GARDINER GREENE HUBBARD 45 



Professor Langley has said that I would speak of him in this 

 connection tonight, and yet what can I say of him here that 

 would not be true of him in everything and in every duty that 

 he assumed? It was not in the nature of Mr Hubbard — it was 

 not the habit of his life — to be a mere ornamental holder of po- 

 sitions, to be a mere routine worker. High as was his personal 

 regard and unstinted his admiration for the ability and scien- 

 tific attainments of the Secretary of that institution and the 

 heads of its bureaus, he wished, if possible, to press still for- 

 ward; and at the last meeting of the Board of Regents, on his 

 motion a committee was appointed, of which he was made chair- 

 man, to consider and report how the value and usefulness of these 

 bureaus could be promoted. 



So many sided was Mr Hubbard's character, so many sided 

 were the activities of his life, that it is fitting that the tributes 

 paid to him tonight should come from many friends and from 

 man}'' points of view; but, start from wherever they may, they 

 will inevitably meet and blend in the common tribute to the man 

 himself. 



I have -tried to speak of him with that studied moderation 

 which I know would be most in accordance with his wishes. I 

 have spoken of him as a man of public spirit, as a patron of ed- 

 ucation and science, and as a benefactor of his fellowmen. 



I will draw aside the curtain of his home life only so far as to 

 say that in all the relations of husband and father and grand- 

 father he was the embodiment of courtesy, affection, and gentle- 

 ness, the inbred traits of a born gentleman. 



President Bell: Mr Wilson has referred to the philanthropic 

 spirit of Mr Hubbard, and I will now invite your attention to a 

 philanthropic work of his that was unique. In March, 1864, 

 Mr Hubbard brought into the Massachusetts legislature a bill 

 for the establishment of an oral school for deaf children. The 

 schools of this country were taught by means of spelling on the 

 fingers and by means of the French sign language. Many per- 

 sons had suggested that oral schools like those in Germany, 

 where the deaf had been taught to speak and to learn to read 

 from the lips, should be established in America; but none had 

 been established, until in March, 1864, Mr Hubbard made the 

 first attempt to establish a school where deaf children could be 

 taught to speak and to understand speech by the motions of the 

 mouth without resort to signs or manual spelling on the fingers. 



It is not my purpose to fully set forth his efforts in this direc- 



