Written By:

www.netsnippets.com

 

Couch, Herbert N
Table of Contents
1. census 1930
2. couch, wife
3. obit

1. census 1930 ^Top

Date Accessed: 25 Sep. 2007
Title: Ancestry.com - 1930 United States Federal Census
URL: http://content.ancestry.com/iexec/?htx=View&r=an&dbid=6224&iid=ILT626_410-0774&fn=Herbert+M&ln=Couch&st=r&ssrc=&pid=83401634
2. couch, wife ^Top

Date Accessed: 25 Sep. 2007
Title: Eunice Burr Stebbins (Couch) 1893-1992 Eunice Couch (née Stebbins) was passionate about the Classics, and especially passionat
URL: http://64.233.167.104/search?q=cache:Ri3Sbe3Qc1UJ:www.brown.edu/Research/Breaking_Ground/bios/Couch_Eunice%2520Burr%2520Stebbins.pdf+%22herbert+n.couch%22+obit&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=1&gl=us
This is the html version of the file http://www.brown.edu/Research/Breaking_Ground/bios/Couch_Eunice%20Burr%20Stebbins.pdf.
G o o g l e automatically generates html versions of documents as we crawl the web.
To link to or bookmark this page, use the following url: http://www.google.com/search?q=cache:Ri3Sbe3Qc1UJ:www.brown.edu/Research/Breaking_Ground/bios/Couch_Eunice%2520Burr%2520Stebbins.pdf+%22herbert+n.couch%22+obit&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=1&gl=us


Google is neither affiliated with the authors of this page nor responsible for its content.
These search terms have been highlighted: herbert n couch
These terms only appear in links pointing to this page: obit




Page 1
Eunice Burr Stebbins (Couch) 1893-1992by Faith Ford SandstromEunice Couch (née Stebbins) was passionate about the Classics, and especially passionateabout ancient coins1. But twice in her life her desire to broaden her work in numismaticsand to publish her numismatic studies was thwarted. As a post-graduate student in Athensshe was the victim of an administrative conflict which prevented her participation infurther study of numismatics at that point. Later, soon after her marriage she undertookan independent study of the coinage of Argos. She devoted nearly ten years to building acorpus of casts and photographs for a die study, hoping that one day her efforts would beshared with others through publication of her study. But the conventions of her time andperhaps others’ personal prejudices placed a glass ceiling over her ambition and her longstudy of the coinage of Argos was never published. It was perhaps her deepest academicdisappointment.Eunice Burr Stebbins was born November 11, 1893 in Newark Valley, New York. As ayoung girl she spent several years with her mother in residence in Europe. Over fouryears of living in pensions for long periods in Tours and Hanover, she studied French andGerman and mastered these languages. They returned to the United States and in 1908spent the summer in Williamstown, Massachusetts. In preparation for entering MissCapen’s School in Northampton, Massachusetts, Eunice studied Latin with ProfessorMonroe N. Wetmore of Williams College. Prof. Wetmore was pleased with his youngstudent who when assigned to translate a modest number of lines of Virgil’s Aeneid,instead read the entire first book.Eunice entered Miss Capen’s School in Northampton, Massachusetts in 1908, whereMiss Capen further encouraged her academic directions. She graduated Miss Capen’sSchool in 1912. She then attended Smith College, Northampton, Massachusetts, from1912-1916, where she studied Classics. She received her Bachelor of Arts Phi BetaKappa from Smith College in 1916.Eunice was an extraordinary female student for her times. She felt obliged to follow hermother’s peripatetic life, but whether living with her mother in New York or in Europe,Eunice managed to further her own academic ambitions. She continued her study ofClassics and Archaeology at Columbia University in New York in 1919-1920, followedby a year attending the lectures at the American Academy in Rome, 1920-1921. In Romeshe and her mother lived at the Pensione Girardet, favored by American students studyingin Rome. Tutored by the Girardet sisters, Louisa and Eugenia, she became fluent inItalian.Her mother died in February, 1924. During the following year, 1924-1925, Eunice againstudied at Columbia University. But in 1925 she became a full-time graduate student atJohns Hopkins University. She received the degree of Masters of Arts in 1926, and in1927 she was awarded the Doctor of Philosophy. Her principal advisor during her yearsat Johns Hopkins was Prof. David Moore Robinson, who also directed her work on herdissertation. In her dissertation she referred to many images of dolphins on ancient coins.She studied the collections of the American Numismatic Society in New York, and

