The University of Michigan

by Wilfred Byron Shaw

As has been suggested a great portion of the scientific investigations of the members of the Faculty of the University is reported in the form of monographs and briefer articles in various journals and special publications, and for this reason the names of many men of national and even international repute do not appear in the lists of those who have published books. Many of their publications also have taken the form of textbooks, some of them exceedingly important, but the list is so long that it would be impossible to do justice to all in a short survey.

Of the men in the Literary College whose reports and articles are given in the recent Bibliography a few may properly be mentioned. Thus the work of Professor Moses Gomberg, whose researches in the chemistry of triphenylmethyl won for him in 1914 the prize from the New York branch of the American Chemical Society for the most distinguished work of the year, has been given to the world since 1909 in the form of relatively short papers, some eighteen in all. Professor E.D. Campbell, in addition to the "History of the Chemical Laboratory of the University," has reported his investigations, largely in the chemical composition of steels, in eighteen papers. Professor William J. Hussey and Professor Ralph H. Curtiss have published respectively fourteen and seventeen papers, though many of them have been included in the 'publications' of the Observatory. Professor Hussey has also made a number of reports in Spanish of his work in the observatory at the South American University of La Plata. Other members of the Literary Faculty whose total publications might be mentioned are Professor E.C. Case, of the Departments of Geology and Paleontology, seventeen; Professor A.F. Shull, Zoölogy, twenty-two; Professor William H. Hobbs, Geology, twenty-six; Professor A.H. Lloyd, Philosophy, twenty-one; Professor Fred Newton Scott, Rhetoric, fifteen; and Professor H.H. Bartlett, Botany, thirty-one.

Almost every member of the Medical Faculty has made many contributions to various medical journals. The University Bibliography includes twelve papers by Professor A.M. Barrett, eighteen by Professor C.D. Camp, eighteen by Professor D.M. Cowie, fifteen by Professor G. Carl Huber, eighteen by Professor F.G. Novy, twenty-two by Professor Reuben Peterson, twenty-six by Professor U.J. Wile, and thirty-nine by Professor A.S. Warthin.

In the Law School Dean Henry M. Bates is represented by eleven papers and Professor Ralph W. Aigler by twenty-six.

The Dental College is represented by nineteen papers by Professor Russell W. Bunting and eleven by Professor C.J. Lyons, while the Homeopathic Medical School shows three books and eighteen articles by Professor W.A. Dewey.

During the late war the abilities of such members of the Faculty as were not in active service and the facilities of the University laboratories for research were employed widely by the Government. The Faculty of the Department of Chemical Engineering entered government service almost to a man and an entirely new teaching force had to be secured. Many technical questions, including those connected with poison gas warfare and the development of the government nitrate plants, whose erection was under the charge of Professor A.H. White, as Lieutenant-Colonel in the Army, were investigated in the Chemical Laboratories. The Department of Physics carried on extended researches in co-operation with the Bureau of Standards in Washington. Many special problems were investigated in the Medical Laboratories, as in the Department of Anatomy, where a study of the repair of peripheral nerves after severance was instituted by Dr. G. Carl Huber, first under the National Research Council, later under the office of the Surgeon General, which sent several medical officers to the University for purposes of instruction and to assist him. Dr. Stacey R. Guild, instructor in Anatomy, also made some valuable experiments in war deafness. Special investigations were carried on in the Bacteriological Laboratories under Dr. Novy, in the Pathological Laboratory under Dr. Warthin, and in the Psychopathic Hospital, where Dr. Barrett, while training successive increments of medical officers every six weeks, carried on special investigations in mental disorders arising from the war.

As was to be expected the technical training of the professional staff of the Engineering College and the resources of the laboratories were employed extensively by the Government. This was particularly true of the Department of Marine Engineering, where Professor H.C. Sadler studied the important problem of standardized types of ships, until he became Head of the Bureau of Design with the Shipping Board, when his work in the Naval Tank was carried on by Professor E.M. Bragg.

It cannot be claimed of course that this record in scientific inquiry and advanced scholarship will equal what has been done in certain other universities, whose riper traditions and great endowments have enabled them to carry on special investigations, establish research professorships and support publications, which have thus far proved impossible for a state institution, whose first obligation rests in its relations with the people of the commonwealth. Nevertheless Michigan has been happy in this, as in so many other respects. The liberality and sympathetic understanding of the public opinion upon which the success of the University rests fundamentally, have enabled it to develop scholarly ideals and a recognition of true scholarship which have given Michigan a high rank among American universities.

This fortunate and early recognition of the highest mission of the University was made possible only through co-operation on the part of the Regents, who, as the governing body, have been able on the one side to encourage scholarly ideals in spite of the occasional lack of appreciation of the University's aims on the part of some individual members of the Board, and, on the other, to secure and preserve the University's freedom, threatened by the efforts of the State Legislature to interfere with its affairs. This relationship of the Regents to the maintenance of the University, and to the State, has had a very important effect upon the development of higher learning and research and may therefore properly be outlined at some length in this place.

The University has been truly fortunate for the most part in the men who have composed the governing body. There have been times, it is true, when relations between the Regents and the Faculties have been far from ideal, but it is no less true that the history of the past eighty years will show a remarkable spirit of co-operation and harmony between the two bodies. Otherwise the University could not have become what it is. While the Regents for the most part have not been men primarily interested, or trained, in educational matters, they have taken their duties seriously and have been unselfish in their service for the institution, with no reward for their labors save the honor inherent in their office. They have sought earnestly to understand the problems before them, and, in whatever measures they took, to keep always before them the welfare of the University as a whole. With the ever increasing numbers enrolling as students and the consequent well-nigh irresistible pressure for elementary and the so-called "practical" courses, they have been strong enough and wise enough, and sufficiently sympathetic with the scholarly preoccupations of the leaders of the constantly growing Faculties, to maintain and encourage the higher aims of the University as a center of learning. It is true that the Board is sometimes criticized for taking upon itself functions which might with propriety rest with the Faculties and their administrative officers, but there is at least a legal justification for this in the legislative provisions upon which the powers of the Board of Regents rest. Thus in the Act of March 18, 1837, the Regents are empowered to "enact laws for the government of the University," and to appoint the professors and tutors and fix their salaries. The number of professorships was specified and fixed at thirteen; though it was provided in the first organization that;