author
Walter Vrooman
b. 1869
An American reformer with big, restless ideas, he helped found Ruskin College in Oxford to widen access to education for working people. His life moved between activism, writing, and experiments in social change on both sides of the Atlantic.
1 Audiobook
The New Democracy: A handbook for Democratic speakers and workers
by Walter Vrooman
About the author
Born in Missouri in 1869, Walter Watkins Vrooman became known as a socialist educational reformer, writer, and organizer. He is best remembered for helping to found Ruskin College in Oxford in 1899 with Charles A. Beard, with the aim of creating serious educational opportunities for working-class students.
Vrooman's interests reached beyond the classroom. He wrote on politics and social questions, and his career reflected a larger belief that education should be tied to public life and reform. After his work in Oxford, he returned to the United States and established another Ruskin College in Trenton, Missouri.
Though his life was relatively short, ending in 1909, his name remains connected to an ambitious vision of education as a tool for democracy and social progress.