Sir Michael Ernest Sadler (3 July 1861 – 14 October 1943) was an English historian, educationalist and university administrator. He worked at

Victoria University of Manchester The Victoria University of Manchester, usually referred to as simply the University of Manchester, was a university in Manchester, England. It was founded in 1851 as Owens College. In 1880, the college joined the federal Victoria University. A ...

and was the vice-chancellor of the

University of Leeds The University of Leeds is a public research university in Leeds, West Yorkshire, England. It was established in 1874 as the Yorkshire College of Science. In 1884, it merged with the Leeds School of Medicine (established 1831) and was renamed Y ...

. He was also a champion of the English public school system.

Early life and education

Michael Ernest Sadler, born into a radical home in 1861 at

Barnsley Barnsley () is a market town in South Yorkshire, England. It is the main settlement of the Metropolitan Borough of Barnsley and the fourth largest settlement in South Yorkshire. The town's population was 71,422 in 2021, while the wider boroug ...

in the industrial north of England, died in

Oxford Oxford () is a City status in the United Kingdom, cathedral city and non-metropolitan district in Oxfordshire, England, of which it is the county town. The city is home to the University of Oxford, the List of oldest universities in continuou ...

in 1943.A detailed biography from UNESCO
accessed July 2007. His early youth was coloured by the fact that one of his forebears, Michael Thomas Sadler, was among the pioneers of the

Factory Acts The Factory Acts were a series of acts passed by the Parliament of the United Kingdom beginning in 1802 to regulate and improve the conditions of industrial employment. The early acts concentrated on regulating the hours of work and moral wel ...

. His early memories were full of associations with leaders of the working-class movement in the north of England. Remembering these pioneers, Sadler recorded: "I can see how much religion deepened their insight and steadied their judgement, and saved them from coarse materialism in their judgement of economic values. This common heritage was a bond of social union. A social tradition is the matrix of education."J. H. Higginson, ed., ''Selections from Michael Sadler'', p. 11. Liverpool: Dejall & Meyorre, 1980. The article ''In the Days of My Youth'' is reproduced in full. Sadler's schooling was typical of his times. It gave him a diverse background, which was reflected throughout his life in his interpretation of the process and content of education. When he was 10 years old, he was sent to a private boarding school at

Winchester Winchester (, ) is a City status in the United Kingdom, cathedral city in Hampshire, England. The city lies at the heart of the wider City of Winchester, a local government Districts of England, district, at the western end of the South Downs N ...

, where the atmosphere was markedly conservative. Sadler recalls:

Think of the effect on my mind of being swung from the Radical West Riding... where I never heard the Conservative point of view properly put, to where I was thrown into an entirely new atmosphere in which the old Conservative and Anglican traditions were still strong.

From this preparatory school he moved to Rugby in the

English Midlands The Midlands is the central region of England, to the south of Northern England, to the north of southern England, to the east of Wales, and to the west of the North Sea. The Midlands comprises the ceremonial counties of Derbyshire, Herefordshi ...

, where he spent his adolescence in an atmosphere entirely different from that of the Winchester school. His masters were enthusiastic upholders of

Oliver Cromwell Oliver Cromwell (25 April 15993 September 1658) was an English statesman, politician and soldier, widely regarded as one of the most important figures in British history. He came to prominence during the Wars of the Three Kingdoms, initially ...

and the Puritan Revolution. The young Sadler soon found himself in critical revolt against the Cavalier and Anglican traditions. He went to

Trinity College, Oxford Trinity College (full name: The College of the Holy and Undivided Trinity in the University of Oxford, of the foundation of Sir Thomas Pope (Knight)) is a Colleges of the University of Oxford, constituent college of the University of Oxford in E ...

in 1880. There he soon came under the spell of leading historians such as

T. H. Green Thomas Hill Green (7 April 183626 March 1882), known as T. H. Green, was an English philosopher, political Radicalism (historical), radical and Temperance movement, temperance reformer, and a member of the British idealism movement. Like ...

and Arnold Toynbee, but it was

John Ruskin John Ruskin (8 February 1819 20 January 1900) was an English polymath a writer, lecturer, art historian, art critic, draughtsman and philanthropist of the Victorian era. He wrote on subjects as varied as art, architecture, Critique of politic ...

who overwhelmed him as an undergraduate. Sadler has left on record how, in his second year at Trinity, a short course of lectures by Ruskin was announced, to be given in the

Oxford University Museum The Oxford University Museum of Natural History (OUMNH) is a museum displaying many of the University of Oxford's natural history specimens, located on Parks Road in Oxford, England. It also contains a lecture theatre which is used by the univers ...

