Autobiography of Andrew Dickson White — Volume 1

by Andrew Dickson White

As to the other part of the plan, I secured Agassiz, Lowell, Curtis, Bayard Taylor, Goldwin Smith, Theodore Dwight, George W. Greene, John Stanton Gould, and at a later period Froude, Freeman, and others, as non-resident professors and lecturers. Of the final working of this system I shall speak later.

The question of buildings also arose; but, alas! I could not reproduce my air-castles. For our charter required us to have the university in operation in October, 1868, and there was no time for careful architectural preparation. Moreover, the means failed us. All that we could then do was to accept a fairly good plan for our main structures; to make them simple, substantial, and dignified; to build them of stone from our own quarries; and so to dispose them that future architects might so combine other buildings with them as to form an impressive quadrangle on the upper part of the university property. To this plan Mr. Cornell gave his hearty assent. It was then arranged, with his full sanction, that the university buildings should ultimately consist of two great groups: the first or upper group to be a quadrangle of stone, and the second or lower group to be made up of buildings of brick more freely disposed, according to our future needs and means. Although this plan has unfortunately been departed from in some minor respects, it has in general turned out well.

Having called a number of professors and seen foundations laid for ``Morrill Hall,'' I sailed in April of 1868 for Europe, in order to study technical institutions, to purchase needed equipment, and to secure certain professors such as could not then be found in our own country. Thus far my knowledge of higher education in Europe had been confined almost entirely to the universities; but now I went carefully through various technical institutions, among them the English Agricultural College at Cirencester, the Agricultural Experiment Station at Rothamstead, the French Agricultural College at Grignon, the Conservatoire des Arts et M<e'>tiers at Paris, the Veterinary School at Alfort, the German Agricultural College at Hohenheim, the Technical School and Veterinary College at Berlin, and others. As to equipment, wherever I found valuable material I bought it. Thus were brought together for our library a very large collection of books in all the principal departments; physical and chemical apparatus from London, Paris, Heidelberg, and Berlin; chemicals from Berlin and Erfurt; the only duplicate of the royal collection of cereals and grasses and the great collection of British patent-office publications from the British imperial authorities; the Rau models of plows from Hohenheim; the Brendel plant models from Breslau; the models of machine movements from London, Darmstadt, and Berlin; the plastic models of Auzoux from Paris; and other apparatus and instruments from all parts of Europe, with diagrams and drawings from every institution where I could find them. During three months, from funds furnished by the university, by Mr. Cornell personally, and, I may be allowed to add, from my own personal resources, I expended for these purposes over sixty thousand dollars, a sum which in those days represented much more than in these.

As to non-resident professors, I secured in London Goldwin Smith, who had recently distinguished himself by his works as a historian and as regius professor of history at Oxford; and I was successful in calling Dr. James Law, who, though a young man, had already made himself a name in veterinary science. It seemed to many a comical juxtaposition, and various witticisms were made at my expense over the statement that I had ``brought back an Oxford professor and a Scotch horse-doctor.'' But never were selections more fortunate. Goldwin Smith, by his high character, his broad and deep scholarship, his devotion not only to his professorship but to the general university work, his self-denial in behalf of the university and its students, rendered priceless services. He bore all privations cheerfully and braved all discouragements manfully. Never were there better historical lectures than his. They inspired us all, and the impulse then given is still felt. So, too, Dr. Law, in his field, was invaluable, and this was soon felt throughout the State. Of him I shall speak later.

