GEORGE W. ATHERTON. 19! 



the Red Cloud Indian Agency preferred by Prof. O. C. Marsh, 

 of Yale, having been added along with the Hon. Timothy 

 Howe, of Michigan, by personal action of President Grant, to 

 a commission of three, previously appointed by the Secretary 

 of the Interior. In 1876, much against his wish, he was made 

 the Republican candidate for Congress for his district. Although 

 the district was hopelessly Democratic, he threw himself into 

 the contest with characteristic energy and, while not elected, 

 ran considerably ahead of the Presidential ticket. In 1878 he 

 was appointed chairman of a commission to prepare and present 

 to the legislature of New Jersey a digest and revision of the 

 State system of taxation. While engaged in this work he 

 found time to study law, and was admitted to the New Jersey 

 bar while still carrying on his college work. 



Both his studies in economics and his activity in public affairs 

 naturally led him to interest himself in the development of in- 

 dustrial education, which occupied so large a share of educa- 

 tional thought during those years, particularly in connection 

 with the land-grant act of 1862. In 1873 he presented an 

 elaborate paper before the National Educational Association 

 upon the subject " The Relation of the General Government to 

 Education." In the course of this paper he traced in consider- 

 able detail the history and development of the land-grant col- 

 leges up to that time and emphasized those broad conceptions 

 of their functions in our educational system and of the impor- 

 tance of the type of education which they were designed to 

 give, to the concrete development of which he was to contribute 

 so largely. 



In 1882 he accepted the presidency of The Pennsylvania 

 State College and began that work for which his previous life 

 had been the unconscious preparation. 



This institution was one of the first fruits of that revolution in 

 the subject-matter and methods of education which characterized 

 the middle years of the nineteenth century. Its foundation was 

 so closely synchronous with that of the Michigan and Maryland 

 agricultural colleges that the degree of priority is largely a 

 question of definition. Chartered in 1855 and opened to stu- 

 dents in 1859, * ts fi rst fi ye years gave promise of a successful 



