For no continuity of social act is possible without a corresponding social status and the many different kinds of act required in an industrial state, with its high degree of specialization, make for corresponding classification of status.

In later life his New Jersey farm was a popular summer retreat for his extended family as reported by his grandson Harry Chapin a contemporary popular song artist. In 1919 he married Lily Mary Batterham with whom he had three daughters: the late feminist Marxist anthropologist Eleanor Leacock (1922–1987); musician (Jeanne) Elspeth Chapin Hart (b. He died of heart failure at his home in Andover New Jersey.

Kenneth Duva Burke (May 5 1897 – November 19 1993) was an American literary theorist and philosopher. He would later return to the university to lecture and teach.