Annual Address by the President. 
15 
get. We may well profit by the example North Carolina has set us. A 
recent bulletin from that State declares that there are something like 
254 different factories for working cotton into seme form of manu- 
factured goods, distributed through forty-five counties. I quote from 
memory, as the bulletin is not at hand at this writing. Within the last 
year several cotton mills have been built in Texas, but a single dozen 
would more than cover their total number. Compare these numbers, and 
the vastly different areas of the two States, and the vast amount of devel- 
opment required to bring us even up to North Carolina’s present position 
will be apparent. In other manufacturing lines Texas is in no better 
condition. All of this must be materially changed if Texas is to take her 
proper place among the States of the Union. She can and will produce 
immense quantities of the finished products of cotton, cane, iron and 
steel, paints, cement, pottery and a multitude of other things, in all of 
which the applied scientist will have an active part. 
One of the articles of the constitution specifically states that the 
Academy holds itself ready to investigate and report upon such scientific 
problems as may be submitted to it by the State government. Although 
nearly ten years have passed since it first came into existence, I am not 
aware that any such service has been asked of the organization, and it 
is doubtful if one per cent, of the people of the State even know of 
its existence. We must make the Academy and its objects better known 
throughout the length and breadth of the State, and to do this v;e must 
publish more and scatter these publications among a larger number of 
interested persons. To do this we need greater financial resources, and 
this means a greater number of members and a larger amount from 
annual dues. The merely nominal dues could be increased without 
becoming a burden to any one, but even this would not suffice without 
a larger membership. It may not be pertinent to here suggest how our 
financial affairs may be improved, but the necessity for a wider sphere of 
usefulness is sufficient warrant for such suggestions as I may be able to 
make regarding increased membership. It seems clear to me that there 
are many who are interested in science in the State who would be glad to 
join us if they were fully informed of the scope and purpose of the 
organization and if an invitation were extended to them. Recently the 
Cornell Association of Civil Engineers, having the same annual dues as 
the Texas Academy of Science, sent out a communication to its member- 
ship stating that two other similar organizations had offered to furnish 
their publications to the full membership of the association in exchange 
for a similar courtesy' and the secretary estimated that the additional 
numbers of the publications would necessitate no more than, twenty-five 
cents extra, charge to each member. In comparison with the benefit to 
be derived from the exchange this extra charge amounts to almost noth- 
ing, and it occurs to me that possibly our organization might make sim- 
