Commemorative biographical record of central Pennsylvania : including the counties of Centre, Clearfield, Jefferson and Clarion, Pt. 1, Part 8

Author: J.H. Beers & Co
Publication date: 1898
Publisher: Chicago : J. H. Beers
Number of Pages: 1358

USA > Pennsylvania > Jefferson County > Commemorative biographical record of central Pennsylvania : including the counties of Centre, Clearfield, Jefferson and Clarion, Pt. 1 > Part 8
USA > Pennsylvania > Centre County > Commemorative biographical record of central Pennsylvania : including the counties of Centre, Clearfield, Jefferson and Clarion, Pt. 1 > Part 8
USA > Pennsylvania > Clarion County > Commemorative biographical record of central Pennsylvania : including the counties of Centre, Clearfield, Jefferson and Clarion, Pt. 1 > Part 8
USA > Pennsylvania > Clearfield County > Commemorative biographical record of central Pennsylvania : including the counties of Centre, Clearfield, Jefferson and Clarion, Pt. 1 > Part 8

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In 1876, greatly against his wishes, but in obedience to what seemed a call of duty from many who were interested in promoting purer politics, he accepted the Republican nomination for Congress, in a district having a very large majority for the opposite party. His defeat fol- lowed as a matter of course, though he ran ahead of the Presidential ticket at almost every polling place, and his vigorous canvass of the district elicited the highest praise on account of his un- compromising advocacy of honest money as

COMMEMORATIVE BIOGRAPHICAL RECORD.

against the green-back folly then prevalent; of civil service reform as against the spoils system, and of the purity of the ballot as against corrup- tion in the North, and fraud and violence in the South. In 1878, he was chairman of a Commis- sion, composed of five citizens appointed by the Governor of New Jersey, to prepare and propose to the Legislature, a digest and revision of the State system of taxation. During this period, the nature of his professional studies, and his widening interest in public questions. led him to take up the study of law. He was admitted to the New Jersey Bar, and practiced for some time as consulting attorney, but without relinquishing his College professorship. All these varied act- ivities he regarded as subsidiary to his principal work as a teacher and guide of young men. Him- self an ardent believer in one school of political opinion, he scrupulously avoided everything like partisanship in the teachings of the lecture-room, endeavoring only to instil a high sense of the re- sponsibilities and privileges of citizenship, and especially of the public duties of educated men; and there can be no doubt that it was his prac- tical experience of affairs which gave that force and effectiveness to his influence in the class- room, of which his students speak with warmth and gratitude. The scientific department of Rutgers College had received from the Legisla- ture of New Jersey the benefits of the United States Land Grant Act, of 1862, and his connec- tion with the institution naturally led him to an examination of the provisions and the underlying principles of that legislation. He became thor- oughly convinced that it was not only a measure of far-reaching wisdom as a provision for higher public education, but that it was peculiarly in keeping with the genius of our system of institu- tions.

An unsuccessful effort made in Congress in the winter of 1872-73, by Senator Morrill, of Vermont, the author of the original measure, to increase the endowment of the colleges estab- lished under that Act, led Prof. Atherton to make a careful study of the results already ac- complished by it. These results he presented in a paper read before the National Education As- sociation at its meeting in Elmira, N. Y., in the summer of 1873. There had been no previous attempt to make so systematic an inquiry, and the array of facts showing what the colleges had already accomplished in the short time since their establishment was a surprise to friends and opponents alike. It was shown that the pro- ceeds of the Land Grant had on the whole been wisely managed, and that the spirit of the Act of Congress had been promptly met by the action

of States, counties, towns, and private individu- als, from which sources nearly five millions of dollars had been already received in grants and gifts, for the purpose of supplementing the funds set apart by the United States. This address was the beginning of an active interest in the subject of government support for higher educa- tion which has given direction to all his subse- quent work, and there has since been no Con- gressional legislation in the shaping and securing of which he has not taken an active and influen- tial part. The well-known Act of 1887, provid- ing for the establishment of Agricultural Experi- ment Stations in connection with the Land Grant Colleges in every State in the Union, and under which fifty principal and several subordinate sta- tions are now in operation, is probably more largely indebted to him for its passage than to any other single individual outside of Congress. While he would be the last to detract from the credit due to the efforts of others, it is the sim- ple truth to say that, in the midst of the numer- ous and wide-spread agencies which were set in operation in behalf of that important measure, his leadership was freely recognized by all who had part in securing it. The passage of this Act was followed by the organization of an Associa- tion, including in its membership all these Col- leges and Experiment Stations, which at once took rank as one of the most influential bodies of educational and scientific workers in the United States. This Association, known as "The American Association of Agricultural Colleges and Experiment Stations," chose Dr. Atherton as its first president. In 1890, Congress passed a third Act intended to strengthen the educa- tional work of the Land Grant Colleges, in dis -. tinction from the work of experiment and re- search which has been especially provided for by the Act of 1887. In promoting the passage of this measure, also, Dr. Atherton rendered im- portant service.

