1 ARRIVING IN WOODS HOLE 



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21 



Once Mrs. Hyatt wrote to her husband, who was away at sea with a group 

 of students, that the students left in Annisquam, particularly the women, 

 were dreadful and that both she and van Vleck almost despaired of teaching 

 them an34hing. But a few prospective professional naturalists also happened 

 into the course, including Thomas Hunt Morgan (in 1886) who later became 

 a major figure at the MBL and the MBL's first Nobel Prize winner. 



Hyatt kept the school going, despite discouragements, until the Wo- 

 man's Education Association decided it was such a success that they should 

 no longer need to fund it. They had always insisted that they would try the 

 school as an experiment, and if it succeeded it should become independent. 

 That time had come. Hyatt was evidently ready for different arrangements. 

 He loved exploring and traveling and was a fine naturalist in the style of the 

 day, but perhaps he had had his share of discouragingly elementary students 

 by then. Besides, the waters of Annisquam were becoming seriously pol- 

 luted. Baird invited Hyatt down to visit, as he had before, and laid the 

 prospects before him to locate a laboratory and school in Woods Hole. The 



Left: Spencer FuUerton Baird, first commissioner of the U.S. Fisheries, 1871-1887, and 

 ftjunderofthe Woods Hole Fisheries. Paul Galtsoff Collection of the Fisheries, MBL 

 Archives. Right: Alpheus Hyatt, first president of the MBL Board of Trustees. MBL Archives. 



