society itself.