68 THE AMERICAN MUSEUM JOURNAL 
JoHNn Davin WoLrE ‘THEODORE ROOSEVELT 
RoBERT COLGATE Howarp PoTrer 
BENJAMIN H. FIEeLp WituiaM T. BLopGetr 
ROBERT L. STUART Morris Kk. Jesup 
ADRIAN ISELIN D. Jackson STEWARD 
BENJAMIN B. SHERMAN A. G. PaEetes DopcE 
Witiiam A. Haines CHarLEsS A. Dana. 
It was to their initiative and far-seeing sagacity that the City and the 
country owe the beginning of this great educational and _ scientific institution, 
and, as you all know, there is nothing so hard as a beginning. 
New York was sadly behind her sister cities in this interesting develop- 
ment of knowledge and science. Although she had many learned natura- 
lists, and had made spasmodic efforts for the establishment of a museum in 
which their valuable collections might be gathered, she had allowed Phila- 
delphia and Boston to be far in advance. 
The advent of the great naturalist, Professor Louis Agassiz, at Cambridge, 
a signal event in the history of Harvard, his boundless enthusiasm for 
science, and the wonderful manner in which he imparted it to his pupils and 
hearers, gave an impetus to the study of natural history not only at Harvard, 
but throughout the country which had never been felt before. The truth is 
that the acquisition of one truly great man by a university does more for the 
advancement of learning than whole decades of mediocrity; and Harvard 
and the country awoke from long slumber to a new life of study and inquiry 
under the light and leading of this famous scholar and naturalist, and almost 
all the men who afterwards became famous in natural history flocked about 
him as pupils and gathered inspiration from his lips. The arrival of Pro- 
fessor Arnold Guyot at Princeton soon afterwards was another great in- 
centive, and the formation and rapid increase of museums at the two 
universities and in Philadelphia were examples of the practical advance in 
science as a means of education which New York could not fail to imitate. 
‘There were many strong men here interested in the subject; there were 
ample resources and many interesting and yaluable collections within reach, 
but there was a total lack of organization, an apparent inability to get to- 
gether, which paralyzed the growing and general desire for the establishment 
of a museum of natural history which should be worthy of New York as a 
great intellectual center. In fact, Iam not sure that New York was then a 
great intellectual center, Its intense energies, stimulated by the triumphant 
close of our great Civil War, were concentrated in commercial channels, and 
while they were ready to give generous help to any honorable enterprise, 
our great merchants and men of rapidly growing wealth had hardly time to 
think of these higher and better things of the mind. They had to be solicited 
