Edward C. Carter Collection

Edward C. Carter was born in Lawrence, Massachusetts on June 9, 1878. He was educated at Lawrence and Phillips Academy in Andover, Massachusetts, received an A.B. degree from Harvard University in 1900, and carried on graduate work there until 1902. He was married to Alice Olin Draper on August 5, 1908, and raised four children: William Draper, Edward Clark, John Alden and Ruth Dana. During his long career of service, Carter was secretary of the Y.M.C.A. in India from 1902-1908 and 1911-191?, secretary of the North American Student Movement (1908-1911), secretary of the Paris Y.M.C.A. (A.E.F.) and the London Y.M.C.A. from 1917-1919 and 1920-1922 consecutively. In 1922 he became secretary of The Inquiry, a publication on world affairs, and remained with the publication, serving as its chairman from 1930, for eleven years.

Carter's reputation as an educator and a scholar, however, reached its peak during the years he spent with The Institute of Pacific Relations, an organization formed to increase and spread knowledge of the Eastern hemisphere in the West. Carter was secretary of the I.P.R. from 1926 to 1933, secretary general from 1933 to 1946 and executive vice-chairman from 1946 to 1948. He retired from the I.P.R. in 1948 to take the position of Provost of The New School for Social Research in New York City, and in 1950 he became Director of the school's division of International Studies. It was during his years at The New School that the McCarran Committee was formed to investigate the affairs of the I.P.R. as part of a general probe of the Department of State being conducted by Senator Joseph McCarthy. Carter came to the aid of the I.P.R. by preparing massive statements and briefs describing the beneficial work done by the non-partisan organization, but became implicated himself in the committee's hunt for communists.

Carter's other activities include: The Russian War Relief Fund, chairman (1941-1945), United States Service to China, director, (1948), United Nations Economic Commission for Asia and the Far East, consultant (1948) and a member of the United China Relief. He was a Decorated Officer of The Order of the British Empire, Officer of the French Legion of Honor, received into the Order of the Crown of Siam and the Order of the Red Banner of Labor (U.S.S.R.). He died on November 9, 1954.