American hishcrics Society. 7 



bersliip. While this d'uX not meet uitii the j^eiieral hearty re- 

 sponse looked for, something" was done, and 1 wish speeially to 

 acknowledge the assistance of the Hon. j. W. Titcomb f(jr the 

 interest taken hy him in this effort, lie has secured four appli- 

 cations, and 1 think has others in view. This work was done 

 without any special effort on his jjart hy simpl}- keeping the 

 matter in mind. I have secured seven ai)plications, and would 

 suggest to members the advisability of doing a little of this work 

 in the future, which will result in bringing in persons who, even 

 if they do not attend, are interested in our work and would be 

 quite willing to take membership for the purpose of getting- the 

 reports of the Society. 



The inducement held out to persons to join used by Mr. Tit- 

 comb and myself was that a person putting in his application 

 during the interim between meetings would receive the report of 

 the last meeting gratis, and his application not coming in to be 

 acted upon until the next meeting he was thus practically given 

 the benefit of a two years' membership for one year's fee. I 

 know no better use to be made of the reports on hand, after the 

 distribution has been made to members. 



Following out the suggestion of the society at the last meet- 

 ing, in May of this year I prepared and sent out a circular to the 

 membership, and to others likely to be interested in our work, 

 inviting their attention to the Omaha meeting, and asking them 

 to contribute papers on some subject of interest to the Society. 

 The result was ver}^ encouraging, as is evidenced by the excel- 

 lent program of papers prepared for this meeting, which is in 

 your hands. I think the preparation of a program in advance 

 is a good idea and has fulfilled the expectations of those who 

 suggested it, and in my opinion should be followed out every 

 year. 



Following the issuing of the program, 175 postal cards with 

 return reply attached were sent out to members asking them to 

 notify me whether they would attend the meeting, so some ar- 

 rangement could be made for their comfort in the wav of trans- 

 portation, not otherwise to be secured. 



The work of this of^ce in the wa\' of correspondence has 

 been quite voluminous, something like three hundred personal 

 letters having been received and answered. This, in connection 

 with the preparation of the report and the issuing of circulars and 

 program, has called for the expenditure of considerable time, but 

 if it shall result in added interest in our work and a successful 

 meeting it has been worth what it cost in expenditure of time. 



