David Prescott Barrows

David Prescott Barrows (June 27, 1873 – September 5, 1954) was an American anthropologist, explorer, military officer, and educator. Born in Chicago in 1874, his family moved to California. He showed a keen interest in the life and customs of Native Americans, and was said to have "spent almost every summer during the period 1890–1899 in research work among the tribes of southern California and in the Colorado Desert."

Early years Barrows graduated from Pomona College in 1894, where he served as the founding editor of its newspaper, The Student Life. He then obtained a Master's degree in political science from the University of California, Berkeley, in 1895. During the summers between 1890 and 1899 he pursued research with the tribes of southern California and the Colorado Desert, and wrote a thesis on "the Ethno-Botany of the Coahuilla Indians of Southern California" which earned a doctoral degree in anthropology from the University of Chicago in 1897.

Career

Barrows taught history in the state normal school in San Diego. In 1900, he was appointed superintendent of schools for Manila by William Howard Taft, president of the Philippine Commission. His career in the Philippines was eventful as he was designated Chief of the Bureau of Non-Christian Tribes of the Philippine Islands, and reconnoitered many unknown areas of the Philippines. In 1903, as general superintendent of education for the Islands, he was instrumental in the total reorganization of the educational system. He traveled for one year to Africa, including visits to Timbuktu and Sudan. He returned from Africa in 1924 and held the post of chairman of the department of political science. He continued to teach till he retired in 1943. He wrote many syndicated articles for journals, newspapers, and The World in Review, participated in radio talks, and also wrote many books on his experiences in Philippines and Africa.

Barrows died at the age of 81 on September 5, 1954. On November 18, 2020, the university announced that his name would be removed from the building, publishing a press release that characterized him as a racist colonizer.