Meantime, in the summer of 1882, he re- ceived and finally accepted a call to the Presi- dency of the Pennsylvania State College, one of the Land Grant Institutions. After having re- ceived the income of the Land Grant Act for fif- teen years, the institution had less than one hun- dred students, a meagre equipment, with a pub- lic sentiment either hostile or indifferent, and! this, notwithstanding the fact that its Faculty and Board of Trustees had never been without strong and able men. The task of building it up and making it worthy of so rich and powerful a Com- monwealth as Pennsylvania seemed almost a hopeless one, but to this task Dr. Atherton de- voted himself with a courage and enthusiasm .:

1810861

COMMEMORATIVE BIOGRAPHICAL RECORD.

which astonished even his friends, and the spirit ut which was in itself an inspiration to others. At the end of ten years the results have been greater than the most sanguine friends of the College had dared to anticipate. A total change in public sentiment has shown itself in a steady increase in the number of students, and the ap- propriation of nearly four hundred thousand dol- Lars by the Legislature has given the College a substantial equipment of the buildings and ap- paratus required for its work. The foundations of future growth have been laid on so broad and comprehensive lines that it is rapidly taking a place among the leading technical institutions of the country. In 1883, the degree of LL. D. was conferred upon him by Franklin and Mar- shall College. In 1887, he was appointed, by the Governor of Pennsylvania, chairman of a Commission created by authority of the Legisla- ture of the State to make inquiry and report upon the practicability of introducing manual training into the public-school system. The re- port of this commission has been widely recog- nized in this country and in Europe as the most complete single presentation of the subject pub- I.shed up to that date. At sixty years of age, after a life filled to an unusual degree with exact- In; labors, it may still be said of the subject of thus sketch, as Cecil said of Sir Walter Raleigh, "he can toil terribly," and, like Raleigh, he pos- Nesses the extraordinary mental grasp and breadth of intellectual interests and sympathies which render him an equally congenial companion to men of letters and men of affairs.

T "HE PENNSYLVANIA STATE COLLEGE is, as its name implies, a State and not a I-nominational institution. It is situated in the wall village of State College, in one of the most futuresque and healthful localities of central 'ensylvania. Practically surrounded by mount- ut ., with Nittany on the east, Tussey on the with, and Muncy on the north, it is, as the poet ity of Lake Constance, "girt round with rugged " untains," yet the rugged mountainous view is ". "ved by the more restful and peaceful beauty the foot-hills and lowlands, forming a well- otrasted panorama of natural scenery. The uge campus of sixty acres, containing the " "rons college buildings and professors' resi- Ances, is artistically laid out with drives, ave- and walks, with here and there a secluded .. r or romantic walk, and well merits the title : the ideal college campus so often bestowed.

The College is one of the so-called land grant irges, established under the Act of Congress of

