Edith Potter, emerita professor of German at Scripps College, died at her Claremont home on July 17. She was 79 years old.
Professor Potter was a member of the Scripps faculty from 1967 until her retirement in 1990 and remained an active member of the College community. A constant theme during her 23 years at Scripps, and in her retirement years, was the promotion of understanding among people of different cultures and languages, especially between Americans and Germans. She played a central role in shaping the German Program of the College, setting up and directing the Scripps Junior Year in Heidelberg Program in 1971, and establishing the German studies major in 1975. As a special tribute to her, in 1995 the College renamed the annual award to the most outstanding student majoring in German or German studies, the Edith Potter German Award.
"Professor Potter was an enthusiastic and gifted teacher," said Scripps President Nancy Y. Bekavac, "as well as a genuinely concerned advisor and friend to generations of students. Those of us who had the privilege to know her, greatly respected and admired her."
As an emerita professor, Edith Potter remained active as a good will ambassador; in 1996 she helped select six students from the Claremont Colleges for the Youth Bridge student exchange program between Berlin and her sister city, Los Angeles. She was frequently on campus to consult with faculty and staff and to participate in College events. She also continued her travels to Germany to promote awareness and support of Scripps’ German Program and related activities, and maintained a close relationship with the German Consulate. At the time of her death, she was vice president of the Los Angeles-Berlin Sister City Committee, a position she had held for several years.
In 1997, the president of the Federal Republic of Germany recognized Edith Potter for her many efforts by awarding her Federal Order of Merit for her ongoing efforts to promote understanding and good will between the American and German people.
Born in Berlin, Professor Potter received her B.A., M.A., and Ph.D. from the University of California at Los Angeles, where she taught from 1958 to 1961. She also served on the faculty of Sonoma State College and the NDEA Institute in Munich, Germany. A respected scholar of German literature, most notably Goethe’s Faust, Professor Potter was the author of numerous articles on German and comparative literature, as well as on cultural issues related to her native country.
Edith Potter’s belief in the need to promote intercultural understanding took its original impetus from her experiences in wartime and post-war Berlin. In a 1990 interview reported in the Scripps College Bulletin, Professor Potter said, "During the War, the Soviet occupation and then the blockade of Berlin, I experienced firsthand how futile and horrible and useless war is, and I learned how easy and dangerous it is to slide into cliches about other peoples."
Shortly after the war, Professor Potter met and later married a U.S. Army officer, Merle Potter, who was stationed in the American-occupied sector of Berlin. Merle Potter conceived the idea of establishing a series of German-American clubs to build bridges of understanding between Germans and Americans. Before he and Edith Potter left for the United States in 1949, he had founded 47 such clubs throughout West Germany. Professor Potter kept in touch with these clubs the rest of her life.
The last member of her family, Edith Potter leaves a wide circle of devoted friends in the United States and abroad. Scripps College will hold a memorial service in honor of her life and work during the College’s 1999 fall semester.