Page 2
enjoyed the guidance and advice of the ANS’s curators, Edward T. Newell and Sydney P.Noe, as well as the assistance of Agnes Baldwin Brett. The dissertation, The Dolphin inthe Literature and Art of Greece and Rome, was published in 1929.While a graduate student at Johns Hopkins University Eunice Burr Stebbins met HerbertNewell Couch, a Canadian, and also a graduate student in Classics at Johns Hopkins.Similar to Eunice, he received the M.A. from Johns Hopkins in 1926 and the Ph.D. in1927. The two students fell in love and chose similar paths for the year following the endof their studies at Johns Hopkins. In early October, 1927, Eunice Stebbins applied formembership in the American School of Classical Studies at Athens. Her purpose, asstated in the application, was to gain “preparation for continued research in Greekarchaeology.” She was admitted as a School Fellow. A few months later, in January,1928, Herbert Couch likewise applied for membership in the American School in Athens.His stated purpose was the “furtherance of Greek studies for teaching same.” He wasadmitted as an Associate Member of the School, and joined Eunice in Athens.The year in Athens at the American School was both wonderful and disappointing forEunice. Her relationship with Herbert Couch flourished, quietly and discretely; but herhopes for deepening her studies in numismatics with the rich resources at the School werefrustrated. For her required “school paper” she was assigned the cataloguing of the coinsfrom the School’s excavations at Corinth in 1927. Her catalogue would be incorporatedin the definitive publication of the coins of Corinth under the direction of ProfessorBellinger. This was a much-desired opportunity for Eunice and she was delighted thatProfessor Carpenter, then Director of the School, had allowed that the coin cataloguecould stand as a School Paper.But her aspirations for work on the Corinth coins met with a conflict. Eunice hadreceived the Sophia Smith Fellowship from Smith College for continuing her studies atthe American School in Athens. Writing in December, 1927 to the Committee onFellowships of Smith College, she asked that the proposed catalogue she would write forthe 1927 excavation coins at Corinth be accepted as the original piece of work requiredby the conditions of the fellowship. If this was not acceptable to the committee, sheoffered to pursue a topic in epigraphy suggested by Prof. Meritt. It seems that the SmithCollege Committee on Fellowships turned down her request to present her numismaticwork, and instead she worked on the epigraphy project. Under the heading of TheAmerican School of Classical Studies at Athens, her paper titled, “An Interpretation ofthe Prescript πολες αυται φορον ταχσαµεναι in the Athenian Tribute Lists,” waspublished in AJA vol. 33, no.4 (Oct.-Dec. 1929), 502-514. When the Corinth excavationcoins were later published in 1935 there was no mention of Eunice Stebbins Couch as acontributor to the study or the catalogue.Eunice Stebbins and Herbert Couch completed their studies in Athens in 1928. Theyannounced their engagement at the School’s Final Dinner at the end of the spring term,1928. On May 12, 1928 they were married in a ceremony performed at the BritishConsulate in Salonika, Greece.

Page 3
From when she left Greece in 1928 Eunice Stebbins Couch would follow her husband’scareer, first to the University of Illinois at Urbana (1928-1930), and then to BrownUniversity, Providence, Rhode Island in 1930. He was a Professor in the Department ofClassics at Brown for the remainder of his life. He was named David Benedict Professorof Classics in 1949, and served as Chairman of the Department from 1948 until his earlydeath from a heart attack in 1959. Eunice Couch continued to live in Providence until herdeath at age 98 in July, 1992.Since leaving Athens Eunice Stebbins Couch no longer held formal ties to academia, yetshe continued to pursue her passion for numismatics. At one point in her studies Euniceencountered the scholarly contributions in Greek numismatics of Charles T. Seltman,Lecturer in Classics in the University of Cambridge. Eunice and her husband were inCambridge during the summer of 1928, and perhaps it was during that period that theirlong friendship with Charles Seltman began. She later claimed his influence in leadingher to undertake the study of the coinage of Argos. Charles Seltman would become thegodfather of Eunice and Herbert’s daughter, Eunice.Eunice began her study of the coinage of Argos in 1928. Her research led her to makecasts from coins in private and public collections from the United States and Europe. Inan interview published in The Evening Bulletin, Providence, March 13, 1935, shedescribed how she made her study through plaster casts poured into sealing waximpressions of coins. Then she would photograph the plasters and form a card file thatwould become the catalogue. It was a multi-step process but she delighted in the tediouswork. Her husband helped her by making sturdy standard coin trays to contain thecollection of fragile plasters.Her goal was that her study would be published and available to future scholars. In the1935 interview she suggests that her Argos study would be published by the AmericanNumismatic Society (ANS) in a two-volume edition. She expected that it would be readyfor publication in three years. Sadly, that proposal was never executed, nor was her studyever published later elsewhere. Today, her precious collection of die-casts hasdisappeared, along with her meticulous notes and the die-study to the extent that she hadcompleted it.Eunice Burr Stebbins Couch was happy as a devoted wife who shared a commonscholarly calling with her husband, happy as the mother of their daughter, and happy toencourage future woman scholars, especially women who pursued studies innumismatics. She was unrelenting in her encouragement, even to this author, to “finishthe dissertation,” and “make sure the dissertation is published.” Eunice accomplishedboth at an early time for women’s contributions to be recognized and she wanted nothingless for women scholars who succeeded her. One understands her sadness anddisappointment that her most cherished labor, the study of the coins of Argos, was notrecognized and not published.

