Drawing Rooms: One for general drawing and four for special drawing in Civil, Electrical and Mechanical Engineering, and Architecture, respectively.

Each of the Laboratories, Shops, and Drawing Rooms mentioned above occupies at least one room, and in some cases more.

Moreover equipment very similar to laboratory equipment is sorely needed for:

Elocution (Charts, Phonographis, etc.);

Commercial Rooms (Typewriters, Charts, etc.).

This makes a total of thirty-two laboratories, five shops, and the Department of Drawing. The sum asked above would give about $340 a year for each of the laboratories, shops, etc. The distribution should not be necessarily equal. Some laboratories require more money at some times than others. Nothing that the Legislature can give comes so close to the teachers and students as the equipment of laboratories and libraries. If the Faculty and students could be allowed to vote they would ask for the equipment of laboratories and libraries next after the money necessary for salaries and current expenses. The wish of the entire Faculty and of our thirteen hundred students should have some weight. Moreover the judgment of the Curators and President sustains

this view.

7. Laying Granitoid Floor in Basement and Finishing Fourth Story of Academic Hall and Putting a Stair Way and a Floor in the Attic of each of three Department Buildings, $5,000.

There is not

For lack of

The University is sorely crowded for lack of room. on the quadrangle a vacant room known to the writer. better rooms much of the teaching has to be done in basements, damp and poorly lighted and poorly heated. The expenditure mentioned above would allow the University to use some valuable space in the basement and in four upper stories. If the same space were obtained by the erection of a separate building it would cost not less than $15,000. We are proposing to the State a measure of great economy. More space in some way the University must have.

8. Completion of Electric Light and Re-wiring of three Buildings, $3,100.

The re-wiring of three buildings is required by the Insurance Companies. We asked the 40th General Assembly for $3,000 for an Electric light plant. By actual estimate this was sufficient when the estimate was made, but owing to the Trusts and Combinations, prices have been more than doubled. A plant that we could have installed for $3,000 in the spring of 1898 costs $6,000 now. The University laments the rise in prices, but is powerless to control it. Our electrical machinery runs night and day. If it were to break it would consign to darkness the Club house for students. Moreover the electric plant is not strong enough to furnish all the light that we need. We still spend several hundreds of dollars a year for electric light from the town-plant. The figures given are from accurate estimates by experts.

9. Student Labor, $1,200.

This money is distributed among the students who work on the farm at the rate of ten cents an hour. The former appropriation has helped many a man to pay his way through the University by honest labor. No further argument is necessary.

10. Completion of Heating System of New Club house (including thermostats) and additional furnishings, $2,500.

It is impossible to regulate the heat at the Club house without supplying it with thermostats. This would conduce much to the health and comfort of the students and would save the University considerable money for coal. The lowest bid for the thermostats is $1,200. It will take $800 to complete the furnishing of the building. The bid on thermostats was taken when the Club house was completed, but the University did not have money enough then to install them. The Architect, Hon. H. H. Hohenschild of Rolla, joins us in earnestly recommending this appropriation. Because the students in the Club house are generally poor, the Legislature should not refuse them respectable furnishings or the comfort and health that would come from regulation of the temperature of the Club house. A new range and a bakery are imperatively needed. They will cost at least $500.

11. University Exhibit at World's Fair at St. Louis, $2,000.

We do not know how much it will take to make this exhibit. The University made a small exhibit at Omaha which cost about $600. We want to make one many times better at the World's Fair at St. Louis. As the fair is to be held in a Missouri city the University of Missouri should make a superb exhibit. It may take $2,000. It is possible that we could make a fine exhibit for less. It may take more than $2,000. Restoration and Preservation of Specimens in Zoological Museum, $3,000.

12.

