vided for the University of the Territory of Wisconsin, with a board of 21 visitors, including the governor, secretary of the Territory, the judges of the supreme court, and the president of the university as ex officio members.

Congress was asked for $20,000 for buildings and two townships of land. An act of Congress of June 12, 1838, gave the land, which might be located in 72 parcels. But the powers of the board of visitors were merely nominal and they did practically nothing.

Part of this Territory became the State of Wisconsin in 1848, under the enabling act of Congress of August 6, 1846. The State constitution of 1848 contained the following provision:

Provision shall be made by law for the establishment of a State university, at or near the seat of State government, and for connecting with the same from time to time such colleges in different parts of the State as the interests of education may require. The proceeds of all lands that have been or may hereafter be granted by the United States to the State for the support of a university shall be and remain a perpetual fund, to be called the "university fund," the interest of which shall be appropriated to the support of the State university, and no sectarian instruction shall be allowed in such university.

The constitution also made the secretary of state, the treasurer, and the attorney general a board of commissioners for the sale of the school and university lands of the State and for the investment of the proceeds, and they were authorized to accept mortgages, with 7 per cent interest, in lieu of the purchase money. The system of investments pursued was unsatisfactory, and in the end the university obtained from this source a fund of only $150,000. To meet its necessities money was loaned to it by the State, but the interest on the loans reduced the income available for educational purposes, so that by 1866 the university had less than $6,000 for its maintenance. The State act of incorporation of the University of Wisconsin was passed in 1848. This act put the control of the university in a board of regents, consisting of a president and 12 members. The members were to be chosen by the legislature. They were to elect a chancellor, who should be ex-officio president of the board. The first meeting of the board was held October 7, 1848, but nothing was done toward the organization of the university until January 16, 1849. Madison was selected as the site of the university and 50 acres of land were purchased there. John H. Lathrop, then president of the University of Missouri, was elected chancellor, and he was installed January 16, 1850. There were then few academies in the State where students could be prepared for college, and the regents therefore first established a preparatory school, which was opened in February, 1850. The first college class was formed August 4, 1850, and was instructed by the chancellor and one professor.

The act of incorporation provided for departments or schools of (1) science, literature, and the arts; (2) law; (3) medicine; and (4) "theory and practice of elementary instruction."

In November, 1849, steps were taken to establish the first and fourth departments, the former with six professorships and the latter with a normal professorship. But insufficient funds prevented the carrying out of this plan until 1855-56, and even then the normal instruction consisted of only short courses for two years, after which they were suspended for several years. The first college class of two students was graduated in 1854.

On March 8, 1851, the Wisconsin State Agricultural Society was organized at Madison "to promote and improve the condition of agriculture, horticulture, and the mechanical, manufacturing, and household arts," and held its first fair at Janesville October 1 and 2, 1851 (405). Át this fair the chancellor of the university made an address in which he urged farmers to learn the theory as well as the practice of agriculture, and stated that the regents intended to estabblish a department of the "applications of science to agriculture and the useful arts."

In a conference of the executive committee of the society with a committee of the regents of the university "it was mutually determined that an attempt be made at once to procure the establishment and organization of an agricultural department in our university."

In 1854 a professor of chemistry and natural science was added to the university faculty, and in 1855 Ezra Carr (see p. 42) gave a course of lectures on agricultural chemistry and the application of science to the useful arts. In 1855 the executive committee of the State agricultural society suggested that preliminary steps be taken to establish and endow an agricultural school and in 1857 asked the governor to recommend to the legislature "to make suitable provision for the founding of an agricultural college in connection with an ample experimental farm" and "endow the college with State lands or ask Congress for a special grant of land," such as had been made to railroads. One argument used was that if Wisconsin does not act in this matter agricultural students will go from this State to the Michigan college.

A bill to reorganize the university was introduced in the legislature in 1858, but failed to pass. This proposed eight departments, including agriculture. Financial difficulties and the Civil War crippled the university. After the passage of the Federal land grant act of 1862 there was a struggle in Wisconsin over the disposal of the grant. Finally an act for the reorganization of the university was passed in 1866 and the land grant was given to this institution. This act provided for as broad development of the university as circumstances permitted. Colleges of arts and letters were named in the act and a college of law was soon established by the regents.

