REPORT OF SPEECHES AT THE THIRTIETH ANNUAL DINNER OF 
THE SOCIETY OF NAVAL ARCHITECTS AND MARINE ENGINEERS 
HELD AT THE WALDORF-ASTORIA HOTEL, NEW YORK, N. Y., 
NOVEMBER 49, 1922. 
The President of the Society, Mr. Walter M. MacFarland, acting as the Toastmaster, 
after the service of the coffee and cigars, called the company to order and said: 
“Gentlemen, we shall take great pleasure in continuing this evening the practice which 
has existed in this Society for the past thirty years. I ask you all to rise and drink a toast 
to the President of the United States.” 
The company rose and drank the toast while the band played “America.” 
THE ToasTMASTER :—Gentlemen, the hour is late, one hour later than we had hoped 
to begin the exercises, and therefore you will hardly expect me to make any lengthy speech. 
There are other speakers who will address you this evening, and I am quite sure that you 
will be highly entertained by what they say. We had allowed ourselves a hope, at one 
time, that we might be favored with the presence of the President as our guest of honor 
this evening, and acting on that hope we sent him an invitation to be our guest. Owing to 
the illnesss of Mrs. Harding there was some delay in the reply, but finally the President 
wrote and said he was very sorry that he could not come, and he sent the foregoing letter 
to be read this evening. 
Since President Harding could not come himself, he has sent a distinguished representa- 
tive, whom we might consider an ambassador extraordinary, and in introducing this gentle- 
man, whose name, of course, you see on the program, I may say that it is an unusual and 
a very great pleasure, for now we have a Secretary of the Navy who is a real sailor man, 
a man who has actually served at sea in the Navy. He is not in the position of one Secre- 
tary, more or less famous, in having found out that a monitor was actually hollow. Our 
Secretary knows all about ships. He served in two wars and made a distinguished record 
all around. He comes with a special message to us from the President, and it gives me 
the greatest pleasure to introduce to this company the Hon. Edwin Denby, Secretary of 
the Navy. (Applause.) 
