Education:
A.B. Illinois Coll., 1875; Ph.D. Yale, 1886; study at Berlin, 1884-5; LL.D. Illinois Coll., 1914.
Dissertation:
“Conditional Sentences in Aischylos” (Yale, 1886); printed in TAPA 18 (1887) 43-58.
Professional Experience:
Tchr. sec. sch.; prof. Gk. Illinois Coll., 1882-90; asst. prof. Gk. Yale, 1890-3; prof. Gk. U. California, 1894-1917; chair Gk. dept., 1896-1917; prof. Gk. ASCSA, 1907-8; chair ed. bd. UCPCP; founder & twice pres., PAPS.
Publications:
“Conditional Sentences in the Greek Tragedians,” TAPA 22 (1891) 81-92; Homer's Iliad. Books xix-xxiv (Boston, 1899); “Pindar's Accusative Constructions,” TAPA 32 (1901) 16-42; Hiatus in Greek Melic Poetry, UCPCP 1.1 (Berkeley, 1904); “On Correption in Hiatus,” CP 1 (1906) 239-43; The Oaristus of Theocritus (Berkeley, 1911); “Two Pindaric Poems of Theocritus,” CP 8 (1913) 310-6.
Notes:
Clapp arrived at Berkeley when it was a small school of some 400 students. By his efforts the department began the first major graduate program on the West Coast, but Greek was also widely taught throughout the state high schools as well. A genial and robust figure until ill health befell him at the age of fifty, his teaching was generally at the graduate level and centered around Pindar and Plato and his, many articles covered a range of subjects. He was a founder of the Philological Association of the Pacific States and served as president for two terms. At the time of his death he was at work on an edition of Pindar that was to be the summary of his life's work on that author.
Sources:
James Turney Allen, CJ 14 (1918-19) 564-5; Fontenrose, 18; WhAm 1:221.