Record. Ixv 



and ought to be presented for publication, though the Council have 

 already bravely undertaken to bring out two brochures of the nine- 

 teenth volume. If they are to publish what ought to be published, 

 increased revenue must be provided or special gifts of money must be 

 solicited. 



Your officers are charged only with administering the business of 

 the Academy and holding it to its declared purposes. They must of 

 necessity see and either meet or avoid financial difficulties. I submit 

 for your thoughtful consideration the question whether, if not actively 

 supported by you individually in every effort to meet such needs, they 

 are not likely in the long run to have confined their administrative 

 effort to escaping them; whether in seeing and reporting them, they 

 may not justly claim to have done their full share of the duty — which, 

 is as personal to each one of us who cherishes the Academy as to the 

 few to whose direct supervision we entrust its affairs. 



You can make the task of administration plain and simple if you 

 will furnish the means of adequate administration. You will furnish 

 the means immediately needed if you will promptly add 150 to the roll of 

 active members. This is your duty, rather than that of your officers; 

 it is not difficult; will you not do it? Membership in the Academy is 

 worth while. Every scientific worker in the community owes it to 

 himself as an investigator and to his science. No man trained in 

 science but compelled to devote his life effort to its application in the 

 arts and professions can afford to dissociate himself from the closest 

 possible contact with investigators and their investigations. Bare 

 examination of the subjects that have been popularly presented before 

 the Academy during the last decade is enough to carry conviction of 

 the educational value of membership to professional man, teacher 

 and business man alike, for touch with the scientific progress of the 

 world is essential to all; and there are few more desirable and no 

 more worthy objects to which money may be given than those which 

 the Academy prosecutes by aid of the six dollars contributed by each 

 local member in the payment of his annual dues. Last year 135 

 members were elected. Their proposal blanks bear the names of only 

 33 members as sponsors — not even half of whom may be assumed to 

 have presented to these candidates the advantages of membership. 

 This privilege is neither personally nor exclusively theirs, and I sug- 

 gest that each of us make haste to claim his own share in it. 



I have confined myself closely to the present activities and 

 urgently vital needs of the Academy; not because these represent 

 what I see as most desirable or necessary in its life, but because they 

 must be reckoned with at once, while other and greater needs and 

 activities can not be seriously considered until these have received 

 adequate attention. Earnest, individual, helpful interest in meeting 

 the minor crises of today will ensure a future fruition of which, as of 

 that of the past half century, the community, the Academy as an 

 organization, and each of its members who has aided in its work 

 according to his ability and talent, may be justly and affectionately 

 proud. 



(Signed) William Trelease, 



President. 



