AGKICULTURAL COLLEGE 461 



As the years passed on, under the intiuence of the common schools, 

 which became more and more free schools, the people clamored for an 

 education which should include the hand as well as the head, and which 

 should leave a man or a woman in the possessicui of full bodily senses, 

 and yet not ashamed to work with his hands. It was gradually discov- 

 ered that as general education advanced there must be some outlook for 

 men beside in the professions; that lawyers, and doctors, and preachers, 

 and teachers, were all very well in their way, but that we might have 

 too much of a good thing. 



The demand, I say, grew for a new education. It found expression in 

 the manufacturing centers, in the organization of trades schools. It 

 found expression in the agricultural states, in the development of agri 

 cultural schools. In Michigan, the constitution of 1850 provided for the 

 establishment of an agricultuj^il school, and provided further for the 

 appropriation of certain salt spring lands for the su]>])ort of the same. 

 In February, 1855, the legislature passed an act establishing and locating 

 an agricultural school. By the sale of salt spring lands |56,00() was 

 secured, and in 1857, |40,(mo was appropriated by the legislature with 

 which these grounds were purchased and the school started. Down to 

 1860 the State had given about |133,000. The school had struggled for 

 an existence, and its fate was uncertain. During this time a scheme was 

 being agitated by which congress should a]>proj)riate a certain amount 

 of its seemingly inexhaustible supply of land for the benefit of scientific 

 education, and on July 2, 1862, the first Morrill Endowment Act was 

 passed. By the terms of this act it was provided "that there should be 

 granted to the several states for the ])uriJOse of establishing at least one 

 ■college where the leadng object should be, without excluding other scien- 

 tific and classical studies, and including military tactics, to teach such 

 branches of learning as are related to agriculture and the mechanic arts, 

 in such manner as the legislature of the states may respectively pre- 

 scribe in order to promote the liberal and practical education of the in- 

 dustrial classes in the several pursuits and professions of life.'' For this 

 purpose, land, or land script, was issued to these several states in the 

 proportion of 30,000 acres for each senator and representative. The 

 smallest state received 00,000 acres. ^lichigan received about 300,(M)0 

 acres. Altogether our nation gave for this form of education over ten 

 million acres. A principality for popular education. 



In February, 1863, Michigan accepted this princely gift, and the Agri- 

 cultural College forgetting, in name at least, the other provisions of the 

 lull, made haste to take ])ossession of her ]»atriuiony. It was not, how- 

 ever, until 1860 that the Michigan Agricultural College realized anything 

 from the sale of these lands, and then she leceived .f58.96. 



During these v(\nrs from 1855 to 1860. the State of Michigan had ap- 

 pro[)riated about !S!250.000. From b'^60 to 1884. the State appropriated 

 ^343,000. and there was received from the ^forrill Endowment Act 

 1238.000. Since 1884, there has been received from the State |203,000: 

 from the federal government |681.000. Altogether in the forty-one years 

 since 1855, there has Ix^en received for th*^ sui)])oit of this College from 

 the State legislature, and from the sale of salt spring lands. iif088,000; 

 from the federal governmeni and from the sale of lands donated under 

 the ^Morrill Endowment Act $01!), 000. making a total of nearly two mil- 