July, 1862. The section of the Act relating directly to the character of the work to be pur- sued by the institution reads: "The leading object shall be, without excluding other scientific and classical studies, and including military tac- tics, to teach such- branches of learning as are related to agriculture and the mechanic arts in such a manner as the Legislature of the State may prescribe, in order to promote the liberal and practical education of the industrial class in the several pursuits and professions of life." The State Legislature accepted this Act of Con- gress, and further "pledged the faith of the State to carry it into effect." The College was opened in 1859 as a school for instruction in practical agriculture. An active movement in this direc- tion had begun several years earlier, and had en- listed the enthusiastic support of some of the most intelligent and public-spirited citizens of the State, among them Hon. Frederick Watts, of Carlisle, and Hon. Hugh N. McAllister, of Belle- fonte. After prolonged consideration of the vari- ous plans presented, a charter was secured in 1855, superseding one granted the previous year, and two officers of the State and twelve other gentlemen were constituted a Board of Trustees. There was thought to be at that time a considerable prejudice among farmers against the word "College," and, for that reason, as subsequently explained, the institution was called The Farmer's High School of Pennsylvania. Donations of land as a site for the institution were offered in several parts of the State and. after a very careful examination, the Board ac- cepted the gift. of 200 acres in Centre county from Gen. James Irvin, to which they soon after- ward added, by purchase, 200 acres more. For the purpose of providing the necessary funds for erecting and equipping buildings, the State Agri- cultural Society gave $10,000, the trustees raised $25,000 by subscription, and the Legislature in 1857 appropriated $25,000, absolutely, and $25,- 000 more on condition that a similar amount should be raised by private subscription, which was done. In 1861, the Legislature made an additional appropriation of $49,900, for the com- pletion of buildings, though the institution had been opened February 20, 1859, with such ac- commodations as were then available.

The first president of the school was Dr. Evan Pugh, who had become deeply imbued with the fundamental conceptions underlying modern methods of teaching the applied sciences. He had studied in Germany at a time when very few American students went abroad for that purpose, and had spent several months at Rothamstead. . England, working under the direction of Messrs.

COMMEMORATIVE BIOGRAPHICAL RECORD.

Lawes and Gilbert. He entered upon this work here with great energy and enthusiasm, and the scheme of instruction was put upon a college ba- sis from the beginning. Dr. Pugh stated in 1862, that " the school, on being organized, adopted a course of instructions in mathematics and the nat- ural sciences more extensive than that in any agricultural college in Europe, required corres- pondingly longer time for graduation, and that the trustees only awaited the time in which they would be able to complete its buildings to change its name." Accordingly in 1862 the name was changed to "The Agricultural College of Pennsyl- vania." From 1855 to 1867 the sum of $99,900 was the total amount given to the institution by the Legislature. and the entire amount was ex- pended in the erection of the original building; but, owing to the great advance in the cost of building material, occasioned by the war which broke out in 1861, the resources at the disposal of the trustees proved inadequate to complete the one main building, and the Legislature, by an act approved April 11, 1866, authorized them to borrow $80,000 and secure the same by a mort- gage. The institution had no endowment and no source of revenue except the fees of students, and the attempt to make such an institution self- supporting failed as it has everywhere and always failed. Since 1873 it has received an income of $30,000 annually from the United States fund. In 1878 the Legislature provided for the payment of the debt of the $80,000, which it had author- ized twelve years before, and that sum is the total amount given by the State to the College between 1867 and 1887, except an appropriation of $3,000 · made for the erection of a barn on one of the ex- perimental farms. From 1857 to 1887, a period of thirty years, the State appropriated a total amount of $179,900 for the erection of the main building and $3,000 for the erection of a barn. It is doubtless true that the institution during that period largely failed to satisfy the public expecta- tion. It is also true that from the passage of the Act of 1867 until 1887 the Legislature of the State was directly responsible for its administration, but, though it heard and entertained complaints from time to time, it took no step to ascertain and supply the needs of the institution, and seemed to feel no responsibility for the proper execution of the trust which it had assumed. In 1874, in recognition of the fact that the Law of Congress necessarily widened the scope of its work, the name of the institution was again changed, and it has since been known as The Pennsylvania State College. In 1887 the State entered upon a new era in its dealings with the College. All the work of the institution was then

