Elmer S. Newton

Western HS Teacher (1898-1915);

Principal (1915-1942)

Dr. Elmer S. Newton served 44 years at Western, 27 as principal and 17 as chemistry teacher. He died Saturday at Doctors Hospital after failing to rally from an illness that struck him in Miami, Fla. three weeks ago. He was 81.

Dr. Newton’s personality was as much a part of Western High School as its pillared portico. It was a waggish personality, dignified by his height, his white goatee and his understanding of students. The twinkle in his bespectacled eyes bespoke his sense of humor. His pride, Western’s Fourth Cadet Regiment, won a Washington competition shortly before Dr. Newton retired in 1942. The cadets told him they had done it for him. He kept his door open to pupils, always. After their graduation, he could remember where hundreds of them lived and where their parents worked.
His standard reply to a student query was, “The answer is no.” Then he’d invite the pupil into his office, sit down with him and thresh out the problem. Graduates insisted on receiving their diplomas from Dr. Newton personally, instead of from a Board of Education member, as is customary in public schools.

He came here in 1898 as chemistry teacher. Four years later, he headed both white and colored school chemistry departments. In 1915, he became principal. Before coming to Western, Dr. Newton taught chemistry at the University of Iowa. He was a graduate of Amherst, where Calvin Coolidge was one of his classmates, and earned a medical degree from George Washington University in 1905.

His wife was the late Edna Towne Newton, an English teacher at Western, who died in 1943.

Citation: Dr. newton; was principal at western. (1954/04/05/, 1954 Apr 05). The Washington Post and Times Herald (1954-1959) Retrieved from https://www.proquest.com/historical-newspapers/dr-newton-was-principal-at-western/docview/148556661/se-2