James M. Crafts, President, 1897–1900.
In reviewing the success which this school has attained, the question naturally presents itself: To what is this success due? Let me here record my conviction that it has been due mainly to the courage and devotion of its corporation and of the presidents who have directed its policy. In this respect no institution was ever more fortunate. With a guiding body possessed of the courage and faith that have animated the corporation of the institution from the earliest days, and especially with the able men who have been its presidents, success was assured. While the school was yet struggling for its very existence, with few friends and little money, they never faltered. They have not hesitated again and again to plunge the school deeply into debt when its needs required it, trusting to the generosity of New England that it should not be allowed to be crippled, and each time has their confidence been justified. Poverty has never been permitted to impair the efficiency of the school. As President Crafts remarked in a recent annual report, “We are less favored than many neighboring institutions in building space, but we have always followed the wise policy of keeping in the foremost rank and in some departments leading the way in supplying the best methods and apparatus for teaching and for making investigation. We have run in debt to buy them, and run still further in debt to build houses to hold them, but we have always had them when the head of a department told the government of the school that they were necessary to the most efficient teaching of his science.” With a corporation acting on such a principle there could be no failure. It is true that the faculty have stood unfalteringly, even in the darkest days, for high scholarship; and equally true that the school has been remarkably fortunate in the character of the young men who have sought its halls, but no faculty and no body of students could have brought success with a corporation less broadminded and courageous. Let me here add my tribute to the work which was done by the late General Francis A. Walker, president of the institute from 1881 till 1897. Probably no single person did more to secure the success of the school than he. His great administrative ability, his wide acquaintance, his accurate judgment of men, his magnificent courage and his splendid enthusiasm, were factors in the development of the school whose importance it is difficult to overestimate.
General Walker was succeeded by President James M. Crafts, who had been connected with the Institute for many years as professor of chemistry, and under whose energetic administration the progress of the Institute has been steadily continued. In fact, thanks to some unexpected additions to the funds of the school, its material resources and its equipment have been more enlarged and extended during the past three years than in many years previous. Only a few months ago, however, President Crafts, desiring to devote himself more uninterruptedly to the pursuit of the science which first awakened his enthusiasm and in which he has attained such eminent distinction, both in this country and abroad, decided to relinquish his office. The corporation has chosen as his successor, Dr. Henry S. Pritchett, for many years professor of astronomy in Washington University, St. Louis, and for the past few years superintendent of the Coast and Geodetic Survey at Washington. A more fortunate selection could not have been made, and the well-known scientific and administrative ability of Dr. Pritchett will no doubt be the means not only of maintaining the present high reputation of the school, but of extending and enlarging it.
Unfortunately, the Institute is still unendowed in the sense that its receipts from invested property constitute but a very small part of the means required to carry on the school. To quote from one of President Walker’s reports, “No other institution of our size but has two, three or four times the amount of wealth to draw upon which we possess. It has only been exceeding good fortune, combined with extreme courage, energy and self-devotion on the part of its trustees and teachers that has more than once rescued the school from paralysis, if not from extinction.” In 1898–’99, the total expenditures of the school were about $367,500, while the current receipts were about $347,500, showing a deficit of about $20,000. Of the current receipts, $207,000, or 59 per cent, were from students’ fees. Dividing the total expenditures by the number of students, we find an expenditure of $314 per student, without counting interest on the value of land and buildings, while the tuition fee is $200. The invested funds of the Institute amount to but $1,917,000. All gifts and legacies, with the exception of this amount, have had to go into land, buildings and equipment. Between 1888 and 1899 the Institute has been obliged to spend $350,000 for land, the purchase of which has been a great burden, and within a few years a further expenditure of $260,000 in this direction has been made.
Henry S. Pritchett, President-Elect of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
The bearing of these figures will perhaps be realized by comparing them with similar figures regarding Cornell University, which is largely a technical school, since nearly one half of its students pursue technical courses similar to those in the Institute. In 1898 the total income of that university was $583,000, of which about $121,000, or only 20 per cent, was received from tuition fees. Its invested funds amounted to $6,446,818.
The State has generously given aid to the Institute in some of its most trying times; as in 1888, when it gave $200,000, one half unconditionally and the other half for the support of free scholarships; and again in 1895, when it granted unconditionally $25,000 a year for six years and $2,000 a year additional for scholarships. Although the school has a very inadequate endowment, yet the future looks bright. It is significant of the general appreciation of its work that men and women who have not received a technical education have devoted a large part of their fortunes to providing such education for others. Among the recent benefactors of the Institute we may name Henry L. Pierce, John W. Randall, Mrs. Julia B. Huntington James and Edward Austin, who, within less than three years have bequeathed nearly a million and a half dollars to the school. If the large gifts of recent years are continued, the school will before long be put financially upon a level with its neighbors. May we not hope that as the applications of science to the arts enrich the alumni and friends of the Institute, they may help to make the road easy for their successors by devoting a part of their riches to the advancement of technical education?