Page 4
Eunice Couch was a member of the American Numismatic Society for 65 years. She waselected to membership in 1927; and in July, 1992, only two weeks before her death, shewas elected an Honorary Member, in recognition of her long membership.In keeping with her long commitment to the study of classics and classical archaeology atBrown University, and honoring her long friendship with Professor R. Ross Holloway,Elisha Benjamin Andrews Professor and Professor of Central MediterraneanArchaeology at Brown University, Eunice Stebbins Couch donated her personalcollection of ancient coins to the Center for Old World Archaeology and Art at BrownUniversity. The collection is housed at the Center. In 1999 Professor Holloway publisheda study of the Argos coins from Eunice’s gift2.________________________________________________Sources:Couch, Eunice Burr, “An Interpretation of the Prescript πολες αυται φορονταχσαµεναι in the Athenian Tribute Lists,” The American School of ClassicalStudies at Athens, AJA vol. 33, no.4 (Oct.-Dec. 1929), 502-514.“Eunice B. Couch,” obituary, Providence Journal, August 2, 1992.Holloway, R. Ross, “A Group of Argive Coins at Brown University, in Pour Denyse,Divertissements Numismatiques, ed. Silvia Mani Hurter et Carmen Arnold-Biucchi, Bern, 2000, 75-86, pls. 9 & 10.Mitchell, Martha, “Herbert Newell Couch,” in Encyclopedia Brunoniana, Providence,Rhode Island, 1993, 166.“Mrs. Herbert N. Couch (65 years)” in Newsletter, American Numismatic Society,Summer 1992, p.2.“A Numismatist at Work on Greek Coins,” The Evening Bulletin, Providence, RhodeIsland, Wednesday, March 13, 1935.Stebbins, Eunice Burr, The Dolphin in the Literature and Art of Greece and Rome,Menasha, Wisconsin, 1929.1With thanks to Sebastian Heath, American Numismatic Society, New York; ProfessorR. Ross Holloway, Center for Old World Archaeology and Art, Brown University,Providence, Rhode Island; Barbara Lesko, Department of Egyptology, Brown University,Providence, Rhode Island; Anne Lozier, Archivist, Sophia Smith Collection, SmithCollege Archives, Smith College, Northampton, Massachusetts; Dr. Natalia Vogiekoff-Brogan, Archivist, American School of Classical Studies at Athens, Greece.

Page 5
And with special thanks to Eunice Couch Claflin who shared her treasury of memories ofher mother.2R. Ross Holloway, “A Group of Argive Coins at Brown University,” in Pour Denyse,Diverstissements Numismatiques, ed. Silvia Mani Hurter et Carmen Arnold-Biucchi,Bern, 2000, 75-86, pls. 9 & 10.
3. obit ^Top

Date Accessed: 25 Sep. 2007
Title: Formatted Document
URL: http://proquest.umi.com/pqdweb?index=4&did=81931830&SrchMode=1&sid=6&Fmt=10&VInst=PROD&VType=PQD&RQT=309&VName=HNP&TS=1190779416&clientId=15935

Bibliography ^ Top

Ancestry.com - 1930 United States Federal Census. 25 Sep. 2007 <http://content.ancestry.com/iexec/?htx=View&r=an&dbid=6224&iid=ILT626_410-0774&fn=Herbert+M&ln=Couch&st=r&ssrc=&pid=83401634>.
Eunice Burr Stebbins (Couch) 1893-1992 Eunice Couch (née Stebbins) was passionate about the Classics, and especially passionat. 25 Sep. 2007 <http://64.233.167.104/search?q=cache:Ri3Sbe3Qc1UJ:www.brown.edu/Research/Breaking_Ground/bios/Couch_Eunice%2520Burr%2520Stebbins.pdf+%22herbert+n.couch%22+obit&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=1&gl=us>.
Formatted Document. 25 Sep. 2007 <http://proquest.umi.com/pqdweb?index=4&did=81931830&SrchMode=1&sid=6&Fmt=10&VInst=PROD&VType=PQD&RQT=309&VName=HNP&TS=1190779416&clientId=15935>.