IOWA. 



391 



dowment fund has straitened the college in its 

 resources, and it therefore asks of the State a 

 tax of one tenth of a mill for five years. 



The State University is receiving this amount 

 from special tax, ordered by the twenty-sixth 

 General Assembly for five years, and continued 

 a year longer by the twenty-seventh. The corner 

 stone of a new building was laid in connection 

 with the exercises of the commencement in June. 

 President Charles A. Schaeffer died in September, 

 1898, and George E. MacLean, of the University 

 of Nebraska, was elected to succeed him. 



A large class was graduated at Drake Univer- 

 sity in June. Ex-Gov. Drake has added more than 

 $30,000 to his gifts to the institution, and a new 

 auditorium is to be built soon. 



A somewhat bitter controversy in connection 

 with Iowa College, at Grinnell, was ended in 

 November by the resignation of Prof. George D. 

 Herron. He has held for six years the chair of 

 Applied Christianity, which was endowed by Mrs. 

 C. A. Rand on the condition that it be filled by 

 Prof. Herron. The socialistic theories taught by 

 the professor have been a source of constant crit- 

 icism, and finally led to his resignation. Mrs. 

 Rand withdrew the condition in regard to him, 

 and gave the endowment to the college, stipulat- 

 ing that the income shall be paid as salary to 

 one man, and that the department shall be for 

 the original purpose the interpretation of the 

 teachings of Christ and their application to the 

 problems of society. 



Charities and Corrections. The State insti- 

 tutions, not including those purely educational, 

 were placed in the care of a State board of control 

 by the twenty- seventh General Assembly. Its 

 first report was filed in November. Fourteen in- 

 stitutions are under the care of the board. 



The total cost of the institutions under the 

 trustee system the last year was $1,440,117.77, 

 and under the board $1,060,627.04. 



The Treasurer says that other payments made 

 by the Board of Control were on contracts en- 

 tered into by the trustees, and therefore charge- 

 able to the year the contracts were made ; this 

 and an undrawn balance would make the differ- 

 ence still greater, and show a decrease of more 

 than 39 per cent. 



The number of inmates of these institutions in 

 November was: Anamosa, 499; Fort Madison, 

 510; Clarinda, 872; Independence, 993; Mount 

 Pleasant, 911; Council Bluffs, 274; Vinton, 160; 

 Davenport, 453; Marshalltown, 563; Knoxville, 

 43; Glenwood, 835; Eldora, 446; Mitchellville, 

 158; total, 6,717. The Cherokee Hospital for the 

 Insane is not finished. 



The board introduced an innovation by stop- 

 ping the supplying of tobacco to convicts. But- 

 ter will be furnished instead. 



A riot broke out in October at the Girls' Re- 

 form School, at Mitchellville. About 100 of the 

 inmates appear to have been involved. Some 

 escaped and more than 70 were put into jail, most 

 of whom were returned to the school. The dam- 

 age to the building was repaired for about $200. 



Military. The report of the Adjutant General 

 gives the casualties of the 4 State regiments of 

 infantry in the Spanish war as 163. Only 1 was 

 reported killed, 1 missing, and 38 wounded; 1 

 died by suicide and 1 by accident, and 127 from 

 typhoid fever. 



The amount of money drawn from the $500,000 

 war appropriation by the State was $148,168.18. 

 There has been refunded to the State Treasurer 

 from the General Government $91,483.78. Those 

 liable to military duty in Iowa at this time num- 

 ber 302,270. 



Court Decisions. The Supreme Court decided 

 in January that the building and loan enabling 

 act of the last Legislature is valid and the build- 

 ing and loan law of the State constitutional. It 

 also holds that premiums charged arbitrarily 

 without actual competition in securing loans from 

 these concerns are interest. The same court de- 

 cided that receivers appointed by courts in other 

 States can not recover in the courts of Iowa. 



One of the lower, courts declared in July that 

 the medical-practice act is unconstitutional, and 

 in December the paving law was held to be in- 

 valid. 



State Historical Building. The corner stone 

 of a State historical building was laid, May 17, 

 on the site chosen, about a quarter block north- 

 east of the Capitol. The cost will be $300,000, 

 and the building, besides reading rooms, parlors, 

 and offices, will have rooms for a museum, an 

 art gallery, an aquarium, and an auditorium. 

 Historical collections illustrating the history and 

 development of the State will form an important 

 part of the museum. 



Products. The following summary of the 

 products of the State is taken from Gov. Shaw's 

 second inaugural: 



" Iowa, during several of recent years, could 

 have annually furnished every man, woman, and 

 child in the United States a pound of cereals per 

 day for three hundred and sixty-five days. This 

 is a larger ration than the average people of the 

 world consume. In addition, we would have po- 

 tatoes and other vegetables, grapes by the car 

 load, apples some years by the train load, and 

 other fruits, $1,000,000 worth of canned goods per 

 annum, 2,500,000 eggs a day, 25 car loads of 

 honey, and all the beef and pork and mutton and 

 butter and cheese that can be produced on 8,500,- 

 000 acres of pasturage and with 4,000,000 tons of 

 hay. By feeding some of this grain we are able 

 annually to slaughter 1,000,000 hogs and cattle 

 worth $15,000,000, and export 5,000,000 more, 

 worth $65,000,000, and $500,000 worth of fat 

 sheep. We can keep our people from freezing 

 with a product from Iowa mines of 2 tons of 

 coal per capita. Not only is Iowa an agricul- 

 tural State, but she is making a very creditable 

 showing in manufactures. She ships woolen 

 goods, spun and woven in this State, by the car 

 load to the best-known wholesale firms in Phila- 

 delphia and New York, shoes by the car load 

 beyond State lines, manufactured lumber into sev- 

 eral, and her cast-iron wheels are used in more 

 than half of the States of the Union. She pro- 

 duces annually 1,000,000 dozen pearl buttons, and 

 gloves and mittens by the car load. Besides these, 

 all over the State small factories of different 

 kinds are springing up, relatively of little im- 

 portance, and yet in the aggregate worthy of 

 consideration. Her facilities for producing beet 

 sugar are unsurpassed. The beet-producing lands 

 of Europe cost per annum, in rent and fertiliza- 

 tion, from $15 to $20 per acre. Most of the cane- 

 sugar lands cost, including water, quite as much. 

 Iowa lands require no expenses of this kind, and 

 produce beets of unexcelled quality, and the pulp, 

 after the saccharine matter is extracted, is claimed 

 to be as good food for dairy cows as before their 

 reduction. Shall we have sugar factories? The 

 question must be speedily decided. What though 

 it requires $400,000 or $500,000 for each plant? 

 There is on deposit in the banks of Iowa to-day 

 over $160,000,000, of which more than one third 

 is owned by farmers themselves, and in many 

 counties of the State the farmers own 75 per cent, 

 of the bank capital also. I should be pleased 

 to see beet-sugar factories exempted from taxa- 