We can not claim that the University needs these specimens imperatively in its daily work, but they have cost the State of Missouri probably $10,000. They make a fine collection but they will probably be ruined if in the next Biennial period they are not put in order by a competent Taxidermist and placed in dust and moth proof cases. We are recommending to the State to spend $3,000 in order to protect property that cost several times that sum. If the State allows the specimens to be ruined through failure to appropriate money for their restoration and preservation the University begs to be held guiltless. To this collection belong the celebrated elephant, a rhinoceros, a hippopotamus, a manatee, a family of gorillas, a crocodile, zebra, giraffe, tiger, bears, foxes, and scores of smaller animals. There is also a large collection of birds from different countries and another of Missouri fish. The complete list of specimens fills quite a large pamphlet. These specimens were well lodged and cared for in the old Museum. When the fire came they were hastily removed from the building in the midst of a snow storm. Every specimen was injured. They were temporarily housed in a little building specially erected for that purpose at the cost of about $300. When the present Museum Building was finished they were put in a large room entirely fire proof, built specially for them. There they are now. The University has never been able to employ a Taxidermist to put them in order. It has never been able to provide dust proof and moth proof cases in which to keep them. These specimens are still worth many thousands of dollars. It seems to us economy to preserve them. We estimate that it will take a Taxidermist at least a year to get the entire collection in order. He can, we think, be

secured for $1,000. Cases in which to protect the specimens forever hereafter from dust and moth bacteria and curious visitors would cost, according to estimate, $2,000. Therefore we ask $3,000 for the preservation of this property. Not a cent of it will be expended in additions. If this property is not cared for soon it will become entirely worthless.

13. Water Plant and Fire Protection, $8,000.

We pay the Water and Light Company of Columbia about $1,000 per annum for water. This water is, in our opinion, unfit to drink and it is scarcely suitable for laboratory purposes. Moreover by actual test it would not afford protection in time of fire to any building on the campus that is three stories high, from the fact that the mains on the campus are not large, and that the water comes through a meter which checks its flow. According to accurate estimates made by experts we could put in a plant of our own that would furnish us an admirable supply of good water and ample protection against fire for $8,000. If the plant is not given us we shall spend $2,000 of the $8,000 for water during the next Biennial period and shall be exposed to greater risk from fire. Mr. Hale, the Chief of the Fire Department of Kansas City, examined our protection against fire and reported emphatically in favor of a water-works plant of our own. In making the estimate we have complied with every suggestion that he made. The time should come when every State Institution should be independent of the town in which it is located in respect to water, light, fire protection, and cold storage. Chief Hale would be glad to appear before any Committee of the Legislature. I write of course in perfect friendliness of spirit to the Water and Light Company of Columbia which charges the University at very moderate rates. The University uses a large amount of water.

14.

Cold Storage for the Hospital, the Students Club House, and the Anatomical Hall, $5,000.

In order to supply our Medical students with anatomical material we have to take dead bodies whenever we can get them, winter or summer. We preserve them in formalin tanks, but the process is open. to many objections. It would be good for our Medical department if

we had cold storage in which the dead bodies could be kept at cold temperature, the year round. From the same plant, cold storage could be provided for the preservation of meats, vegetables, and fruits for the students Club house and the Hospital. This would greatly reduce the cost of provisions to the students many of whom are poor. A cold storage plant is rather expensive to erect, but the cost of maintaining it is very slight. It would not be a tithe of what the same refrigeration would cost if ice were used.

15. Ventilation of Academic Hall and the Buildings for Engineering, Biology, and Law, $6,000.

The statement that these buildings are badly ventilated because the University has never had money enough to provide ventilation ought to be all the argument needed. It is a shame that on the campus of the State University there should be a badly ventilated building. What can we expect of the district schools and the high schools when badly ventilated buildings are on the campus of the University. It means that to get an education our young men and young women must submit to a tax on their health.

16. For Experiment Station at Columbia, $3,500.

The State has not given the Experiment Station at Columbia a dollar for more than ten years, but has accepted the yearly grants from the Federal Government. The State for a dozen years has forced the Station to print its own bulletins, issued for the benefit of Missouri farmers, with money received from the United States. For years the plea was made that the State had no money for this purpose, but last session many thousands of dollars were appropriated for Experiment Station purposes in South Missouri. The University makes no objection to this, but submits the statement that the State ought to aid in the work at Columbia, which is of great value to the fruit growers and also to the stock breeders, stock feeders, and farmers of the commonwealth.