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Caption: Book - History of the University (Nevins)
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80 THE FOUNDING OP THE UNIVEBSITY a peculiar university," he wrote, "which our posterity can erect into the strongest, broadest, and best university on the face of the earth. . . . Our institution is wholly new." The measure for a division of the land grant failed, as similar measures failed in other States, notably New York; and the public opposition to the designs of several of the literary colleges, manifested especially by a series of mass meetings of farmers and mechanics, caused those who wished such a division to give over further attempts. But they were followed by Chicagoans who believed that the Federal grant should be split between an agricultural and a mechanical institution, the one to be located in some rich farming region, the other in the metropolis. Though their design, too, failed, the confusion among the various interests was sufficient .to block a bill introduced by the indignant farmers and others, Turner at their head, at the session of 1865—a committee of six under the chairmanship of Turner * appointed at the State Fair of 1864 having framed it. On the whole, however, the course of events was favorable to those desiring a single new State institution, and when the session ended they looked forward to a prompt victory. Plans were at once laid, at^a meeting held in Bloomington in December, 1865, and elsewhere, for reintroducing the measure at the next biennial session. The eleventh section of the farmers' bilk as it was duly brought forward again in 1867, provided for a commission to locate the University; and its discussion at Springfield opened one of the strangest contests in the State's history—that fo«|the location of the Illinois Industrial University. In #865 Champaign County
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