Elmer Sprague  Elmer Sprague (1924-2019) was a professor emeritus at Brooklyn College of the City University of New York, where he taught philosophy for 44 years. He obtained a B.A. from the University of Nebraska, and a B.A. and D.Phil. from Oxford. He was a Rhodes Scholar at Oxford (1948–51), and was the Paul Robert and Jean Shuman Hanna Professor of Philosophy at Hamline University (1987). Growing up in Lincoln, Nebraska, "where Lee Lawrie's sculptures on the state capitol dominate the city" led to Sprague's interest in "sculpture watching," which in turn led him to publishing "Brooklyn Public Monuments: Sculpture for Civic Memory and Urban Pride." His previous publications include articles on Ryle and Hume, and the books, Metaphysical Thinking and What is Philosophy published by New York Oxford Press in 1961. His specialties are the philosophy of mind, metaphysics and the philosophy of language. His book "Persons and their Minds", published in 1999, is a Wittgensteinian-Ryleian critique of modern philosophy of mind. He viewed it as a mistake to treat mind and body as two abstract categories to be somehow assembled into a third abstract category purportedly encompassing both. Rather he thought the features that have been attributed separately to mind and to body ought to be returned to their lived context in "the person." His finely contextual approach is exemplified in his books: What Is Philosophy? (1961), Metaphysical Thinking (1978), and Persons and Their Minds (1999). He also had a longstanding interest in the history of British philosophy and published widely in this area. Early in Elmer's career at Brooklyn College he and his colleague Paul Taylor were asked by the Philosophy Department to prepare an anthology for use in the department's introductory course. The result was the very successful Knowledge and Value that influenced many other anthologies of its type. Like his written work, Elmer's teaching was characterized by its clarity. He was an extremely influential teacher and the recipient of a college-wide Excellence in Teaching Award. A number of his students went on to academic careers in philosophy. He also inspired scores of other students, many of whom would visit the Philosophy Department at Brooklyn College periodically to meet and speak with him. Elmer once described himself as a person who couldn't be told things but always had to learn them for himself. This revealing comment might lead those who did not know Elmer to believe that he was a solitary inquirer or considered this to be the paradigm of learning and knowledge.