Elgin Ralston Lovell Gould (1860–1915) was a Canadian social scientist, educator, and

lacrosse Lacrosse is a team sport played with a lacrosse stick and a lacrosse ball. It is the oldest organized sport in North America, with its origins with the indigenous people of North America as early as the 12th century. The game was extensively ...

coach. In 1883, he served as the first head coach of the lacrosse team at

Johns Hopkins University Johns Hopkins University (Johns Hopkins, Hopkins, or JHU) is a private university, private research university in Baltimore, Maryland. Founded in 1876, Johns Hopkins is the oldest research university in the United States and in the western hem ...

Early life and college

Gould was born in

Ottawa, Ontario Ottawa (, ; Canadian French: ) is the capital city of Canada. It is located at the confluence of the Ottawa River and the Rideau River in the southern portion of the province of Ontario. Ottawa borders Gatineau, Quebec, and forms the core ...

on August 15, 1860.''The Johns Hopkins Alumni Magazine: Published in the Interest of the University and the Alumni, Volume 4''
p. 82, The Johns Hopkins Alumni Association, 1915. He attended college at the

University of Toronto The University of Toronto (UToronto or U of T) is a public research university in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, located on the grounds that surround Queen's Park. It was founded by royal charter in 1827 as King's College, the first institution ...

and received a

Bachelor of Arts Bachelor of arts (BA or AB; from the Latin ', ', or ') is a bachelor's degree awarded for an undergraduate program in the arts, or, in some cases, other disciplines. A Bachelor of Arts degree course is generally completed in three or four years ...

degree in 1881. The following year, he emigrated to the United States and attended

Baltimore Baltimore ( , locally: or ) is the List of municipalities in Maryland, most populous city in the U.S. state of Maryland, fourth most populous city in the Mid-Atlantic (United States), Mid-Atlantic, and List of United States cities by popula ...

. From 1882 to 1884, he held a Fellowship in the history and political science departments under

Herbert Baxter Adams Herbert Baxter Adams (April 16, 1850 – July 30, 1901) was an American educator and historian who brought German rigor to the study of history in America; a founding member of the American History Association; and one of the earliest ed ...

. He also played a role in increasing the importance of

at Johns Hopkins. In 1883, Gould coached the first official lacrosse Johns Hopkins lacrosse team. That inaugural season consisted of one game, in which Hopkins lost to the Druid Lacrosse Club, 4–0, on May 11. Gould also played on the first Johns Hopkins football team. Gould befriended future President

Woodrow Wilson Thomas Woodrow Wilson (December 28, 1856February 3, 1924) was an American politician and academic who served as the 28th president of the United States from 1913 to 1921. A member of the Democratic Party, Wilson served as the president of ...

while attending the university.

Professional career

He spent some time working as an assistant to statistician

Carroll D. Wright Carroll Davidson Wright (July 25, 1840 – February 20, 1909) was an American statistician. Wright is best known for his title as the first U.S. Commissioner of Labor, serving in that capacity from 1885 to 1905. Biography Wright was born at Du ...

at the

Department of Labor The Ministry of Labour ('' UK''), or Labor ('' US''), also known as the Department of Labour, or Labor, is a government department responsible for setting labour standards, labour dispute mechanisms, employment, workforce participation, training, a ...

Washington, D.C. ) , image_skyline = , image_caption = Clockwise from top left: the Washington Monument and Lincoln Memorial on the National Mall, United States Capitol, Logan Circle, Jefferson Memorial, White House, Adams Morgan, ...

Gould received his

Ph.D. A Doctor of Philosophy (PhD, Ph.D., or DPhil; Latin: or ') is the most common degree at the highest academic level awarded following a course of study. PhDs are awarded for programs across the whole breadth of academic fields. Because it is a ...

from Johns Hopkins in 1886. He married Mary Hurst née Purnell of Baltimore in 1887, and they had six children, two of whom died in infancy. One of their sons, Erl Clinton Barker Gould, was an original member of the

First Yale Unit The First Yale Unit was started by then Yale sophomore F. Trubee Davison in 1915. The First Yale Unit is considered to be the first naval air reserve unit. Davison and 11 other Yale students were fascinated with the possibilities of aviation in g ...

prior to

World War I World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...

