ments of society. The Legislature did no more at its session in 1850 than to pass a joint resolution (approved April 2,) requesting our Senators and Representatives in Congress to use all honorable means to secure a grant of lands from Congress for the establishment and endowment of an Agricultural College, and to establish a Bureau of Agriculture at Washington. An act approved March 25th, of the same year, (1850,) authorized the Board of Education, and made it their "duty, from time to time, as the means at their disposal may warrant, to provide," in connection with the Normal School, "suitable grounds and buildings, implements of husbandry and mechanical tools," etc., for instruction "in the mechanic arts and in the arts of husbandry and agricultural chemistry." While in ac cordance with this provision some attempt was made to introduce agriculture as a study in the Normal School, to which fact Mr. Sherman, Superintendent of Public Instruction, called the attention of the State Agricultural Society in September, 1852, the University went still further, and instituted a two months course of daily lectures, in the spring of 1853.

These, according to the programme presented by Dr. Tappan, President of the University, to the Secretary of the Agricultural Society, consisted of lectures on chemistry, its application, meteorology, climate, geology, animal and vegetable physiology, diseases of animals, habits of insects, agricultural chemistry, &c. In 1854, the Rev. Charles Fox, A. M., editor of thé Michigan Farmer, was appointed Lecturer on Theoretical and Practical Agriculture. He was soon removed by death, and his place has never been filled. Mr. Fox was a man of rare qualifications for the place he filled, a man beloved and mourned by the whole State. A committee of the State Society visited both the University and the Normal School; but while they expressed themselves highly gratified at what was done in those Institutions for agricultural education, they were unanimously of opinion that an Institution was needed especially for the ed. ucation of the farmer. We find them petitioning the Legislature of 1853 for a College, to be under the control of the Regents,

but not to be "in immediate proximity to any existing educational institution." Again, in December, 1854, the executive committee "Resolved, that it is the sense of the committee that an Agricultural School should be entirely separate from any other Institution." They again petitioned the Legislature, and presented to the committee in the Legislature a bill for its establishment and organization, which with one or two amendments became a law. So wholly has the Institution been the creature of the farmers of the State, through the action of their State Society. It is they who insisted upon it, and upon the characteristics of farm, labor, and a liberal course of instruc

tion.

The act for the establishment of the "Agricultural College of the State of Michigan," was approved February 12, 1855. It authorized the President and Executive Committee of the State Agricultural Society "to select, subject to the approval of the State Board of Education, a location and site for a State Agricultural School, within ten miles of Lansing." It was to be not less than 500 acres nor more than 1,000, and in one body. The amount to be paid was not to exceed fifteen dollars per acre, and the conveyance was to be made to the State of Michigan.

The same act appropriated twenty-two sections of salt spring lands for the establishment of the College, from which the Institution at once realized $56,320. The act put the College under the direction of the State Board of Education. It prescribed, in general terms, the course of instruction, as an English and scientific course, introducing among more professional studies, political economy. It required three hours manual labor of the students daily during the first term of each year, from the first Wednesday of April to the last Wednesday of October. Tuition was to be forever free to pupils from the State, and the Board of Education were to fix the wages to be paid pupils for their labor. Such were the distinguishing features of the act.

On the 12th of June, 1855, the executive committee of the State Agricultural Society met at Lansing to select a site and

farm for the Agricultural College. The afternoon of the 12th was devoted to a very instructive address from Professor J. C. Holmes, Secretary of the Society, who had identified himself with the movement from the first. The College continues to this day to enjoy the cordial support of this gentleman. For some time an officer of the College, he feels identified with its success, and no season passes without substantial tokens of his regard. The 13th, 14th and 15th days of June were spent by the committee in the examination of nine offers of land, and the present site of 676 acres was unanimously selected by the committee, and afterwards approved by the Board of Education. The Farm embraces a great variety of soil, from heavy clay to light sand, with oak groves, heavy timber, and muck bed. The Cedar river runs through the Farm. Most of the soil is of the finest quality.

