The American Cyclopædia (1879)/Wheelock

WHEELOCK. I. Eleazar, an American clergyman, the founder and first president of Dartmouth college, born in Windham, Conn., April 22, 1711, died in Hanover, N. H., April 24, 1779. He graduated at Yale college in 1733, and from 1735 to 1770 was pastor of the second Congregational society in Lebanon, Conn. He established a missionary school there, called “Moor's Indian charity school,” out of which grew Dartmouth college. (See Dartmouth College, and Occom, Samson.) He removed to Hanover in 1770, and presided over his new college nine years. He published a “Narrative of the Indian School” in 1762, and several continuations of it up to 1773. He received the degree of D. D. from Edinburgh university in 1767. A memoir of him, with selections from his correspondence, appeared in 1811. II. John, second president of Dartmouth college, son of the preceding, born in Lebanon, Conn., Jan. 28, 1754, died April 4, 1817. He entered Yale college in 1767, but graduated with the first class at Dartmouth in 1771, and was a tutor there from 1772 to 1776. In 1775 he was elected to the colonial assembly, and in 1777 was appointed a major in the New York forces, and soon after lieutenant colonel in the continental army. In 1778 he commanded an expedition against the Indians, and soon after he was placed on Gen. Gates's staff. Though only 25 years old at the death of his father, he was chosen to succeed him as president of the college. In 1782 the trustees sent him to Europe to procure books, money, &c., for the institution, which were lost by shipwreck off Cape Cod. An ecclesiastical controversy among the trustees occasioned his removal in 1815. In 1817 a new board of trustees restored him to office, but he died a few weeks after. He bequeathed half his large estate to Princeton theological seminary. He published “Sketches of the History of Dartmouth College” (1816).