In this current school year there are one hundred and seventy-five undergraduate students, among them men from Maine, California, and Florida; while during the fourteen years of its existence the school has had among its members students from nearly every State in the Union, the Territories, and District of Columbia, as well as several from the Empire of Japan.
The graduates now number about six hundred and fifty, and the school is to be congratulated on the success which many of them have attained in professional and public life. In this Commonwealth, during the year just closed, the alumni counted among them members of the Governor's Council, State Senators, Mayors, District Attorneys, Registers of Probate, Representatives, and Clerks of Courts; while in some of the Western States graduates, though still young, wear judicial honors.
The many friends of the school suffered a great loss in the recent sudden death of Mr. John E. Wetherbee. At thirty years of age he had already earned for himself a substantial practice, and his constant application to the study of law, together with an easy and impressive delivery, gave his instruction at the school peculiar power. Some burden too heavy for him to bear brought his work to a sudden close. Those who were accustomed to meet him, and look for him, and listen to him, will find it hard to realize that they will see him no more. His work at the school is now in the hands of Mr. Albers, Mr. Smith, Mr. Jenney, and Mr. J. G. Thorp, Dr.
A course of lectures on Railroad Law is now being given, for the first time, by J. H. Benton, Jr., the counsel for the Old Colony Railroad Company; and the course on Real Property, which was but partially completed by Mr. Wetherbee, has been taken up by Christopher G. Tiedeman, now Professor of Law in the University of Missouri.
It is safe to say that everything that means, intelligence, experience, and hard work can suggest, to continue the school at its present high grade of excellence, will be afforded by those who are, and who will be, intrusted with the charge; and it is proper to add that the school has benefited greatly by the untiring efforts of Mr. Samuel C. Bennett (son of Judge Bennett), who is now Assistant Dean, and also one of the regular instructors, and who faithfully seconds the work of his father in the general direction of affairs.
The school already has a large and valuable library, and an annual appropriation is made by the University for its care and increase. The State Library, Boston Public Library, and Social Law Library, all of which are in the immediate neighborhood of the school, afford every possible facility for extra investigation.
FOOTNOTES:
[A] Prof. Wm. Mathews, LL.D., in Bay State Monthly, November, 1885.