carried on, as it had been from the first, in the one original building, except that a small frame building for mechanical work had been erected three years before. All the lecture rooms, labora- tories, dormitories, society halls, boarding club, armory, chapel, library, and everything else re- quired for the work of the institution, besides five families of professors, were crowded together un- der that single roof. In the meantime .other States had taken active and continuous steps, and made large appropriations for carrying out the Congressional Act, and leading men, in our Leg- islature and elsewhere throughout the Common- wealth, felt that Pennsylvania had too long disre- garded her own interests as well as the obliga- tions she had assumed toward the United States. It is not necessary to recall the long and not very agreeable record from 1867 to 1887, during which the College maintained a difficult struggle for ex- istence. It is easy now to see that a different policy on the part of the State might have brought about different results during that period; but that has become a part of ancient history. In 1887 the attention of the Legislature was called to the situation, and the sentiment became gen- eral that if Pennsylvania was to maintain a State institution, it should be kept up at least to the standard of her penal and reformatory and charita- ble institutions; and, after a careful and detailed examination, $112,000 was appropriated with a view to beginning the work of reconstruction and placing the institution on a footing that would be creditable to Pennsylvania, and in keeping with what other progressive States were doing for their institutions which had been established in accordance with the same Act of Congress. The total amount then and since appropriated up to 1895 inclusive was: Buildings $303, 500; repairs. improvements and insurance. $36,220; equip- ment, $102,200; maintenance, $38,300; making $480,220. For these recent expenditures the College has buildings to show which are worth every dollar they cost. They are: an armory, a botanical building, with conservatory and green houses, a chemical and physical building, with lecture rooms and laboratories, an experiment station building, with offices, laboratories, etc .. a cottage for the ladies' department, a residence for the United States military detail, a residence for the director of the experiment station, four professors' houses, and an engineering building. arranged for the departments of civil, mechanical and mining engineering, which is believed to be the best for its purpose in the United States. Besides these, the barns and outbuildings on the two farmis have been greatly enlarged (one of the barns being entirely new), and a central boiler

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COMMEMORATIVE BIOGRAPHICAL RECORD.

house and steam plant erected for heating all the public College buildings, while a smaller plant serves the same purpose for all the experiment station buildings.

In 1881, a very important rearrangement and enlargement of courses of study was made by the Faculty and approved by the Trustees, which may be said to mark a distinct epoch in the educa- tional organization of the College, and one from which may be dated a new era in its growth. The substance of the new scheme was specializa- tion, in technical lines. A classical course and a general educational course, called the "General Science Course" were substituted for the three previously maintained ("Agricultural," "Classic- al" and "Scientific") and four Technical Courses added, viz :- Agriculture, Chemistry and Physics, Civil Engineering, and Natural History. These courses began with the Junior year, all alike being based on the general training given in the Freshman and Sophomore years. The number of full four-years' courses now organized is thir- teen, as follows:

I. Classical Course. II. General Courses: A General Science course; a Latin Scientific course; a course in Philosophy. III. Technical Courses: A course in Agriculture; a course in Biology; a course in Chemistry; a course in Civil Engineering; a course in Electrical Engineering; a course in Mathematics; a course in Mechanical Engineering; a course in Mining Engineering; a coursein Physics. Besides these regular courses, there are eight short courses-four in Agriculture, one in Chemistry, two in Mining, and anelement- ary course in Mechanics. The scheme was necessarily incomplete, but. while it has since been modified and enlarged in nearly every de- tail, the fundamental principle of differentiated rather than elective specialties), based on a common foundation of training, has been ever since substantially maintained, and the growth of the College has followed along the main lines of the plan thus sketched out. In addition to these courses there exists the military drill and disci- pline which furnishes, as it were, the brawn for the healthful growth of the brain. The military or- ganization consists of the entire student body as 4 battalion, divided into companies, with their respective cadet captains. All the necessary territory for the various military manœuvres is readily afforded by the large campus, and in win- ter the spacious armory is utilized as a drill hall. The National Government has furnished the College with two field pieces of modern pattern, and a large number of cadet rifles similar to those used at West Point. . By a recent law of the State, commissioned officers of the battalion

are eligible to appointment as brevet second lieutenants in the National Guard.

Based upon this broadened foundation, the special work of the State College is the training of youth in those branches of learning which lie at the foundation of modern industrial pursuits. In accordance with the purposes of its founders and the terms of its original charter, it aims to give special and prominent attention to agricult- ure, both theoretical and experimental; but it also provides "a liberal and practical education" in the leading branches of mathematical, natural and physical science, in order to prepare youth for "the several pursuits and professions of life." In other words, while the College is no longer exclusively agricultural, it is doing more in the direction of progressive and scientific agriculture than when that was its principal object; and at the same time it has increased its subjects and courses of study, and its teaching and illustrative equipment, to such an extent that now, "with- out excluding classical studies," its leading ob- ject is to teach the various sciences in such a manner as to show their applications in the more important industries-to combine with every branch of instruction such an amount of actual practice in the shop, the field and the laboratory as will serve to illustrate and apply the theory, but without subordinating it.

