Albritton, Claude C., 1913-1988

A long-time SMU professor and administrator, Claude Carroll Albritton, Jr. was born on April 7, 1913, in Corsicana, Texas. He was the son of Claude Cleveland Albritton, Sr. (1884-1971), a Corsicana grade school principal, who became a real estate and oil entrepreneur in Dallas, and Iris I. Stapleton (1889-1944). Albritton, Jr. grew up in Corsicana and moved to Dallas, TX in 1929. He married Jane Christman on August 5, 1944, in Washington D.C., and the couple had three children. Claude C. Albritton died on November 1, 1988, in Dallas.

Albritton attended Southern Methodist University in Dallas from 1929 to 1933, and graduated with a B.S. in geology and a B.A. in geography. It was during the undergraduate years that he established long-term close relationships with SMU Professors Ellis Shuler and Edwin Foscue. Albritton went to graduate school at Harvard University between 1933 and 1936, earning the M.S. in geology in 1934 and the Ph.D. in geology in 1936. During his studies at Harvard, Albritton was a Harvard University fellow (1934-35) and a J.B. Woodworth fellow (1935-36). He worked under the mentorship of Dr. Marland Billings, who advised his doctoral dissertation on the geology of Trans-Pecos, Texas, and also did intensive field work in Massachusetts, Texas, and New Mexico, under the direction of Dr. Kirk Bryan.

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