38 PROCEEDINGS OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 



From 1865 onwards in addition to the scientific work of the Museum 

 he was developing and managing most successfully the largest copper 

 mine in the world. He did not rest content with the development of 

 the mine as a problem in engineering, but always mindful of the 

 just obligation of capital to labor, he employed experts for the purpose 

 of securing good conditions of living, caused careful measures to be 

 taken for the protection of life and limb in this hazardous occupation, 

 and secured the formation of pension and aid funds for the benefit of 

 disabled and aged employees to which the corporation made liberal 

 contributions. No workman was so far removed from the authorities 

 in control that his complaint passed by unheard. The whole con- 

 duct of the mine is one of the bright spots in the much beclouded 

 world of such enterprises and must still be reckoned among the more 

 satisfactory attempts to bring the workman and his employer into 

 harmonious relations with each other. 



A pleasing instance of his thoughtfulness with regard to the popula- 

 tion of this mining community is related by one of his friends, the 

 physician who took care of him through a fever which might have 

 been acquired during one of his visits to the mines at Calumet. The 

 physician was asked one day whether he suspected that the disease 

 could have been brought from that place. If that were so, there was 

 something to do at once and that was to take such measures that his 

 work people should be protected from a like danger. Upon this 

 suspicion, possibly unfounded, a thorough overhauling of water supplies 

 and systems of sewerage was at once undertaken there while Agassiz 

 was still confined to his house. 



He was early called to service upon the governing boards of Harvard 

 College, he was elected a member of the Board of Overseers in 1873, 

 became a member of the Corporation in 1878, resigned his place there 

 in 1884, and was promptly elected to the Overseers in 1885, was again 

 transferred to the Corporation in 1886, and definitely gave up his 

 place there in 1890, when he found it necessary to free himself 

 from some of his many occupations. During all the period of his 

 connection with these boards he was an active, much interested and 

 far sighted helper in all the departments of the University. The 

 Jefferson laboratory owed much to him for the friendly cooperation 

 with which he promoted the intentions and plans of the generous 

 founder. He gave valued aid to the Observatory, to the Botanical 

 Museum, the Mineralogical Cabinet and the Peabody Museum of 

 American Archaeology and Ethnology. 



He interested himself in the attempt to secure for women a share 