Dr. Evan Pugh served as president of the college from 1859 to 1864, his death occurring April 29 of the latter year. He was a profound scholar and a man of wonderful intellectual pow- ers. He spent six years abroad; he was three or four years in Europe at the Universities of Leip- sic, Gottingen. Heidelberg and, as stated above, in the laboratories of Lawes and Gilbert. Dr. Pugh by his scientific investigations while in Europe settled several important scientific ques- tions, and gained for himself a world-wide repu- ation as a scholar and investigator. Dr. Pugh was succeeded by William H. Allen, LL. D., of Girard College, who served two years, and re- signed to accept his old position as president of Girard College. On the resignation of Dr. Allen, Gen. John Frazer, A. M., professor of mathe- matics and astronomy and lecturer on astron- omy, was elected president. President Frazer was mainly instrumental in securing to the Col- lege part of the National land grant. He re- .signed his position in 1868, and was afterward president of the University of Kansas, and also State superintendent of public instruction of that State. Thomas H. Burrows, LL. D., became president in December, 1868, and died in office in 1871. Of Dr. Burrows, J. P. McCaskey, ed- itor of the Pennsylvania School Journal, said:

COMMEMORATIVE BIOGRAPHICAL RECORD.

No other man in the history of Pennsylvania has touched our common-school system so nearly, so powerfully, or throughout its whole range to such a degree, as Dr. Bur- rowes. He put the system into working force in 1835-8; he established The Pennsylvania School Journal in 1852, and was its editor for eighteen years; he was the first president of the Pennsylvania State Teachers' Association, and the first president of the Lancaster County Teachers' Institute, called to both positions by the unanimous choice as the leading spirit among the advocates of general education by the State and of an improved common-school system; he wrote the. Pennsylvania State Book, which we recall as a reader in a country school, in 1847, before we knew anything of its author; he wrote the Pennsylvania School Architecture, which, being supplied to all the school districts, did much to im- prove the plans of school buildings and their surroundings in 1856 and thereafter; he wrote the Normal School Law at the request of Hon. H. C. Hickok, who tells elsewhere in the present issue of The School Journal the interesting story of the origin of that law of vital importance to our educa- tional progress; he was called by Gov. Curtin-who origi- nated that most worthy public charity-to organize the sys- tem of Soldiers' Orphan Schools, which was done with his customary energy and strong practical sense; and he died, after thirty-five years of almost continuous effort in behalf of general education, at the head of the school that, we believe, is destined soon to be recognized as the last essential feature which rounds out into satisfactory completeness our Penn- sylvania system of public instruction.

In March, 1871, Dr. Calder, the president of Hillsdale College, Mich., was chosen president, and during his administration ladies were ad- mitted to the privileges of the institution, Dr. Calder resigned in 1880. and was succeeded by President Shortlidge, and the latter in 1882 by Dr. George W. Atherton, the present executive. A writer in referring to the College in 1894 said:

The rapid growth of the institution into a position of na- tional prominence has taken place within the last decade, and has been the result of the policy adopted by the present executive, Dr. George W. Atherton. Previous to his inaugu- ration the College had gained scarcely a local reputation, and was on the verge of a retrograde movement. He im- mediately outlined the present courses of technical work, and the degree of success which they have attained is sufficient evidence of their practicability, and the demands of the times for instruction of such character.

Referring to a visit to the college in 1892, Editor J. P. McCaskey said:

The president, Dr. Atherton, was absent in attendance upon a meeting of the Association of College Presidents and Professors then in session at Swarthmore, where he had a paper upon the relations of the High Schools of the State to the Collegiate institutions. It was a disappointment not to see him. But what was better still, we saw everywhere evi- dence of his devotion to the interests of the College, every- where the master hand in the work that has been done and is doing under his administration. We heard also on every hand admiration of his good judgment, broad plan, execu- tive ability, tireless energy, and unlimited capacity for work. Dr. Atherton, we may add, is a soldier as well as a scholar, holding one of the honor medals awarded by Act of Congress during the late war for gallantry in action.

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Commemorative biographical record of central Pennsylvania : including the counties of Centre, Clearfield, Jefferson and Clarion, Pt. 1, Part 8

Author: J.H. Beers & Co Publication date: 1898 Publisher: Chicago : J. H. Beers Number of Pages: 1358

Author: J.H. Beers & Co
Publication date: 1898
Publisher: Chicago : J. H. Beers
Number of Pages: 1358