PEOGEESS OF INDUSTRIAL EDUCATION. 



In thirty-six States tbere are now thirty-nine colleges which have 

 received the congressional land-grant of July 2, 18G2. There are also 

 branch institutions in Georgia and Missouri. The Agricultural and 

 Mechanical College of Texas has been opened during the year. All the 

 colleges are now in operation, except that of Florida, which is expected 

 to be opened early in 1877. The professor^ and assistants in these col- 

 leges during the year numbered 473, and the students, 4,211. There 

 are eleven States which have not sold all the scrip or land granted by 

 Congress; Illinois, Iowa, Kansas, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Ne- 

 braska, Kevada, l^ew York, Oregon, and Wisconsin. They have sold 

 during the year 51,405 acres, at an average price of .$4.41 per acre, and 

 1,463,505 remain unsold. The largest average price obtained per acre by 

 any State was $8.38, by Michigan, and the smallest, $2.20, by Iowa. The 

 annual interest received by the agricultural and mechanical colleges of 

 the several States from the proceeds of all the lands thus far sold 

 amounts this year to $525,745. Thirty-four of the colleges have farms, 

 which contain, in the aggregate, 15,418 acres, and their estimated value 

 is $1,321,092. -Statistics more in detail may be tbund in the tables at the 

 close of this article. 



It will be seen that in some of the colleges of which a report is made ia 

 the folowing pages, the number of students pursuing agricultural or me- 

 chanical studies is much smaller in proportion to the number in attendance 

 than in others. This may be owing to several causes. In some cases 

 the colleges have been recently established, and have not yet been 

 brought into practical working order; in others the students were poorly 

 prepared when they entered, in consequence of the low standard of 

 education in the surrounding country, and in others inducements were 

 greater to enter upon other courses of study which seemed to promise 

 more immediate protit ; but these embarrassments are gradually becom- 

 ing less, and when agriculture and the mechanic arts require higher quali- 

 fications for their practice and become more remunerative, they will, 

 no doubt, entirely disappear. Some of the colleges have already at- 

 tained a high standard of excellence, considering the time they have 

 been in operation and the fact that they have largely to educate their 

 own educators. A large number of students graduate at these colleges 

 every year, and enter upon practical farming and the mechanic arts, or 

 become professors in industrial institutions of our own or other countries. 



ALABAMA. 



Agricultural and Meclianical College of Alabama, at Auburn ; Bev. I. T. 

 Tichenor, 1). J)., president. — "Our college," says the president, "is steadily 

 increasing in popularity. The people of the State are beginning to 

 understand our aims and to appreciate our efforts." During the year 

 French and German books, plates, and models, and various kinds of ap- 

 paratus have been imported for reference and illustration of the differ- 

 ent branches taught. 

 326 



