May 16, 1913] 



SCIENCE 



751 



ories." Other graduate lecture courses in 

 physics are announced on " Relativity " 

 (Lunn), "Wireless Waves" (Kinsley), "Ra- 

 diation Theories" (Millikan). 



Dr. Franklin D. Barker has completed ten 

 years of service in the University of Nebraska 

 and has been made a full professor, having 

 charge of the work in medical zoology and 

 parasitology in the department of zoology. 



Dr. Ira D. Cardiff, professor of plant phys- 

 iology and bacteriology in Washington State 

 College, has been appointed head of the de- 

 partment of botany. Professor John G. Hall, 

 of the South Carolina Agricultural College, 

 has been appointed professor of plant pathol- 

 ogy in the same institution. 



To the professorship of bacteriology in Co- 

 lumbia University made vacant by the death 

 of Dr. Philip Hanson Hiss, Dr. Hans Zinsser, 

 professor of bacteriology in Leland Stanford 

 University, has been appointed. 



DISCUSSION AND COBBESPONBENCE 



UNIVERSITY LIFE IN IDAHO 



To THE Editor of Science: Professor J. M. 

 Aldrich, professor of zoology and entomology 

 in the University of Idaho (Moscow), has just 

 been summarily dismissed without trial or 

 official warning after twenty years of faithful 

 and successful service. The conspicuous inci- 

 dents connected with this matter are few, 

 simple and suggestive. They are the follow- 

 ing: 



In 1900 James A. McLean, a young Cana- 

 dian, came to the University as president and 

 director of the agricultural experiment sta- 

 tion. He was a doctor of philosophy from 

 Columbia in economics. He found the duties 

 of director of an agricultural experiment sta- 

 tion bewildering and uncongenial. 



In 1904 Professor Aldrich with five other 

 members of the faculty protested to the board 

 of regents that the president was incompetent 

 for his place. Strangely neither the president 

 nor the protesting professors were dismissed 

 but a compromise was effected which endured 

 for eight years. It may be inferred from later 

 occurrences that despite the long and healing 



lapse of time, the criticized president did not 

 forget nor forgive his critics. 



In 1912 President McLean left Idaho to be- 

 come the president of the University of Mani- 

 toba. Before he left he made out, and gave to 

 the board of regents, a list of professors who 

 ought to be dismissed. 



Near the end of 1912, Idaho did away with 

 all separate boards for its various educational 

 institutions and put its whole system in 

 charge of a single new board. The law enact- 

 ing this provided that the old boards shall hold 

 their last meetings in the following spring. 



In April, 1913, President McLean, of the 

 University of Manitoba, crossed an interna- 

 tional boundary and the boundary of decency 

 and in secret session with the acting president 

 of the University of Idaho made up a list of 

 seven undesirable professors which list was 

 presented to the dying board of regents and 

 promptly acted on. All were dismissed. At 

 the end of the meeting the board died, and its 

 victims received their malodorous notices of 

 dismissal two days after the board had been 

 defunct. Thus Professor Aldrich and six col- 

 leagues have enjoyed the peculiar experience 

 of being removed from their positions on the 

 recommendation of a citizen of Manitoba by 

 an oiScial board which passed out of existence 

 before the victims knew what had happened to 

 them. 



An appeal to Governor Haines of Idaho has 

 resulted in an official statement that the re- 

 gents acted entirely within their authority. 



No comment seems necessary on these in- 

 teresting incidents. Professor Aldrich, who is 

 an unusually competent entomologist, and a 

 peculiarly prepossessing and attractive man, 

 will of course have no difficulty in finding work 

 elsewhere. Will Idaho have as little difficulty 

 in getting as good a man to fill his place? 



Vernon L. Kellogg 

 Stanford Universitt, California 



educational standards at an agricultural 



college 



Perfect freedom in the expression of ideas 



and opinions is born of one of two conditions, 



either full information, or lack of informa- 



