3 I BUILDINGS AND BUDGETS A 69 



Whitman and his supporters had won, so that the MBL became an organ- 

 ism on its own, in their view not so dependent on the action of that nucleus 

 of restrictive conservatism represented by the nonscientific Boston trustees. 

 With the help of Mr. Nunn's money, the MBL could continue to grow and 

 flourish in the manner to which Whitman wanted it to become accustomed. 

 Building and expansion continued apace, and all was well — briefly. 



But running a "national" laboratory proved horrrfically expensive. What 

 the MBL, like any aspiring institution, really needed — and still needs to this 

 day— was a solid major endowment. For a while it appeared that Helen 

 Culver, who controlled the Hull fortune in Chicago, which had also sup- 

 ported Jane Addams's Hull House project, had provided just such an 

 endowment. She had donated one million dollars to the University of 

 Chicago, vvdth the intention that it also be used to provide classes for 

 Chicago's less well-to-do West Side and to support a national marine 

 laboratory, among other biological activities. Her correspondence makes 

 her intentions clear. She hoped to support the MBL as well as the University 

 of Chicago because advisors had convinced her of the value of both. As 

 plans unfolded for tlie projects at Chicago, however, it became evident that 

 her money would not stretch as far as she and her advisors had hoped. Her 

 donation came in the form of real estate, and prices had dropped pathet- 

 ically in a short time. In addition, building prices had risen so much that 

 providing a modern laboratory for the University of Chicago finally took all 

 the million dollars, as well as an additional gift from Miss Culver. The MBL 

 gained nothing but moral support from the Hull fortune. 



By 1900 the continued difficulties in raising money, the demands to 

 expand the laboratory, and the desire to include more advanced (and more 

 expensive) investigations combined to make Whitman even more anxious to 

 obtain financial security. L. L. Nunn and a group of businessmen repre- 

 senting the University of Chicago made an off"er that it seemed unlikely the 

 MBL could afford to refuse. The group offered a considerable sum of 

 money in exchange for some simple expectations of financial accountability 

 to them. The offer seemed very attractive. Stubbornly and perversely it 

 seemed to Whitman, the MBL board nonetheless refused. Whitman felt that 

 some of the trustees had impugned his integrity vvdth their implication that 

 he and Chicago were trying to take over control of the Laboratory. It seems 

 clear that this charge was unfair to Whitman, who had after all served as 

 director all those years with no salary and often at some considerable 

 personal expense. Whitman wanted to place the MBL on solid financial 

 ground. But the Nunn proposal was unacceptable to the MBL's leading and 

 trusted scientists. 



Whitman, in turn, opposed an attractive proposal by the Carnegie 

 Institution in 1902 to fund the research of the laboratory. The Carnegie 

 Institution by this time was beginning to fund various sorts of biological 



