Repository: UIHistories Project: Course Catalog - 1892-1893 [PAGE 15]

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HISTORY.

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leading object shall be, without excluding other scientific and classical studies, and including military tactics, to teach such branches of learning as are related to agriculture and the mechanic arts, * * * * * in order to promote the liberal and practical education of the industrial classes in the several pursuits and professions of life." Under this act Illinois received scrip for 480,000 acres of land subject to location in any surveyed but unoccupied part of the public domain. At this time the market value of the scrip was very low, and great difficulties seemed to present themselves in locating land upon it. But 25,000 acres were thus located in Nebraska and Minnesota, while the remainder of the scrip was sold for what could be obtained. In compensation for waitiDg something more than a quarter of a century, the land thus secured has added and will add to the endowment fund nearly as much as was obtained for the vastly greater proportion of the scrip originally sold. The entire principal sum received from the sale of scrip and of land is held inviolate as endowment, the income only being available for current expenditures. To secure the location of the University several counties entered into sharp competition by proposing to donate to its use named sums of money, or its equivalent. Champaign county offered a large brick building, erected for a seminary, and nearly completed, about 1,000 acres of land for a campus and adjoining farms, and $100,000 in county bonds. To this the Illinois Central railroad added $50,000 in ireight. The state legislature has from time to time appropriated various sums for permanent improvements, as well as for maintenance. The present value of the entire property and assets is estimated at $1,182,000.00. The institution was incorporated under the name of the Illinois Industrial University the last day of February, 1867, and placed under the control of a board of trustees constituted of the governor, the superintendent of public instruction, and the president of the state board of agriculture, as ex-ojjicio members and twenty-eight citizens appointed by the governor. The chief executive officer, usually called president, was styled Regent and he was made, ex officio, a member of the board and presiding officer both of the board of trustees and of the faculty. In 1873 the board of trustees was reorganized by the reduction of the number of members by appointment to nine and ex officio to two, the governor, and the president of the state board of agriculture. In 1887 a law was passed making membership elective at a general state election and restoring the superintendent of public instruction as an ex-officio member. There are, therefore, now three ex-ojjicio members and nine by