. Tickets were hard to get because of the popularity of the speaker. After a warm description of Ruskin's picturesque appearance, Sadler expresses a favourite conviction:

Nominally these lectures of Ruskin's were upon Art. Really they dealt with the economic and spiritual problems of English national life. He believed, and he made us believe, that every lasting influence in an educational system requires an economic structure of society in harmony with its ethical ideal.

That belief persisted to the end of Sadler's life and is recurrent in his many analyses of foreign systems of education. When, in July 1882, the examinations lists were issued, Sadler had gained a first-class degree in Literae Humaniores. A month earlier he had become president elect of the

Oxford Union The Oxford Union Society, commonly referred to as the Oxford Union, is a debating society in the city of Oxford, England, whose membership is drawn primarily from the University of Oxford. Founded in 1823, it is one of Britain's oldest unive ...

, a field of public debating experience that has produced many English politicians.

Career

In 1885, he was elected secretary of Oxford's Extensions Lectures Sub-Committee, providing outreach lectures. He was a "student" (the equivalent of a

fellow A fellow is a title and form of address for distinguished, learned, or skilled individuals in academia, medicine, research, and industry. The exact meaning of the term differs in each field. In learned society, learned or professional society, p ...

) at

Christ Church, Oxford Christ Church (, the temple or house, ''wikt:aedes, ædes'', of Christ, and thus sometimes known as "The House") is a Colleges of the University of Oxford, constituent college of the University of Oxford in England. Founded in 1546 by Henry V ...

from 1890 to 1895. In 1895, he was appointed to a government post as director of the Office of Special Inquiries and Reports, resigning from the board of education in 1903. A special professorship in history and administration of education was created for him at the

University of Manchester The University of Manchester is a public university, public research university in Manchester, England. The main campus is south of Manchester city centre, Manchester City Centre on Wilmslow Road, Oxford Road. The University of Manchester is c ...

, where he was impressed by the work of the educational theorist Catherine Isabella Dodd and her experimental school. He became

vice-chancellor A vice-chancellor (commonly called a VC) serves as the chief executive of a university in the United Kingdom, New Zealand, Australia, Nepal, India, Bangladesh, Malaysia, Nigeria, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, South Africa, Kenya, other Commonwealth of Nati ...

of the

in 1911, where he now has a building named after him, and returned to Oxford in 1923 as master of

University College, Oxford University College, formally The Master and Fellows of the College of the Great Hall of the University commonly called University College in the University of Oxford and colloquially referred to as "Univ", is a Colleges of the University of Oxf ...

. There he continued to influence national educational policy and promote the work of various modernist artists.

Leeds Arts Club

Whilst in Leeds, Sadler became president of the avant-garde

modernist Modernism was an early 20th-century movement in literature, visual arts, and music that emphasized experimentation, abstraction, and Subjectivity and objectivity (philosophy), subjective experience. Philosophy, politics, architecture, and soc ...

cultural group the Leeds Arts Club. Founded in 1903 by Alfred Orage, the Leeds Arts Club was an important meeting ground for radical artists, thinkers, educationalists and writers in Britain, and had strong leanings to the cultural, political and theoretical ideas coming out of Germany at this time.Tom Steele, ''Alfred Orage and the Leeds Arts Club 1893–1923'' (Mitcham, Orage Press, 2009) 218 ff. Using his personal links with

Wassily Kandinsky Wassily Wassilyevich Kandinsky ( – 13 December 1944) was a Russian painter and art theorist. Kandinsky is generally credited as one of the pioneers of abstract art, abstraction in western art. Born in Moscow, he spent his childhood in ...

in Munich, Sadler built up a remarkable collection of expressionist and

abstract expressionist Abstract expressionism in the United States emerged as a distinct art movement in the aftermath of World War II and gained mainstream acceptance in the 1950s, a shift from the American social realism of the 1930s influenced by the Great Depressi ...

art at a time when such art was either unknown or dismissed in London, even by well-known promoters of modernism such as

Roger Fry Roger Eliot Fry (14 December 1866 – 9 September 1934) was an English painter and art critic, critic, and a member of the Bloomsbury Group. Establishing his reputation as a scholar of the Old Masters, he became an advocate of more recent ...