SEC. 2. The college of arts shall embrace courses of instruction in the mathematical, physical, and natural sciences, with their applications to the industrial arts, such as agriculture, mechanics, and engineering, mining, and metallurgy, manufactures, architecture, and commerce; in such branches included in the college of letters as shall be necessary to a proper fitness of the pupils for their chosen pursuits, and in military tactics; and as soon as the income of the university will allow, in such order as the wants of the public shall seem to require, the said courses in the sciences and their application to the practical arts shall be expanded into distinct colleges of the university, each with its own faculty and appropriate title.

A professor of agriculture was added to the faculty in 1868, but little was done in this department until after 1881 when W. A. Henry came as professor of botany and agriculture. H. P. Armsby was made professor of agricultural chemistry in 1884, S. M. Babcock succeeding him in 1887. Then Professor Henry organized the short course in agriculture and the dairy school. (See p. 212.) The college of agriculture in the university was not established until 1893.

MASSACHUSETTS

PROPOSAL FOR AGRICULTURAL COLLEGE IN 1825

On September 9, 1825, there appeared in the New England Farmer (vol. 4, p. 54) an article entitled "Massachusetts Agricultural College." This contained an argument and plan for such an institution with a 4-year course for boys over 14 years of age, who had had a common-school education. Professors of agriculture, mechanics, domestic economy, moral philosophy, and books seem indispensable requisites," this article asserted.

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Connected with the college will be a farm, with soil "best adapted to agricultural experiments." The buildings will include "mechanic workshops." The students will have "exercise at agricultural experiments, or at the mechanic arts in workshops two hours each day," together with military tactics and gymnastics. "A regular journal of the results of agricultural experiments * * will be kept by the students and published semiannually."

An article in the same journal on October 21, 1825, favored "an agricultural professorship with each of the existing colleges," supported by State funds, which should also provide "a farm with suitable buildings and stock." The students would thus not only receive instruction in agriculture but in other branches taught at these colleges, and would form acquaintances among literary men which would promote harmony among people of different occupations. All the students and visitors at the colleges would learn about improvements in agriculture and widely disseminate information. about them. Farmers thus educated would in after life "intermingle literary pursuits with manual labor" and be "able to exert a controlling influence in legislative assemblies and other public meetings." This paper also records a meeting, held in Boston November 8, 1825, "of the friends of the proposed Massachusetts Agricultural College," at which a committee was appointed to solicit funds for the college. This meeting favored a location near Boston, but it became necessary to combat the views of those who, like the writer in the Franklin Post of Greenfield, argued for its location further west, perhaps in connection with an established institution, such as the Deerfield Academy. No practical result came from this effort to establish an agricultural college, but the record of it shows that it aroused some of the important questions which in later times were much debated in connection with the establishment of an agricultural college in Massachusetts.

That year the town of Stockbridge asked the legislature to endow "an institution best calculated to afford instruction to laborious classes in practical arts and sciences." On this matter two committee reports were made in 1826 and a third report in 1827, and a bill was drawn up "to establish the Massachusetts Seminary of Arts and Sciences." 1

The later movement, which resulted in the establishment of the State agricultural college, centers in two men, Marshall Pinckney

1 See Massachusetts Resolves VI, pp. 379, 381; also House Doc. 5 and Senate Doc. 23 of second session, 1826-27.

Wilder and Edward Hitchcock, under whose leadership the movement took shape and made definite progress.

MARSHALL P. WILDER

Mr. Wilder (1798-1886) was born at Rindge, N. H., but soon moved to Sterling, Mass. He was brought up on the farm and at the age of 16 was offered by his father a choice of a college course, a business career, or a farming career. He chose farming, but soon his father's store needed him and he entered on a business career. In 1825 he became a West Indies merchant in Boston and from 1837 was partner in a commission house. For many years he was director in an insurance company and in a bank. In 1839 he was a member of the lower house in the State legislature and in 1850 was president of the State senate. He also served as a member of the governor's council. In 1830 he became a member of the Massachusetts Horticultural Society, which had been organized the year before, and was its president from 1840 for eight years. His activity in horticulture was greatly increased after the purchase of an estate at Dorchester in 1832. At one time he had there 2,500 pear trees of 800 varieties. He made many experiments with fruits and flowers, in connection with which he imported many varieties. He was also a member of the Massachusetts Agricultural Society and for eight years its president.

