GEOGRAPHY OF THE AIR 
ANNUAL ADDRESS BY THE VICE-PRESIDENT 
GENERAL A. W. GREELY 
(Presented before the Society November 2, 1894) 
The broadening fields of human knowledge haye changed 
their very name in the evolution that has been wrought in man- 
ner, means and extent of learning, research and study. We no 
longer say science, but instead the sciences. From time to time, 
as the aggregations of fundamental data and accompanying dis- 
cussions have become too divergent for easy comparison or too 
abundant for individual assimilation and reception, they have 
been divided and subdivided first into branches and eventually 
into separate sciences. 
It is only within the early part of the present century, how- 
ever, that associations have formed for the study of geographic 
problems. and yet more recent is the claim and belief that geog- 
raphy is no longer an unappreciated handmaid of history or 
geology, but rather an able-bodied member of the scientific 
brotherhood. 
At this time, then, it is fitting that the general subject of geog- 
raphy should be very briefly reviewed, especially with reference 
to its proper place among the sciences, its enlarged scope in the 
ereat universities of the world, and the radical transformation in 
methods of study that makes it a science rather than an accom- 
plishment. 
It is twenty years since Germany, first of the great nations, 
awoke to the value of sound geographic study. Previously 
taught perfunctorily as an adjunct to history, geography was at 
that time honored in one of its great universities by a separate 
chair. Such were the results from this field of research, previ- 
ously rfeglected by the other sciences, that other universities 
speedily followed the example, and at present fourteen of the 
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