. Most notable in his collection was Kandinsky's abstract painting ''Fragment for Composition VII'', of 1912, a painting that was in Leeds and on display at the Leeds Arts Club in 1913. Sadler also owned

Paul Gauguin Eugène Henri Paul Gauguin (; ; 7 June 1848 – 8 May 1903) was a French painter, sculptor, printmaker, ceramist, and writer, whose work has been primarily associated with the Post-Impressionist and Symbolist movements. He was also an influ ...

's celebrated painting "The Vision After the Sermon", and according to

Patrick Heron Patrick Heron (30 January 1920 – 20 March 1999) was a British abstract and figurative artist, critic, writer, and polemicist, who lived in Zennor, Cornwall. Heron was recognised as one of the leading painters of his generation. Influenced ...

, Sadler even had Kandinsky visit Leeds before the First World War, although this claim is uncorroborated by other sources. With

Frank Rutter Francis Vane Phipson Rutter (17 February 1876 – 18 April 1937)"Rutter, Frank V. P.", ''Who Was Who'', A & C Black, 1920–2007; online edn, Oxford University Press, Dec 2007. Retrieved froukwhoswho8 August 2008. was a British art art critic, c ...

, Sadler also co-founded the Leeds Art Collections Fund to help Leeds City Art Gallery. In particular the aim of the Fund was to bypass the financial restraints placed on the gallery by the municipal authorities in Leeds, who had, in the opinion of Sadler, a dislike of modern art.

The Sadler Commission

In 1917 to 1919, Sadler led the "Sadler Commission" which looked at the state of Indian Education.Sir Michael Ernest Sadler at Britannica.com
J. H. Higginson accessed July 2007 Towards the end of the

First World War World War I or the First World War (28 July 1914 – 11 November 1918), also known as the Great War, was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War I, Allies (or Entente) and the Central Powers. Fighting to ...

, the Secretary of State for

India India, officially the Republic of India, is a country in South Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by area, seventh-largest country by area; the List of countries by population (United Nations), most populous country since ...

Austen Chamberlain Sir Joseph Austen Chamberlain (16 October 1863 – 16 March 1937) was a British statesman, son of Joseph Chamberlain and older half-brother of Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain. He served as a Member of Parliament (United Kingdom), Member of ...

, invited Sadler to accept the chairmanship of a commission the government proposed to appoint to inquire into the affairs of the

University of Calcutta The University of Calcutta, informally known as Calcutta University (), is a Public university, public State university (India), state university located in Kolkata, Calcutta (Kolkata), West Bengal, India. It has 151 affiliated undergraduate c ...

. Chamberlain wrote: " Lord Chelmsford he Viceroyinforms me that they hope for the solution of the big political problems of India through the solution of the educational problems." After some hesitation, Sadler accepted the invitation. Under his direction the Commission far exceeded its initial terms of reference. The result was 13 volumes issued in 1919, providing a comprehensive sociological account of the context in which

Mahatma Gandhi Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi (2October 186930January 1948) was an Indian lawyer, anti-colonial nationalism, anti-colonial nationalist, and political ethics, political ethicist who employed nonviolent resistance to lead the successful Indian ...

was campaigning for the end of the British Raj and the independence of India. The lines of inquiry pursued make it possible to deduce a concept of expanding higher education that goes far beyond the traditional university image in its search to relate higher education to the 20th century, along with its increasing availability of educational opportunities to women. Sir

Ashutosh Mukherjee Sir Ashutosh Mukherjee (anglicised, originally Asutosh Mukhopadhyay, also anglicised to Asutosh Mookerjee) (29 June 1864 – 25 May 1924) was a Bengali mathematician, lawyer, jurist, judge, educator, and institution builder. A unique figure i ...

, known as the Tiger of Bengal, was a member of that commission. Before the publication of the

Calcutta University The University of Calcutta, informally known as Calcutta University (), is a Public university, public State university (India), state university located in Kolkata, Calcutta (Kolkata), West Bengal, India. It has 151 affiliated undergraduate c ...

Report, Sadler delivered a private address to the Senate of the

University of Bombay University of Mumbai is a public university, public List of largest universities and university networks by enrollment, state university in Mumbai. It is one of the List of largest universities and university networks by enrollment, largest univ ...

. He put forward his personal conclusions as he surveyed The Educational Movement in India and Britain. It was characteristic of Sadler's belief in the inter-relationship of all the various levels of education and the importance of teacher training. He warned his listeners about producing an academic proletariat with job expectations that could not be fulfilled. And finally he told the members of the Senate:

And in India you stand on the verge of the most hazardous and inevitable of adventures—the planning of primary education for the unlettered millions of a hundred various races. I doubt whether the European model will fit Indian conditions. If you want social dynamite, modern elementary education of the customary kind will give it to you. It is the agency that will put the masses in motion. But to what end or issue no one can foretell.

