Union College - Garnet Yearbook (Schenectady, NY)

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State Assembly for a college charter. However, since the petition sought to establish a college without the auspices of any single church, it came to naught. In February, 1785, measures were taken for the establishment of a private academy at Schenectady, by mutual agreement among leading citizens, and it was placed in the charge of twelve trustees. An academy building was erected a few years later on the northwest corner oflwhat are now Union and Ferry streets. This academy was the seed of Union College. Next to Dominie Romeyn, to General Philip Schuyler belongs the honor of establishing the college at Schenectady. The city of Albany had offered strong pecuniary inducements for making the capital the site of the college, but the vigorous efforts of General Schuyler so reinforced the Schenectady petition that it secured the young institution for that town. The college was organized on the 19th of October, 1795, by the election of the Rev. John Blair Smith, D. D., of Philadelphia, as president. The first commencement was held in May, 1797, in the old Reform Dutch Church, and the first degrees conferred upon three young men who had finished the course of study then required. . President Smith resigned in 1799, and was succeeded by Rev. Dr. Jonathan Edwards, the younger, who died in oflice in August, 1801. His successor was the Rev. Dr. Jonathan Maxcy, who resigned in 1804. Although the college was still feeble, it was not without enterprise. Under the presidency of Dr. Edwards, in 1798, a new edihce was begun on a scale magnificent for that day. This was afterwards known as VVest College, located on the corner of Union and College streets, and was finished in 1804. An event occured in 1804 which proved to be of peculiar and lasting advantage to the institution, and from which its success may bejustly dated. This event was the choice of the Rev. Eliphalet Nott as president. He had not yet become known for that talent in the education of young men which this election gave him the opportunity to exercise, and which has never been surpassed in the history of any American college. En- dowed by nature with a keen perception of character, a discriminatingjudgment in developing latent talent, a dignity ofmanner commanding both love and respect, a facility in governing young men, the secret of which lay in teaching them to govern themselves, and a zealand earnestness in the discharge ofevery duty, he acquired m '7 .. :L T11 C I' 4 he PU C 'A i I JR. Q ., . :K-1,1 is---asa - 1 ' '5' 771 73' ffffgs-,fbi . 3 ' mga' 1 ' 'T z-if Riff . D 1451311-'li 1 V . ..,. vw. . gn-I. V4 A F . 1 gw af.-6

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HE VVar of the American Revolution had not yet come to a close. The smoke was still rising from the smoldering ruins of burned habitations on the northern and western borders, and the echo of the Indian warwhoop had not yet died away in the Valley of the Mohawk. The long struggle for liberty had left the people decimated, weary and impoverished, Yet, in these hardy settlers of the northern and western frontiers the spirit of progress found a firm soil in which to spread its I'OOtS. The building of a new nation meant that there was to be a demand for men who could work out and control the destinies of that nation. Men of spirit, courage, ability and ambition were needed who could grow with the nation and the nation with them. Thus it was that the great force of education was set in motion. The people ofthe valleys ofthe Mohawk and Hudson desired a college in which their children and their children's children, for ever after, might find an opportunity to make themselves equal to tl1e tasks before them. Shortly after the battle of Saratoga, in 1779, the frontiersmen petitioned the Revolutionary JOHN B. SM1111 .......... . 1795-1799 JONATHAN Enwmans ...... I7QQ-ISOI JONATHAN MzXXCY ........ 1802-1804 E1.1PHA1.n'r N011 .......... 1504-1866 LAURENS P. HICKOIC ...... 1866-1868 CHARLES A. A11c15N ....... 1869-1871 E1.1PHA1.Er Norr Po'r'rER. .. 1871-1884 HARRISON E. NNE1:s'rER .... 1888-1894 AQNDREW V. V. RAYMQND.. 1894-1909 CHARLES A. RICHMOND .... 1909-1928 FRANK P. DAY ........... . 1928-

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HICKOK .gi -4 f- wait and held through a long and active life a commanding position as an educator. A few years' experience showed that the site in the city was not sumciently ample, and the observing eye of Dr. Nott, at an early period in his presidency, had noticed on the suburbs a better one, which combined in a rare degree every advantage desirable. On the eastern border of the city the fields rose by a gentle slope to a plain of moderate elevation and easy access. Near the upper edge of this slope the construction of terrace a few feet high would afford a level campus of ample space, and a site for buildings that would overlook the valley, the river, and the neighboring city, while northward glimpses of moun- tains blue in the distance, and southwestward ranges of hills dividing the waters of the Mohawk and Susquehanna rivers, would present a panorama of peculiar loveliness. A gently murmuring brook, issuing from dense woodlands, fiowed across the grounds just north of the proposed site and into the river. Alternat- ing fields and groves extend several miles eastward to the Hudson. The Union College of today is located on the same, beautiful 100 acres of land overlooking the Valley of the Mohawk. Jacques Ramee, the famous French architect, who was for a time employed by the National government in plan- ning fortifications and public works, drew up a campus and building plan in 1812, which has been followed throughout the years. From the time of the new college on the hill the number of students steadily increased until in 1820 the nuinber in all the classes exceeded 300, and the graduating class alone contained sixty-five. In 1825 Union had passed Harvard and Yale in the number of its students, and, with the exception of a few inter- vening years, held for a quarter of a century the honor of being the largest college in the United States. The fame of Dr. Nott as an educator, the high reputation of the college, the excellence of its system and management, drew students from all parts of the nation to Schenectady, and large numbers came from lower classes of other institutions to see and hear President Nott. It is not too much to say that during the administration of Dr. Nott he alone shaped the policy of the college and controlled its affairs as absolutely as any monarch who ever ruled an empire. Union was the first college to break away from the standardized and tradi- tional classical course and to place scientific instruction on a plane of equal dignity. At Union also originated the so-called optional system, which it has always exercised to a limited degree but never to the extent of license which it afterward attained in other colleges. The first course of civil engineering oPfered in an American College was established at Union in 1845, by Professor Williaiii M. Gillespie and has ever since been successfully continued. The prosperity of the college grew with the fame of Dr. Nott and his staff of well known educators. Then came the news of the Civil XVar. The classes V 22 Q, f