CHICAGO
Mortimer J. Adler, the high school dropout who became a philosopher at 15
and revolutionized American thought by insisting that reading the Great
Books was the key to understanding the human condition, died Thursday in
his San Mateo, Calif., home.
He was 98 and died of natural causes, said his son, Philip
Adler.
From the time Mr. Adler and University of Chicago President Robert
Hutchins, his intellectual comrade, created the Great Books program in
1946, Adler's name has been essential to conversation about American
thought.
He organized what would become the Aspen Institute for the Humanities
in the early 1950s and wrote more than 100 publications, including his
seminal 1940 work, How to Read a Book.
Along with educator John Dewey, Adler was hailed by America Magazine
editor John W. Donohue as one of ``the two most widely known American
practitioners of philosophy.'' He is credited with popularizing the study
of both literature and philosophy in his lifetime.
As the longtime chairman of the board of editors at Encyclopaedia
Britannica, he oversaw that publication's content overhaul in the 1970s
and organized all of human knowledge into a single 1,000-page volume
called the Propaedia, said Aspen Institute President Elmer Johnson.
``He was so convinced by the power of idea and ideals, that it was
essential to remember the legacy of ideals in Western civilization,''
Johnson said. ``There is a tremendous need in an age of specialization for
people to have their minds and hearts opened and engaged. This was a man
determined to open up the minds of people. He was very passionate.''
Mortimer Jerome Adler may also have been the only person in the United
States to have earned a Ph.D. without having a master's degree, a
bachelor's degree or a high school diploma.
Born in New York City, he was a voracious reader from a young age. He
attended Columbia University on a scholarship even after dropping out of
high school, and he finished his undergraduate work in three years.
Nevertheless, he did not receive his bachelor's degree until 1983, when
Columbia dropped its requirement that undergraduates pass a swimming test.
Adler had refused long ago to take the test on principle and was given an
honorary master's degree so he could teach psychology classes anyway.
He received his Ph.D. in 1928, the year after his marriage to Helen
Boyton. They divorced in 1961, after having two children.
