NOVEMBEK 8, 1901.] 



SCIENCE 



735 



Markings on Jupiter. ' Other articles are : ' The 

 Astronomy of the Nebulae,' by W. W. Payne ; 

 'The Coming Opposition of Eros,' by Mary 

 Clark Traylor ; 'The Limits of Vision,' by 

 Edwin Holmes, and ' The Brightness of Star 

 Light,' by J. E. Gore. 



DISCUSSION AND CORRESPONDENCE. 

 THE UNIVERSITY OF WEST VIRGINIA. 



With the final resignation of Jerome Hall 

 Raymond, last March, from the presidency of 

 West Virginia University, and the election of 

 Dr. Purinton, of Denison, to succeed him, 

 another turbulent period in the history of that 

 institution has come to an end. 



It is worth noting that no one of the six men 

 who have served as presidents of the West Vir- 

 ginia University since its foundation in 1867 

 has proved generally acceptable to the people 

 of the State, and that no one has been less 

 acceptable than President Raymond. And yet, 

 according to a statement made to the writer by 

 one member of the University faculty who has 

 always lived in Morgantown, no other presi- 

 dent began his work under more auspicious 

 circumstances. The board of regents had a 

 good working majority of intelligent men who 

 were deeply interested in the welfare of the 

 University and who were anxious to give a 

 hearty support to their enthusiastic young presi- 

 dent. The people in the surrounding commu- 

 nity and the members of the faculty were also 

 more friendly and more inclined to be pleased 

 with Mr. Raymond than they had been with 

 any of his predecessors. 



Notwithstanding all this, trouble was inevi- 

 table. The president was young, aggressive 

 and thoroughly saturated with the spirit of 

 unlimited, rushing expansion which had pi'e- 

 vailed in the University of Chicago during the 

 preceding five years. The faculty of the West 

 Virginia University, on the other hand, did not 

 at that time (1897) contain a single Ph.D. from 

 any reputable university. Some of the pro- 

 fessors were therefore naturally unfit to be in 

 charge of any department in a modern college 

 or university, and their unfitness became es- 

 pecially glaring through the new president's 

 vigorous attempts to convert the old Morgan- 

 town institution into a miniature copy of the 



University of Chicago. Several of the profess- 

 ors, moreover, not only lacked the training 

 necessary to make them competent instructors 

 in a university, but were in addition so addicted 

 to financial schemes and to politics as to be a 

 hindrance to the peaceful development of any 

 state institution of learning. 



Unhampered and alone, Mr. Raymond suc- 

 ceeded for a time in carrying out his plans in 

 the management of the University. The Uni- 

 versity catalogue was entirely remodeled on the 

 plan of the University of Chicago catalogue, 

 and the studies were correspondingly rear- 

 ranged ; the summer quarter was added, and 

 the four-quarter system with the ' quarterly 

 convocations ' was introduced ; an unlimited 

 elective system of studies leading to one degree 

 only (B.A.) was adopted; faculty meetings 

 were 'abolished, and the president's plans and 

 changes were all carried out by means of com- 

 mittees of his own appointment. 



All these changes and many others less funda- 

 mental, though scarcely less irritating to one 

 or another among the professors, followed in 

 rapid succession. One by one the older mem- 

 bers of the faculty came to feel that they were 

 entirely unsatisfactory and that the president 

 would like nothing better than to replace them 

 as soon as possible by men of his own selection. 

 This led to a tacit or open combination of the 

 greater number of the professors against the 

 president — a result which might have been ex- 

 pected, especially considering the records of 

 forced resignations, reappointments and quar- 

 rels of various kinds which formed a part of 

 the previous history of the University. The 

 opposition spread rapidly not only among the 

 students and the people of Morgantown but 

 also throughout the State, where it unfortu- 

 nately developed into a narrow-minded support 

 of 'West Virginians' as against 'foreigners.' 

 The temper ^of some of the crudest of Mr. 

 Raymond's enemies is well illustrated by the 

 extravagant vulgarity of the attacks which 

 were made upon him during the winter and 

 spring of 1900 by the Clarksburg News and the 

 New Dominion of Morgantown. The unpopu- 

 larity of the president alike among the faculty, 

 students and the people, especially the local 

 people, was in addition much increased by his 



