PACE, EDWARD ALOYSIUS

Educator, author; b. Starke, FL, July 3, 1861; d. Washington, D.C., April 26, 1938. As the son of George Edward and Margaret (Kelly) Pace, he was descended on his father's side from 17th-century English colonists in Virginia; his maternal grandfather was Owen Kelly, comptroller of ports of Halifax, Nova Scotia. He attended public school in Starke, and Duval High School, Jacksonville, before studying for the priesthood at St. Charles College, Ellicott City, MD (1876–80), and the North American College (with classes at the Propaganda University), Rome, where he was ordained on May 30, 1885.

After being awarded the S.T.D. degree in 1886, he returned to the Diocese of St. Augustine, FL, and served for two years as rector of the cathedral and chancellor. In 1888, following his selection for the faculty of the projected Catholic University of America, Washington, D.C., he returned to Europe for graduate studies in psychology. After a year at Louvain and Paris, he transferred to Leipzig, where he studied under Wilhelm Wundt, and received the Ph.D. magna cum laude in 1891. Thereafter he served at the Catholic University of America as professor of psychology (1891–94) and of philosophy (1894–1935), dean of the School of Philosophy (1895–99, 1906–14, 1934–35), general secretary (1917–25), vice rector (1925–36), and founder (1899) and first director of the Institute of Pedagogy, which developed into the department of education. In 1936 he was named vice rector emeritus and professor of philosophy emeritus. The psychological laboratory that he established in 1891 was the second in America and the first in a Catholic university. As an editor of the Catholic Encyclopedia (1907–14), Pace took a leading part in planning and bringing it to a successful conclusion. At the international Congress of Arts and Sciences held in St. Louis, MO, in 1904, Pace served as chairman of the section of experimental psychology. He became first editor of Studies in Psychology and Psychiatry (1926), and with Thomas Edward Shields he founded and edited the Catholic Educational Review (1911). He was founder and first president of the American Catholic Philosophical Association, which was established at the Catholic University of America in 1926, and with James Hugh ryan he first edited its journal, New Scholasticism. In 1925 he was elected president of the American Council on Education and in 1929 was appointed by President Herbert Hoover to the National Advisory Committee on Education. He received the medal Pro Ecclesia et Pontifice (1914), was named a prothonotary apostolic (1920), and received various honorary degrees.

Pace's publications include his doctoral dissertation, Das Relativitaets-prinzip in Herbert Spencer's psychologischer Entwicklungslehre; many articles in philosophy, religion, and education; and The Mass for Every Day in the Year (1916), one of the first modern translations of the Missal, which he prepared with John J. Wynne, SJ. A pioneer in experimental psychology, Pace's teaching and writing were characterized by depth and originality of thought, careful reasoning, and clarity of expression. In 1919, the American bishops commissioned him to compose a national pastoral letter; his notable document analyzing issues then facing the Church and the nation was signed by Cardinal James Gibbons "in his own name and in the name of the hierarchy."

Bibliography: Pace Papers, Catholic University of America Archives, Washington, D.C. j. k. ryan, "In Memory of Edward Aloysius Pace," New Scholasticism 35 (1961) 141–151. h. misiak and v. m. staudt, Catholics in Psychology: A Historical Survey (New York 1954). c. a. hart, ed., Aspects of the New Scholastic Philosophy (New York 1932), festschrift.

[j. k. ryan]