June, 1904.] Opening of the Lake Laboratory Building. 
183 
Professor Bradford ; the contractor, Mr. George Feick ; to the 
officers of the Cedar Point Pleasure Resort Companj’, and espec- 
iall}" to the Hon. John T. Mack, Trustee of the University, who 
from the beginning has been its watchful and thoughtful guardian. 
To Professor Osborn, whose quiet, earnest effort has largeh^ 
contributed to this better opportunity for scientific investigation, 
thanks and congratulations are due for his part in the work. But 
he and his able associates. Professors F. L. Landacre and James S. 
Hine are to be further congratulated that to them is entrusted 
the present responsibilit}^ of seeing that this great laboratory' 
shall be used with an eye single to the advancement of science 
and the public welfare in accordance with the aims of its founder, 
and that the students who go forth from it shall be so inspired by 
the spirit of truth that they shall be its devoted servants and loyal 
to it all their lives. 
Remarks by Professor Herbert Osborn, Director. 
After what has been said already I need not detain you with an 
extended statement of our purposes and plans in the work of our 
summer station. I would like, however, to mention some phases 
of our work and if po.ssible, emphasize our position in regard to 
our relations to other institutions and to scientific workers in 
general. 
Only about thirty years ago there was begun on a little island 
off the coast of Massachusetts what has proved to be the pioneer 
of the seaside aud aquatic laboratories now so plentiful in differ- 
ent parts of the world. When Agassiz opened up his summer 
laboratory on Penikese he not only started a movement for the 
closer study of animal life under inspiring surroundings but he 
really inaugurated a movement in American education which has 
had a remarkable effect on the methods of teaching here and 
abroad. A method that involves the inspiration of personal con- 
tact with nature under the guidance of a lover of nature expert 
in understanding her ways. 
I can my.self remember the kindling of boyish ambition to go 
to Agassiz’s school, for his name had then become a familiar one 
throughout the land. To .study under his guidance was to my 
youthful fancy the height of opportunity. I remember, too, most 
distinctly, how bewildered and dazed I felt when I learned that 
Agassiz was dead. It had never occurred to me that Agassiz 
might die. I had never thought of him as a man who possibly 
was old but only as the representaffve teacher. In the airy castles 
of youth I had dreamed that possibly, some day, I might be able 
to come under his inspiring instruction. 
Of course we may say that the direct method of study must 
have originated long before Agassiz’s time, in fact such method 
can be referred readily to Aristotle and other early interpreters 
