Indiana University - Arbutus Yearbook (Bloomington, IN)

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J J Introduction ff ff ff ff x N P 1 ERE is our book. We have used our best efforts to make it a true representative of life in our Alma Mater. Noth- ing has been createdg We have merely recorded the hop- penings of a college year. Now it is left in your hands - do with it what you will. We, hope it has some merits -if so, recognize them. It has its faults-criticize them leniently. So, trusting in you for iustice, the Class of '98 bows herself from the scene of college life Leaving you this Souvenir . of one more Happy College cfYear.

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Lon' A, SMARIT. ED. J. RABER. . LEWIS A. HOLMAN. IRA BQRDNER. O. H. RHOADS. ELIZABETH WASMUTH. ERNEST P. WILES. GEO. D. FORKNER. ANNA S'rUI.'rz MARY O. KOLB. CLAUDE MCD. HAMIr.'roN, Editor-in-Chief. Em-'A JOHNSON WILL A. REED, Business Manager. Y : E1--f-- ..-gf g I

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illIlIi ll lIIlI ff ff ff ndiana IT University ff ff ff , lllilllllllllIlllllIlllI HE Constitution of Indiana, adopted at Corydon, June 19, 1816, contained the following section: lt shall be the duty of the General Assembly, as soon as circumstances will permit, to provide by law for a general system of educa- tion, ascending in a regular gradation from township schools to a State University, wherein tuition shall be gratis and equally open to all. This section of the Constitution exemplifies the spirit of democracy and patriotism in the minds of the Hoosier pioneers. Indiana was yet a wilderness when Congress passed the act, April 19, 1816, providing for the admission of this Territory into the sisterhood of States. The iirst step had not yet been taken to prepare this great State for what she has become to-day. All the perils of settling a new and wild country confronted the iii-st citizens of the new State. Time has proven that our forefathers realized that in education the principles of sound government and true democracy rested. It was made a part of the Act of Congress creating the State, that one entire township, which shall be designated by the President of the United States, in addition to the one heretofore reserved for that purpose, shall be reserved for the use of a Seminary of learning and vested in the Legislature of said State, to be appropriated solely to the use of such Seminary by the said Legislature. It is in this provision of the State Constitution that we End the germ of Indiana University. According to the above, President Madison designated township number eight, range one west, as the township to be set apart for this purpose. The county in which this township laid, when organized in 1818, was christened Monroe, from ex-President Monroe, and the township designated received its name from that of Commo- dore Perry. It was also made a part of the Constitution that no lands granted for the use of schools or seminaries of learning shall be sold by authority ol' the State prior to the year 1820? In accordance with this provision, no action was taken to dispose of the lands until 1820. An act was passed by the Legislature, January 28, 1820, to establish a State Seminary. This was the beginning of our State University. The terms of this act provided for the establishment of the Seminary at Bloomington, near the seminary township, and made Charles Dewey, Jonathan Lindley, David H. Maxwell, John M. Jenkins and Jonathan Nichols a Board of Trustees. When this bill hung in the balance in the Senate, with five votes for it and Eve against, Lieutenant-Governor Ratcliife Boone gave the deciding vote that launched Indiana University into the path of, educational influence. Father David H. Maxwell was in the lobby in the interest of the new Seminary when the fate of Indiana University was so uncertain, and to his influence may be attributed the final passage of the bill. If our politic Presi- dent had been seen in the atmosphere of the two last legislative assemblies, it would have' been observed that the iilibustering instinct of the initiatory mind of the University had been well preserved.