CHAPTER XX

THE FIRST YEARS OF CORNELL UNIVERSITY—1868-1870

On the 7th of October, 1868, came the formal opening of the university. The struggle for its charter had attracted much attention in all parts of the State, and a large body of spectators, with about four hundred students, assembled at the Cornell Library Hall in Ithaca. Though the charter had required us to begin in October, there had seemed for some time very little chance of it. Mr. Cornell had been absent in the woods of the upper Mississippi and on the plains of Kansas, selecting university lands; I had been absent for some months in Europe, securing plans and equipment; and as, during our absence, the contractor for the first main building, Morrill Hall, had failed, the work was wretchedly behindhand. The direct roads to the university site were as yet impracticable, for the Cascadilla ravine and the smaller one north of it were still unbridged. The grounds were unkempt, with heaps of earth and piles of material in all directions. The great quantities of furniture, apparatus, and books which I had sent from Europe had been deposited wherever storage could be found. Typical was the case of the large Holtz electrical machine from Germany. It was in those days a novelty, and many were anxious to see it; but it could not be found, and it was only discovered several weeks later, when the last pots and pans were pulled out of the kitchen store-room in the cellar of the great stone barrack known as Cascadilla House. All sorts of greatly needed material had been delayed in steamships and on railways, or was stuck fast in custom-houses and warehouses from Berlin and Paris to Ithaca. Our friends had toiled heroically during our absence, but the little town—then much less energetic than now—had been unable to furnish the work required in so short a time. The heating apparatus and even the doors for the students' rooms were not in place until weeks after winter weather had set in. To complicate matters still more, students began to come at a period much earlier and in numbers far greater than we had expected; and the first result of this was that, in getting ready for the opening, Mr. Cornell and myself were worn out. For two or three days before my inauguration both of us were in the hands of physicians and in bed, and on the morning of the day appointed we were taken in carriages to the hall where the ceremony was to take place. To Mr. Cornell's brief speech I have alluded elsewhere; my own presented my ideas more at length. They were grouped in four divisions. The first of these related to ``Foundation Ideas,'' which were announced as follows: First, the close union of liberal and practical instruction; second, unsectarian control; third, a living union between the university and the whole school system of the State; fourth, concentration of revenues for advanced education. The second division was that of ``Formative Ideas''; and under these—First, equality between different courses of study. In this I especially developed ideas which had occurred to me as far back as my observations after graduation at Yale, where the classical students belonging to the ``college proper'' were given a sort of supremacy, and scientific students relegated to a separate institution at considerable distance, and therefore deprived of much general, and even special, culture which would have greatly benefited them. Indeed, they seemed not considered as having any souls to be saved, since no provision was made for them at the college chapel. Second, increased development of scientific studies. The third main division was that of ``Governmental Ideas''; and under these— First, ``the regular and frequent infusion of new life into the governing board.'' Here a system at that time entirely new in the United States was proposed. Instead of the usual life tenure of trustees, their term was made five years and they were to be chosen by ballot. Secondly, it was required that as soon as the graduates of the university numbered fifty they should select one trustee each year, thus giving the alumni one third of the whole number elected. Third, there was to be a system of self-government administered by the students themselves. As to this third point, I must frankly confess that my ideas were vague, unformed, and finally changed by the logic of events. As the fourth and final main division, I presented ``Permeating Ideas''; and of these—First, the development of the individual man in all his nature, in all his powers, as a being intellectual, moral, and religious. Secondly, bringing the powers of the man thus developed to bear usefully upon society.

In conclusion, I alluded to two groups of ``Eliminated Ideas,'' the first of these being the ``Ideas of the Pedants,'' and the second the ``Ideas of the Philistines.'' As to the former, I took pains to guard the institution from those who, in the higher education, substitute dates for history, gerund-grinding for literature, and formulas for science; as to the latter, I sought to guard it from the men to whom ``Gain is God, and Gunnybags his Prophet.''

At the close, referring to Mr. Cornell, who had been too weak to stand while delivering his speech, and who was at that moment sitting near me, I alluded to his noble plans and to the opposition, misrepresentation, and obloquy he had met thus far, and in doing so turned toward him. The sight of him, as he thus sat, looking so weak, so weary, so broken, for a few moments utterly incapacitated me. I was myself, at the time, in but little better condition than he; and as there rushed into my mind memories of the previous ten days at his house, when I had heard him groaning in pain through almost every night, it flashed upon me how utterly hopeless was the university without his support. My voice faltered; I could for a moment say no- thing; then came a revulsion. I asked myself, ``What will this great audience think of us?'' How will our enemies, some of whom I see scattered about the audience, exult over this faltering at the outset! A feeling of shame came over me; but just at that moment I saw two or three strong men from different parts of the State, among them my old friend Mr. Sedgwick of Syracuse, in the audience, and Mr. Sage and Mr. McGraw among the trustees, evidently affected by my allusion to the obloquy and injustice which Mr. Cornell had met thus far. This roused me. But I could no longer read; I laid my manuscript aside and gave the ending in words which occurred to me as I stood then and there. They were faltering and inadequate; but I felt that the vast majority in that audience, representing all parts of our commonwealth, were with us, and I asked nothing more.

In the afternoon came exercises at the university grounds. The chime of nine bells which Miss Jenny McGraw had presented to us had been temporarily hung in a wooden tower placed very near the spot where now stands the porch of the library; and, before the bells were rung for the first time, a presentation address was delivered by Mr. Francis Miles Finch, since justice of the Court of Appeals of the State and dean of the University Law School; and this was followed by addresses from the superintendent of public instruction, and from our non- resident professors Agassiz and George William Curtis.