Philadelphia University - Analysis Yearbook (Philadelphia, PA)

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HIHEWIIRII The ordinary purpose of a yearbook is to serve as a peg on which to hang one's memories. But this is no ordinary year for usp this year is the culmination of a dream, a dream shared by many men whose in- defatigable efforts have built for us, and for the textile industry at large, this beautiful new building housing the Philadelphia Tex- tile Institute. In 1876, the Centennial of the Declara- tion of lndependence was held in Philadel- phia. Among the exhibits on display were fabrics and dyestuffs from many of the Euro- pean producers and from most of our do- mestic mills. Our Philadelphia manufacturers came, they saw, they were aghast at the overwhelming superiority of English cloth and German dyestuffs. The realization that the United States could not hope to compete unless its products contained the highest skill in manufacture, and the best taste in design, and that these attributes could be achieved only by importing trained technicians from Europe provided the necessary impetus for the formation of the Philadelphia Textile School. The Philadelphia Textile Association, formed in l882, set out to provide a school for developing local talent. The members of the Association, under the leadership, spiritual and financial, of Mr. Theodore C. Search matched their determin- ation with dollars and raised nearly S3U,UOO. Their project was made known to the Trustees of the Pennsylvania Museum and ' Broad and Pine Streets

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School of Industrial Art, and rooms were placed at the disposal of the new school in the Art school building at 1336 Spring Garden Street. In September 1885, the instructors were regularly engaged on a full time basis, and a day class was organized. The Depart- ment of Chemistry and Dyeing opened in 1887 at l346 Spring Garden Street, the first course of its kind in America. By l89l the rapidly increasing student body had caused removal of the school to the three floors leased at 1303 Buttonwood Street. In 1893, the magnificent gift of SlUO,UOO by Mr. Wil- liam Weightman and the generous response of the people of Philadelphia to an appeal for assistance, by Which a similar amount was raised through popular subscription, en- abled the schools of Industrial Arts and Tex- tiles to move to the World famous Broad and Pine Streets location. Here the Textile School was fated to remain for fifty-six years, long past the time when its facilities were equal to the task imposed upon it. The first few classes were drawn in the main from Philadelphia and environs, but soon students were entering the Textile School from greater and greater distances. Like a pebble cast into a quiet pool the influ- ence of the Philadelphia Textile School radi- ates outwards. Today its students are drawn from the four corners of the earth, its reputa- tion is world-wide, its prestige enormous. Thirteen years after the formation of the Philadelphia Textile School, the second tex- tile school established in the United States