NATIONAL ACADEMY BIOGRAPHICAL MEMOIRS VOL. VII 



In the summer of 1875, after his graduation from Harvard 

 and before his visit to Mr. Agassiz's laboratory at Newport, in 

 August and September of that year, he was instrumental in 

 organizing a laboratory for instruction in Biology in Cleve- 

 land. As no fees were charged for this course it seems prob- 

 able that his purpose was to gain experience in teaching, as 

 well as the purely disinterested aim of establishing an inland 

 Penikese for the instruction of teachers and students of natural 

 history. In his address at the dedication of the new biological 

 laboratory of Western Reserve University, in 1899, he de- 

 scribed that enterprise in the following words : 



It was my good fortune to have a share in one of the first attempts to 

 organize laboratory instruction in Cleveland, and I hope you will pardon 

 me if, on this occasion, my mind runs back to this old undertaking. In 

 1875 three young men who had begun to train themselves as naturalists, 

 came together for their summer vacation, at their homes in Cleveland. 

 They were Theodore B. Comstock, afterwards President of the Uni- 

 versity of Arizona; Albert H. Tuttle, now Professor of Biology in the 

 University of Virginia, and myself. We were filled with enthusiasm 

 for our work, and, like all earnest students from Chaucer's day to this, 

 as glad to teach as to learn, and we determined to organize a summer 

 class for laboratory instruction in zoology and botany. Money for our 

 expenses was liberally supplied by R. K. Winslow, Leonard Case, and 

 other citizens ; the authorities granted us the use of the old high-school 

 building on Euclid avenue near Erie street, and we were soon able to 

 issue notices of our undertaking, and invitations to all who wished to 

 join the class, asking them to do so without the payment of any fee. 

 Some twenty-five were soon enrolled, most of them teachers, some from 

 a distance, and work was begun with a class which shared all the 

 earnestness and enthusiasm of their instructors. We had daily lectures 

 or demonstrations, followed by four or five hours of work in the labora- 

 tory, while two afternoons in each week were given to excursions to 

 Rocky River, Cuyahoga Falls, and other places favorable for the out-of- 

 door study of nature. As a small steamboat had been placed at our 

 service, we made two excursions upon the lake, and thus gave to the 

 class an opportunity to learn the use of the naturalist's dredge for col- 

 lecting the animals of the bottom. Our work was in part the study of 

 the animals and plants which we obtained on these expeditions, and we 

 also made use of a supply of marine animals which had been gathered 

 for the purpose at the seashore. 



This account is interesting not merely as a bit of local his- 

 tory, but rather because it reveals thus early in his career his 



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