In 1848 he was one of the signers of a call for a national convention of fruit growers which resulted in the organization of the American Pomological Society, of which he was the first president. He was largely instrumental in the creation of the Massachusetts State board of agriculture and as president of the board issued the call for a convention which formed the United States Agricultural Society, of which he was president from 1852 to 1858.

In 1845 he was one of the incorporators named in the act authorizing the establishment of the Massachusetts Academy of Agriculture to be located in Westborough, Worcester County, but this institution did not come into existence.

In October, 1847, the Hampshire, Franklin, and Hampden Agricultural Society at Northampton voted to "make application to the next legislature for the endowment of an institution in the Connecticut Valley for instruction in the various departments of agricultural science." At the fairs of the agricultural societies in these counties that year Charles Upham Shepard, Massachusetts professor of chemistry and natural history in Amherst College, had made an address which contained a plea for an agricultural school in that region (187).

In 1848 Mr. Hubbard, of Sunderland, raised in the legislature the question of the establishment of a State agricultural school or of an agricultural department in one or more existing colleges. That year the legislature also received petitions for an agricultural school in the interior of the State. This resulted in the incorporation of the Massachusetts Agricultural Institute, authorized to hold $50,000 of real and personal estate, for establishing in some town on the banks of the Connecticut River, or in a town immediately adjoining such

towns, an agricultural school and experimental farm, the object of which shall be instruction in agricultural science and improvements in all the arts connected with the practice of farming.

EDWARD HITCHCOCK

Edward Hitchcock (1793-1864) was named first in the list of incorporators. He was born in Deerfield, spent his boyhood on a farm, and afterwards worked at carpentry and surveying. He early became a student of nature and theology and a writer. Ill health prevented him from taking a regular college course, though he pursued studies in chemistry and geology under Silliman and in theology at Yale College. He was principal of Deerfield Academy (18151818), professor of chemistry and natural history in Amherst College (1821-1844), president and professor of natural theology and geology in that college (1845-1854), and thereafter lecturer in his department until his death. He was State geologist in Massachusetts beginning with 1830, and from 1857 to 1861 in Vermont. He was pastor of a church at Conway (1821-1825), and at that time made a scientific survey of the western counties of the State. He was an original and forceful preacher, and while president of Amherst once preached on the text "Selah," which he interpreted to mean "stop and think." Miss Mary Lyon was for a time a member of his family, and he assisted her in the foundation of Mount Holyoke Seminary (now College) at South Hadley. His breadth of interest in science is shown by the fact that at some time he taught chemistry, botany, mineralogy, geology, zoology, anatomy, physiology, astronomy, natural philosophy, and natural theology. His interest in agriculture was shown in his institution of instruction in that subject at Amherst College and in his connection with the agricultural societies, State board of agriculture, and the movement for agricultural education.

COMMISSION ON AGRICULTURAL EDUCATION

In 1849 Mr. Wilder, in an important address on agricultural education before the Norfolk County Agricultural Society, called attention to the need of an agricultural college in Massachusetts. This address aroused much interest in this subject throughout the State, and on January 8, 1850, Governor Briggs asked the legislature to give favorable consideration to this matter.

This portion of the governor's address was referred to the joint committee on agriculture, together with petitions from the Massachusetts Society for Promoting Agriculture and the Norfolk, Hampden, Middlesex, Worcester, and Essex agricultural societies. This committee reported five resolutions regarding agricultural education which were adopted by the legislature and approved by the governor, May 3, 1850. These resolutions provided for a board of five commissioners to consider broadly the subject of agricultural education in its relation to the State (175).

HITCHCOCK'S REPORT ON EUROPEAN AGRICULTURAL SCHOOLS

Wilder and Hitchcock were among the commissioners appointed under this act. The latter went to Europe, where he made a