Honours

Sadler received the

honorary degree An honorary degree is an academic degree for which a university (or other degree-awarding institution) has waived all of the usual requirements. It is also known by the Latin phrases ''honoris causa'' ("for the sake of the honour") or '' ad hon ...

LL.D. from

Columbia University Columbia University in the City of New York, commonly referred to as Columbia University, is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in New York City. Established in 1754 as King's College on the grounds of Trinity Churc ...

in June 1902. He was awarded CB in the 1911 Coronation Honours. In 1919, Sadler was appointed a

Knight Commander Knight Commander (or Dame Commander) is the second most senior grade of seven British orders of chivalry, three of which are dormant (and one of them continues as a German house order). The rank entails admission into knighthood, allowing the rec ...

of the

Order of the Star of India The Most Exalted Order of the Star of India is an order of chivalry founded by Queen Victoria in 1861. The Order includes members of three classes: # Knight Grand Commander ( GCSI) # Knight Commander ( KCSI) # Companion ( CSI) No appointments ...

(KCSI).

Later life

From 1923 to 1934, Sadler served as Master of

. He collected paintings and encouraged artists.

Personal life

Second marriage to Eva Gilpin in 1934 Sadler married Mary Ann Harvey Sadler, "a wealthy Yorkshire heiress", in 1885. Mary, born in 1852, was the daughter of a linen manufacturer with a warehouse in

. She was his hostess at their house in

Headingley Headingley is a suburb of Leeds, West Yorkshire, England, approximately two miles out of the city centre, to the north west along the A660 road. Headingley is the location of the Beckett Park campus of Leeds Beckett University and Headingley ...

Leeds Leeds is a city in West Yorkshire, England. It is the largest settlement in Yorkshire and the administrative centre of the City of Leeds Metropolitan Borough, which is the second most populous district in the United Kingdom. It is built aro ...

, called Buckingham House, where Sadler's

Impressionist Impressionism was a 19th-century art movement characterized by visible brush strokes, open Composition (visual arts), composition, emphasis on accurate depiction of light in its changing qualities (often accentuating the effects of the passage ...

and Post-Impressionist paintings were displayed in a picture gallery, receiving many cultural figures like

and emerging artists like

Henry Moore Henry Spencer Moore (30 July 1898 – 31 August 1986) was an English artist. He is best known for his semi-abstract art, abstract monumental Bronze sculpture, bronze sculptures which are located around the world as public works of art. Moore ...

and Jacob Kramer. Mary died in 1931 and left a legacy to the Oxford Preservation Trust. Their only child was

Michael Sadleir Michael Sadleir (25 December 1888 – 13 December 1957), born Michael Thomas Harvey Sadler, was a British publisher, novelist, book collector, and Bibliography, bibliographer. Biography Michael Sadleir was born in Oxford, Oxford, England, the ...

(1888–1957), a British publisher, novelist, book collector and bibliographer. In 1934 Sadler married Eva Margaret Gilpin (1868-1940), headmistress of Hall School,

Weybridge Weybridge () is a town in the Borough of Elmbridge, Elmbridge district in Surrey, England, around southwest of central London. The settlement is recorded as ''Waigebrugge'' and ''Weibrugge'' in the 7th century and the name derives from a cro ...

Surrey Surrey () is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in South East England. It is bordered by Greater London to the northeast, Kent to the east, East Sussex, East and West Sussex to the south, and Hampshire and Berkshire to the wes ...

, who had been the governess of his son, Michael Sadleir. Gilpin retired from the school leaving it to her niece. The two of them spent five years touring and enjoying retirement.

Sources

*The text here calls freely on the text published by UNESCO below, which "may be reproduced free of charge as long as acknowledgement is made of the source."

References

External links

A detailed biography from UNESCO
*Archival material at {{DEFAULTSORT:Sadler, Michael 1861 births 1943 deaths People from Barnsley People educated at Rugby School Alumni of Trinity College, Oxford Presidents of the Oxford Union 19th-century English historians Fellows of Christ Church, Oxford Vice-chancellors of the University of Leeds Academics of the University of Manchester Masters of University College, Oxford Knights Commander of the Order of the Star of India Companions of the Order of the Bath Civil servants in the Department of Education (United Kingdom)

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