Texas A and M University - Aggieland Yearbook (College Station, TX)

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a In compliance with a general demand and in response to numerous petitions, in the year 1859, a bill to “ promote the liberal and practical education of the industrial classes,” drawn with great care by the able and practical statesman, Hon. Justin S. Murrell, of Vermont, was passed by both houses of Congress. It proposed to give to the several States and Territories 20,000 acres of land for each of their Senators and Representatives in Congress for the purpose above indicated. The bill was vetoed by President Buchanan. In 1862 a similar bill was passed which increased the number to 30,000 acres of land to the States and Terri¬ tories for each of their members in both houses of Congress. This bill was approved by Abraham Lincoln, July 2d, 1862, establishing upon a national basis this new system of education, constituting by its methods, an innovation upon the scholasticism of existing colleges and universities. Among the sciences to be taught it was declared that the leading object was to teach those relating to Agriculture and Mechanical Arts. The language of the act making the grant declares specifically that it was not the purpose to exclude other sciences, but the design was to establish institutions of learning of the highest order, making the scope of the act as comprehen¬ sive as its design was liberal. Seldom has a subject of greater magnitude called for legislative deliberation. Upon the result depended not only the extent and degree to which agricultural knowl¬ edge was to be disseminated among the farmers, but likewise the degree of proficiency to be made in all the arts of life. It was a new problem, upon which the friends of existing colleges looked with suspicion, a problem which law-makers approached cautiously. In the organization and establishment of the first of these Agricultural and Mechanical Colleges, only the 25

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perhaps, say this, but regarding ' them as I do, as still on their trial before the world, and in the midst of their voyage onward and upward to a mighty fulfillment, or a still mightier failure, I cannot but feel that they are placed as no other colleg ' es are for drawing to them the ga e of a liberal and philosophical curiosity. The subject of the hopes and fears that may be felt with regard to them is, in its general scope, too wide for me, even, to enter upon ; so I shall then confine myself to the history of one out of the many. THE A. AND M. COLLEGE OE TEXAS. To understand this subject properly, a brief reference to the history and origin of the “ Land-grant Colleges ” may be necessary. Prior to Congressional legislation for their establish¬ ment, the first school of a high grade in which classical gave place to scientific instruction, was the Military Academy at West Point ; this school was, however, established for a specific and exceptional purpose. Conspicuous among the early attempts to provide for scientific and practical education were the Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute at Troy, New York, established in 1824; the Sheffield Scientific School, an adjunct of Yale College, which had its beginning in 1846 ; the Lawrence Scientific School, in connection with Harvard University, established in 1847, and the Chandler Scientific School, in connection with Dartmouth College, established in 1851. The more earnest and practical educators, however, demanded a still more radical system, the ideal of which, combined the co-education of the mind, the hand and the heart, as a trinity in unity, with the purpose of investing labor with the broader culture that would not only render it more effective, but raise it in rank and dignity com¬ mensurate with its acknowledged importance.

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agricultural department was embodied or made promi¬ nent. The introduction of the present system of shop instruction and practice, primarily for the benefit of students in the department of Mechanical ICng-ineering-, owes its origin to the Centennial Exposition, held at Phila¬ delphia, in 1876, at which the Russian Government made an exhibit of the Russian system of shop-work and instruction. The great features of simplicity and comparative inexpensiveness characteristic of this system, so com¬ mended it to practical educators for its wonderful adapta¬ tion to the ends desired, that in the autumn of the same year, (1876), the Boston School of Technolog-y adopted and put it into practice at once, and it soon found favor in all the Land-grant Colleges. By joint resolution, approved November 1st, 1871, the Legislature of Texas formally accepted the pro¬ visions of the Congressional acts, and the State received from the general government script for 180,000 acres of land, the proceeds of which constituted the frst perma¬ nent endowment fund of the College. This fund is now invested in Texas 7 per cent, gold frontier defense bonds to the amount of $174,000. By an act of August 21st, 1876, it was made the duty of the State Board of Education to collect the interest due up to the end of the fiscal year, and invest all of it except $12,000 in 6 per cent. State bonds. An investment has been made to the amount of $35,000, so that the endowment fund now stands as follows: Seven per cent gold bonds.......................... $174,000 Six per cent, gold bonds........................... 35,000 Total principal........................... 209,000 Total annual interest............................... $14,280 With respect to the $174,000 seven per cent, bonds, these constitute a permanent fund, but as to the $35,000