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  • In Memoriam

George Warren Arms, Professor of English at the University of New Mexico, and one of the founders of the Rocky Mountain Modern Language Association, died January 1, 1992. Professor Arms was born in LaGrande, Oregon, February 1, 1912. He completed his BA at Princeton University in 1933 and his PhD at New York University in 1939. He taught at Mary Washington College before moving to the University of New Mexico in 1945.

To his students he was a mentor, good friend, second father, and chief inspiration for their literary pursuits. He taught them the joy in literature and became a model for their own lives. As a scholar he was an organizer and originator, editing numerous college texts which were among the most influential in America. Following his first important critical work, The Fields Were Green, a study of Lowell, Bryant, Whittier, Longfellow, and Holmes, he published many books and articles on American literature, and he edited a number of volumes of the works of William Dean Howells. He also accomplished groundbreaking bibliographical, biographical, and critical work on Howells and other American literary figures. At the University of New Mexico he founded the American Studies program, which later became a department, and chaired the Department of English from 1951 to 1956. He was a founding editor of The Explicator and continued in that position until his death. His international, national, and regional service in various offices and committees of the National Council of Teachers of English, the American Association of University Professors, the American Studies Association, the Conference on College Composition and Communication, the Rocky Mountain Modern Language Association, and numerous others was extraordinary.

In 1947 T. M. Pearce, chair of English, and F. M. Kercheville, chair of Foreign Language, at the University of New Mexico, collaborated to found the Rocky Mountain Modern Language Association. They invited professionals in the region to a meeting in Albuquerque, November 28-29, 1947. The local committee included Pearce, Kercheville, George W. Arms, Robert M. Duncan, W. T. Albrecht, W. D. Jacobs, A. Lopes, and Katherine Simons. The continuity of our professional interests is revealed by one presentation on the program ("The Great Critics Sit In Judgement"), which argued that "the great critics of the past would be disturbed by the set of values to which our times are adjusted. . . ." There was in addition an exhibit of Taos art that included the work of Georgia O'Keefe. The attendance at the first convention of the RMMLA was 104, representing eight states and twenty-five institutions, according to the report of George W. Arms, who was elected first editor of the News Bulletin, since evolved into the Rocky Mountain Review of Language and Literature. In 1967 Professor Arms shared the presidency with Robert M. Duncan, though Professor Duncan reports that he attempted to have Arms serve alone. Arms was instrumental in organizing the 1967 convention which met again at the University of New Mexico. The RMMLA and the region has lost one of its formative scholars. (Compiled from material by James L. Thorson, Ingeborg Carlson, and T. M. Pearce.)

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