July 27, 1906.] 



SCIENCE, 



101 



chanics and chemistry. It was expected 

 that funds for the enterprise would be con- 

 tributed by the prosperous mechanics and 

 manufacturers of Worcester. The financial 

 panic of 1857 prevented the execution of 

 this plan, and Mr. Washburn later decided 

 to carry out his earlier conceived purpose 

 in connection with the institute. 



Fortunate, thus in its foundation and its 

 location, the institute began its life under 

 the happiest auspices. In one particular 

 its scheme for education was unique in 

 combining with the studies ordinarily pur- 

 sued in technical schools, manual labor in 

 a shop, run upon a commercial scale and 

 producing articles to be sold in the market. 



Unsuccessful experiments in thus com- 

 bining the practical with the theoretical 

 had previously been made in Germany and 

 Austria. 



At this point I am led to inquire just 

 what sort of a school this was in 1865, and 

 what its founders expected of it. I un- 

 derstand that in the definition of the pres- 

 ent day a trade school aims to give the 

 pupil a thorough, practical knowledge of 

 some handicraft. In the manual training 

 school instruction is given in various kinds 

 of work with tools for educational dis- 

 cipline. In the technical or engineering 

 school the sciences are taught in their prac- 

 tical application to the various industries. 



Mr. Boynton, in his letter of gift which 

 was prepared under the advice of the Rev. 

 Seth Sweetser, of Worcester, and Judge 

 Emory Washburn, of Cambridge, adopted 

 in most comprehensive form the curriculum 

 of the scientific school as then known, with 

 the addition of some subjects not ordinarily 

 included. 



Mr. Washburn's final letter of gift and 

 instruction, dated March 6, 1866, discloses 

 a purpose to establish a trade school as we 

 now understand it, excepting that in addi- 

 tion to learning a trade the apprentice was 



to be instructed in the principles of science. 



Dr. Charles 0. Thompson, the first presi- 

 dent of the faculty, of brilliant accomplish- 

 ments and magnetic personality, in his in- 

 augural address delivered at the institute 

 November 11, 1868, said, among other 

 things : 



Add to these considerations the fact that boys 

 whose faculties are kept constantly alert by the 

 training of the school are in a condition to learn 

 faster than others the practical application of 

 science and that the time spent in the shop will 

 serve the double purpose of instruction and phys- 

 ical exercises and it will be admitted that this 

 form of a manual labor school is at least an 

 experiment worth trying. 



The late Senator George F. Hoar, one of 

 the charter members of the board of trus- 

 tees, always untiring in his efforts in behalf 

 of the institute, and whose memory should 

 always be held in most grateful remem- 

 brance by us, in addressing a committee of 

 the Massachusetts Legislature, February 

 11, 1869, urging an appropriation of $50,- 

 000, said, among other things: 



You can not find an instance of a boy who has 

 been educated in the Scientific School at Har- 

 vard College going back to the bench of the work- 

 man or the farm, and so of the Institute of Tech- 

 nology. Theirs will be a different, and in many 

 particulars a higher education than ours. * * * 

 You will not find there any boys who, having 

 studied for two or three years, are going back 

 to work in the shop * * * and there they will 

 work their way up from the journeyman to the 

 foreman and then the master mechanic. 



All this testimony leads, I think, to the 

 conclusion that the institute in 1865 was 

 what would now be considered a combina- 

 tion of a scientific school and a trade school, 

 and of a grade not as high in some respects 

 as either the Scientific School at Harvard 

 or the Institute of Technology in Boston. 



It was frankly admitted that it was an 

 experiment, and attention was called at the 

 time to the fact that at Berlin the workshop 

 connected with the school had been tried 

 and abandoned twice. But the experiment 



