612 Wisconsin Academy of Sciences, Arts, and Letters. 



academy, but in 1865 he was called to Antiocli College, Ohio, 

 by the acting president, who had learned to know and respect 

 him. Dr. Orton felt that here at last was his opportunity, and 

 he said, ^'The prison doors are at last opened for me.'' Driven 

 from his own state by danger of persecution he felt that here 

 his search for truth vrould be untrammeled. While at Antioch 

 he was appointed assistant to Dr. Xewbury, then State Geolo- 

 gist of Ohio, in w^hich capacity he won such golden opinions that 

 when, under the Morrill Act of 1862, the new State Agricultural 

 and Mechanical College was founded, he vras chosen for its Pres- 

 ident. The difficulties of this position may be better imagined 

 than described. Ohio, always foremost amone: the states in the 

 number of its strongly denominational colleges, naturally 

 regarded the new institution as an interloper, but Professor Or- 

 ton's tact was only equalled by the necessity for it, and notwith- 

 standing the unpromising conditions, he was able to make of the 

 Agricultural and Mechanical College the State University of 

 Ohio as it is today. Prof. I. C. White says of this work : 



"The unceasing toil of eight years which Dr. Orton had given to its 

 interests had not only allayed all opposition but built up for it a host 

 of friends in every portion of the state, so establishing it in the hearts 

 of the people that its continued growth and influence have been phe- 

 nomenal. The Ohio State University is so largely the creation of Dr. 

 Orton's personal efforts that he needs no other monument to perpetuate 

 his name and fame, not only as a great teacher, but also as a consum- 

 mate organizer, director, and promoter of educational forces. i 



President T. C. Mendenhall, who was associated with Dr. 

 Orton for a period of thirty years, says of him : 



"He believed that the character of an educational institution should 

 be judged by the quality of its work rather than by the number of 

 students enrolled in the annual catalogue, a principle which everybody 

 admits and nearly everybody ignores. To stand up for it and do it, 

 especially during the early struggling years of a college, demands a 

 courage that few possess. That Dr. Orton did this, even under the 

 most trying conditions, I set down as, on the whole, the most notable 

 characteristic of his career as president. For I am thoroughly con- 

 vinced that if he had chosen to do otherwise, if the doors had been 

 opened wide, at both ends of the curriculum, the institution would 

 have long since sunk into a deserved oblivion. 2 



11. c. p. '200. 

 21 c. pp. 3-4. 