.Puck Purnell
Erl Clinton Barker Gould
The Millionaires' Unit Documentary Film, retrieved July 14, 2010. Gould was then employed by the

Bureau of Labor Statistics The Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) is a unit of the United States Department of Labor. It is the principal fact-finding agency for the U.S. government in the broad field of labor economics and statistics and serves as a principal agency of t ...

, which sent him to Europe to study living conditions of laborers. In 1892, he returned to Johns Hopkins University, and taught

social science Social science is one of the branches of science, devoted to the study of societies and the relationships among individuals within those societies. The term was formerly used to refer to the field of sociology, the original "science of soc ...

s there until 1897. Gould then taught as a professor at the

University of Chicago The University of Chicago (UChicago, Chicago, U of C, or UChi) is a private research university in Chicago, Illinois. Its main campus is located in Chicago's Hyde Park neighborhood. The University of Chicago is consistently ranked among the b ...

. He moved to

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...

where he was tasked with helping to address the city's congestion and poor housing conditions. Gould served as the city

chamberlain Chamberlain may refer to: Profession *Chamberlain (office), the officer in charge of managing the household of a sovereign or other noble figure People *Chamberlain (surname) **Houston Stewart Chamberlain (1855–1927), German-British philosop ...

under Mayor

Seth Low Seth Low (January 18, 1850 – September 17, 1916) was an American educator and political figure who served as the mayor of Brooklyn from 1881 to 1885, the president of Columbia University from 1890 to 1901, a diplomatic representative of t ...

. He was also a founder of the

Citizens Union Citizens Union is a New York City-based good government group founded in 1897 to combat the influences of the Tammany Hall political machine. J. Pierpont Morgan, Benjamin Altman, Elihu Root, and Carl Schurz numbered among its 165 founders. In 198 ...

, a government watchdog organization established to oppose the

Tammany Hall Tammany Hall, also known as the Society of St. Tammany, the Sons of St. Tammany, or the Columbian Order, was a New York City political organization founded in 1786 and incorporated on May 12, 1789 as the Tammany Society. It became the main loc ...

political machine In the politics of Representative democracy, representative democracies, a political machine is a party organization that recruits its members by the use of tangible incentives (such as money or political jobs) and that is characterized by a hig ...

. Gould's work often concerned city sanitation and living conditions. One source wrote that he was "a major proponent of the idea of philanthropic housing". He suggested that entrepreneurs build working-class housing outside of the cities, where commuters would travel by

streetcar A tram (called a streetcar or trolley in North America) is a rail vehicle that travels on tramway tracks on public urban streets; some include segments on segregated right-of-way. The tramlines or networks operated as public transport are ...

, an emerging form of transportation at the time. His goal was to reduce the congestion and crowding in the tenement neighborhoods.''Conceiving the future: Pronatalism, Reproduction, and the Family in the United States, 1890-1938''
p. 61, UNC Press, 2007, . He authored at least two books, ''The Social Condition of Labor'' in 1893, and the "influential 1895 volume", ''The Housing of the Working People''.Howard Gillette, Jr.
''Civitas by Design: Building Better Communities, from the Garden City to the New Urbanism''
p. 7, University of Pennsylvania Press, 2010, . Gould was killed in a horseback riding accident on August 18, 1915 in

Cartier, Ontario Cartier is a community in the Canadian province of Ontario, located in the Sudbury District approximately north of the northwestern city limits of Greater Sudbury along Highway 144. Geography A designated place administered by a local services ...

Published works

*
The Social Condition of Labor
' (1893) *
The Housing of the Working People
' (1895)

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Gould, Elgin 1860 births 1915 deaths Sportspeople from Ottawa University of Toronto alumni Johns Hopkins Blue Jays men's lacrosse coaches Johns Hopkins Blue Jays football players University of Chicago faculty Johns Hopkins University faculty Canadian players of American football Canadian educators Canadian social scientists