Minnie Mason Beebe

Mason was born in Pavilion, New York, the daughter of Wallace W. Mason^[2] and Mary Elizabeth Ward Mason. She graduated from Geneseo Normal School.^[3] She earned a bachelor's degree from Syracuse University in 1890, and a master's degree in 1893.^[4] She was a member of the Gamma Phi Beta sorority^[5] and the Phi Beta Kappa honor society. She earned a Ph.D. in history the University of Zurich in 1900, with a dissertation in German,^[6] and became a fluent French speaker during her time in Europe.^[7]

Beebe taught English literature at Wyoming Seminary in Pennsylvania from 1891 to 1898.^[1][8] From 1900 to 1937, she taught history and French at Syracuse University. At Syracuse she organized an interdenominational and co-educational Sunday school class, called Kolledj Klan, which lasted from 1907 to 1946.^[9] During World War I, she took a leave of absence and spent 14 months in France, using her language skills to work for the YMCA in Aix-les-Bains.^[10]

• A French Grammar for Schools and Colleges (1911)^[11]
• The American Soldiers’ Souvenir of Aix les Bains (1919)^[12]
• "William Howard Taft and Phi Kappa Phi" (1930)^[13]

Minnie Mason married pastor Theodore Orville Beebe in August 1890; he died about six months later, in February 1891.^[7] She died in 1955, at the age of 89, in Syracuse.^[10][14] A local newspaper paid tribute to her as "one of the nation's great teachers" and "a woman brimming with spirit and devotion to the cause of education."^[15] Her journals are in the Syracuse University Archives.^[16]