University of Chicago - Cap and Gown Yearbook (Chicago, IL)

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-f-1'..:' 1 ,... . ,,..,,1 , ,, , ' M 'T'-'A , 5 I ui CAP AND GOXVN I suppose there were no other sports except baseball, in which I took no part. I am not sure that the present game had been evolved. A few years earlier, at the fitting school I attended in Massachusetts, there were alternative versions, the New York game and the Massachusetts game. The latter was played with a soft ball and a man was put out by being hit with it. New York triumphed over Massachusetts in the density of the ball, and of course with a hard ball it would have been a criminal offence to throw to hit a man, it would have been as proper to shoot him. I suppose I founded the chair of political economy in the University of Chicago, for after I had been out of college a few years I coaxed Dr. Burroughs to let me give what I called lectures to a class for a term or two. The following year I was not urged to repeat the experiment, but my friend, Hayden K. Smith, financial editor of the Chicago Times, did give lectures, I think, for some time. Possibly he was more competent, certainly he could not have been any cheaper. 1 I suppose we got as good an education as we could have gotten anywhere. Half a century ago not so many things were taught as now constitute a liberal education. My opinion as to whether the departure from the old classical course has been any improvement is of no value and I do not give it. We learned as much Latin and Greek as we should have learned anywhere, and probably the same thing is true of mathe- matics, though I am not so sure about that. The plant was pretty weak in the natural sciences, and we did not get very much history or philosophy. I ought not to omit the fact that we published a paper, monthly or semi-monthly, or occasionally, and I record this because I wrote poetry for it. I want to get this fact of my poetical achievements into the record somewhere. I was immensely pleased a great many years ago, but also a great many years after I left college, to see some reminiscences of the old University in which the fact that Powers wrote poetry for the students' periodical was recalled. Twenty-three years ago I attended the Washington's Birthday dinner of the Uni- versity, but while it was a very pleasant occasion, it didn't seem at all like getting back home. I am glad to feel, however, that I am a sort of step-child, or adopted child, of the present magnificent institution, which is supplying professors to so many other institutions of learning. FREDERICK PERRY POWERS. l 1 5 I

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e ' e 1 o. ::.,,w, ' ,-.-I I 1 ,, F 4, 1 CAP AND GOXVN The Old University of Chicago Y recollections of the old University are not only remote in time, but they are faded by lack of use. They have not been kept alive by frequent vi.sits to my Alma Mater and reunions with my colleagues. I left Chicago soon after graduation. I lived there again from 1876 to 1882, but even that last date is thirty- four years ago, and I have rarely been in the city since. The old institution closed its doors not long after that date. There have been no class reunions, and I know not who is living. I entered in the Sophomore year of the class of '71, so that it is forty-eight years- or soon will be-since Snowdon and I traveled down to the University of Chicago in the same Cottage Grove Avenue street car. We did not know each other until We entered the office of Dr. Burroughs and found that we were to be classmates. It was a handsome building that the University had, a reproduction, with some variations, of the Smithsonian Institute in Washington, in light stone. The southern wing was Jones Hall, a dormitory. I had a room on the top story in my Senior year, the two earlier years I lived with relatives on the West Side. The middle part of the building was devoted to class rooms and the beginning of a library, and such administrative offices as a small institution needed, and there was a larger chapel than we needed at the north end. There was plenty of ground around the building, but we were not scholastic enough to know that it was a campus. There was a considerable preparatory department, and back of the University was a Baptist Theological Seminary, known as the Hdipper factory, for youth is always irreverent. How many there were in the collegiate department I do not re- member, but perhaps sixty or seventy. In my class there were nine. In our Senior year we were joined by one more, but we treated him coldly as a rank outsider, and invariably regarded ourselves as nine. Besides Snowdon, who was my particular chum and my city editor when I was a reporter on the Chicago Times, there was Chesbrough, who went into law, Tucker, who studied both law and theology and died early, Pratt, who soon distinguished himself in medicine, Webb, who was also a doctor, Calkins, who, I think, went into business, Goodwillie, and I hope the one whose name does not just now occur to me will be indulgent if he sees thisg 1871 is forty-five years ago. C. C. Adams, the distinguished geograrpher and long on the staf of the New York Sim, was in the class behind, and I was associated with him in the local room of the Chicago Times. There was a good faculty. I remember all of them with respect and some of them with affection. I have always had a high opinion of President Burroughs. He deserved to succeed. That he did not make the University a success was due in some measure to personal antagonism outside of the institution. The most distinguished member of the faculty was Professor Boise, one of the most eminent Grecians in the COUUUY, who had 001116 from the University of Michigan. I recall him with veneration and. affection. I had the misfortune once to Wound him deeply, but it was without malice on my part and without resentment on his. I compared Demosthenes with Webster, greatly to the disadvantage of the former, but it was due to the fact that I could read the language of Webster with facility. I-1 r

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WILLIAM RAINEY HARPER First President of the University of Chicago