The Board of Education procured the erection of a Boarding Hall of brick, eighty-two by forty-three feet, three stories and basement, a College Building fifty by one hundred feet, three stories and basement, a stable, twenty-eight by forty feet, 300 feet of shed, and four dwelling houses for professors, all being of brick. They spared no expense on the Chemical Laboratory. Philosophical apparatus, mathematical instruments and other means of illustration were purchased. The State Agricultural Society, by resolution of 15th January, 1857, donated its library to the College. The cost prior to opening was $69,793 73.

The College went into operation the 13th of May, 1857, under the charge of Joseph R. Williams, A. M., President, four pro. fessors and an assistant in chemistry. It was dedicated with appropriate ceremonies, addresses and music, in the presence of a large concourse of citizens. President Williams delivered at that time his inaugural address. The number of students was sixty-one. The winter term numbered one hundred and one. The summer term of 1858 numbered ninety-eight. The next winter term eighty-six. At the close of the second year, President Williams resigned.

These two years were years of severe trial to the Institution. No service more pure and unceasing could be rendered, than was given to the interests of the Institution by its President; but Mr. Williams had been in political life, and the Collage was made at once the object of bitter party feeling. The buildings had been insecurely made, and large outlays were demanded to render them trustworthy. A wet spring and severe drought afterwards, made the crops to be meagre. Articles of every kind were unusually high during the building and furnishing at the College, so that at the end of two years the original grant of $56,320, and an appropriation of $40,000 had been spent, and an additional debt incurred of $13,472 73.*

But perhaps the chief fault with the Institution was the lack of practical instruction in agriculture. It was everywhere and by all parties admitted, that the academic instruction was of high order; all visitors at examinations or at other times so reported invariably. But the farm was new, the farming was inferior to what good farmers elsewhere practiced, and the labor was not instructive to the pupil.

It was not taken into consideration that the land was mostly uncleared of the native trees, and that the first toil must be put forth in gaining fields and draining soils, in logging and fencing. It was the misfortune of the Institution that the newness of the location rendered it unable to take advantage of the first enthusiasm which could not but be excited in regard to an enterprise so novel and promising so largely. The President in his inaugural had used the following language: "Friends and enemies will demand too much, and that too early. The acorn we plant to-day will not branch into a majestic oak to-morrow. The orchard we plant this year, will not offer a harvest of fruit the next. The Institution itself, like the seeds, the plants, the trees, the breeds, the very implements which come under its ordeal, require patience, wisdom, time for trial and development."

At this time the very purpose for which the Institution was founded was made a subject of common debate. Very many,

the President of the College being of their opinion, thought its first use to be the providing of a place where the student's labor should lessen his expenses in acquiring a good English and scientific education. Professional study was not ignored, but was thrown somewhat in the background. Others on the contrary thought the school should be purely professional, as much so as a School of Medicine or of Law. After the resignation of the President, the College continued on the old basis without a President for one year. The Board of Education, after considerable attention, declared in December, 1859, this to be their opinion, and a re-organization of the College was resolved upon. The course of instruction was cut down from four to two years, and five departments of instruction were made, viz:

1. Department of Agricultural Chemistry;

5.

Theory and Practice of Agriculture.

The Board of Education at the same time recommended that a Board of Agriculture, to whom the Institution should be intrusted, should be created by the Legislature.

The Faculty of the College at once resigned, but were in part re-appointed to professorships. The new system never had a perfectly fair trial. It proved unpopular with the old students, who had entered on a full course, to whom, as a temporary measure, considerable departures from the plan were allowed. The State Society appointed a committee to 'examine into the expediency of the change. The next Legislature, 1860, agreeably to the request of the Board of Education, created a Board of Agriculture, into whose care the College was intrusted.

The Board of Education practiced the most rigid economy during the years 1859 and 1860. There being no President, they personally audited every account before its payment. The result was that they left the Institution entirely free from debt, and out of an appropriation for the two years of $37,500, left unexpended some $3,300. The appropriation made by the Leg