grant), and that the other half should be devoted to the establishment and endowment of a new institution in the northern part of the State. The minority report urged the bestowal of the whole grant upon a small institution at College Hill, near Cincinnati, then known as Farmers' College. Fortunately for the interests sought to be benefited by the grant, neither report was approved by the legislature. The subject continued in agitation with the sentiment apparently growing in favor of the establishment of a new institution that should be unfettered by old ties and traditions. The State board of agriculture, by resolutions, protests, and petitions, succeeded in crystallizing general public feeling against any division of the fund or the establishment of more than one college to take its benefit.

In this connection an article by Hon. Ralph Leete, of Ironton, is worthy of special note. He advised that the State resume direct control of the educational trusts of Ohio University and Miami University and uniting their funds with that from the agricultural grant found a new and broad university creditable to the State, at a central location, wherein agriculture and the mechanic arts and other arts and branches of science as well should find place. This proposition, which from an educational standpoint contained much wisdom, was opposed by both universities directly concerned, and also by many denominational colleges in the State that seemed to dislike the idea of a strong university founded and sustained by the State. Mr. Leete's proposal, which embodied the sound idea that the State, in its efforts in behalf of higher education, should concentrate its attention and assistance upon one or at most two colleges, failed to receive public approval.

In 1868 a joint commission of the two houses of the general assembly was appointed to receive and report propositions for the location of the college. As from the first commission, a double report was made and the general assembly took no action.

The conditions of the grant making it necessary that a college be organized by July, 1872, in order to receive the endowment, forced the general assembly to hasten to some definite conclusion. Accordingly, in March, 1870, an act was passed which is usually considered as the foundation stone of the university. This act was an elaborate piece of legislation for the creation of the Ohio Agricultural and Mechanical College; the appointment by the governor of a board of trustees consisting of one member from each Congressional district in the State; conferring upon this board the powers usually exercised by such bodies, and making it the duty of the board to locate the college before October 15 following (1870) upon land, "not less than 100 acres, which in their judgment is best suited to the purposes of said institution, the same being reasonably central in the State and accessible by railroad from different parts thereof, having regard to healthfulness of location and also regarding the best interests of the college in the receipt of moneys, lands, or other property donated to said college by any county,

town, or individual in consideration of the location of said college at a given place." (67 Ohio Laws, 20.)

At the same time a law was passed authorizing any county in the State so desiring, by vote of the electors, to issue bonds and give the proceeds to the college as a donation to secure its location within the county. (67 Ohio Laws, 95.)

The act just referred to as organizing the college was passed during the administration of Governor R. B. Hayes, who, from the beginning, had shown great interest in the projected institution, and who now manifested that interest actively in the appointment of an excellent board of trustees, the majority of whom were already deeply interested in the subject and well qualified for the duties laid upon them.1

An address was soon issued by the board, setting forth the aims of the college and inviting the various counties to submit propositions of donations for providing sites, buildings, and equipment for it. Four counties responded, one offering $400,000, a second promising $300,000, and the other two $200,000 each; each of these offers was, of course, conditioned upon the location of the college within the county making the offer. After a careful and prolonged consideration the trustees finally accepted the proposition of Franklin County, which had offered $300,000 in 7 per cent. bonds. October 13, 1870, a fine farm of 325 acres, now within the corporate limits of Columbus, was purchased at a cost of $117,508. The donation of Franklin County was increased $28,000 by citizens of Columbus and two railroads entering the city.

The reason for locating the college at Columbus in spite of the larger cash offer of another county is found in the fact that Columbus is the capital city of Ohio and the policy of the State has been to group the State institutions, when practicable, at the capital, where they can more easily be subject to inspection and direction; and also in the fact that Columbus is more centrally located, Governor Hayes, though not a member of the board, favored the location at Columbus and doubtless had influence with the trustees. The wisdom of the location has been proved by subsequent events, and, from a financial standpoint, has been more than justified, as the farm is already worth many times its cost to the university, and in a decade or two its value will have so appreciated that the sale of a portion of the land, which can well be spared, would give the university an endowment surpassed by that of few colleges in the country.

The site having been fixed, plans were prepared for what is known. as the "main building" and the structure completed in 1873 at a cost of about $125,000 paid from the Franklin County donation, the remainder of this fund being used for equipment and for improving and stocking the farm.

'It has been one of the pieces of good fortune that have befailen the college that President Hayes, who, in the infancy of the college, had so interested himself in its affairs, was in 1887 himself appointed a trustee of the institution.

ORGANIZATION OF THE WORK OF THE COLLEGE.

From the very outset in Ohio, as in other States where the acceptance and application of the grant of 1862 came under discussion, there arose great diversity of opinion as to the scope and character of an institution "where the leading object shall be, without excluding other scientific and classical studies, and including military tactics, to teach such branches of learning as are related to agriculture and the mechanic arts, in order to promote the liberal and practical education of the industrial classes in the several pursuits and professions of life." It is proper here to dwell upon the discussion which arose, only in so far as it affected the subsequent organization of the college.

Governor Brough, in a message to the general assembly of 1865, in discussing the proposed college, maintained (1) that it was the intention of Congress to provide for the instruction of the laboring classes in that which pertains to their own calling in order that they may make practical and manual application of it; (2) that the instruction should be "plain and practical, not theoretic and artistically scientific in its character;" (3) that it is manifestly intended that this instruction shall be such that "its recipients, instead of becoming detached from laboring interests, will return to them." The governor evidently believed the design of Congress to be that these institutions should merely teach practical agriculture and the "mechanic's trade" and that whatever did not bear directly upon such practical education was hardly within the scope of the projected institution.

On the other hand the State school commissioner, E. E. White, until recently superintendent of the public schools of Cincinnati, in his annual report for 1864 held that the object was "to promote the liberal and practical education of the industrial classes;" that the college must furnish facilities for a liberal as well as a practical education. "Nothing less wide and thorough. will meet the specific terms of the grant." which aims to secure the "liberal" education of the industrial classes" as a necessary basis of their practical' or professional education."

These two views, thus officially held by two different branches of the State government, were widely and warmly discussed for several years, but fortunately until 1870, when the college was chartered, no decision that would hamper its trustees had been reached and in the organic law of the institution the trustees were given full power "to fix and regu late the course of instruction." The question and its settlement were thus transferred to the board of trustees. At their first meeting, May 11, 1870, before the college had been located, a resolution that "thie course of study should be that only pertaining to agriculture, stock, and mechanic arts," provoked warm discussion, one side maintaining that "the college should educate our farmers as farmers and our mechanics as mechanics," while the other party urged that "the college was not