Repository: UIHistories Project: Board of Trustees Minutes - 1880 [PAGE 223]

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mend that the Board pay his traveling expenses to Wellington, Kas., and return, as this journey was made necessary by his return here to complete the term's work. I also recommend to your attention Mr. Parsons' request for some extra compensation, which he believes to be his due, and which he expects to receive when he enters upon the work of the year. As the question of filling Mr. Parsons' place is now before you, the question arises as to the propriety of discontinuing this department of our work till the Board shall have means to recommence it. Bookkeeping, athough desirable, if not indispensable, for every educated man and woman, does not at present constitute a part of any of the regular College courses. It is advertised as a preparatory study, andonetermofiinstructioninit is provided in the autumn of each year. A substitute for this may be put in the course unless it should be found convenient to employ an instructor for that term. It has been suggested that the higher course in Bookkeeping might be sustained here by a proper fee, charged and collected as the fees for music and for drawing and painting. It may be advisable for the Board to authorize the Begent and Faculty to make and announce such an arrangement in the forthcoming catalogue if, on enquiry, it is found feasible. About the 1st of March I received notice from the War Department that Lieut. Dinwiddie had been relieved from his post here and diricted to join his regiment. I was also informed through Mr. Cannon, member of Congress from this district, that the Department would detail another officer, and recommending Lieut. Wood, a graduate of West Point, of the class of 1877. I immediately opened correspondence to ascertain his qualifications for the work, but before such correspondence was completed a second letter trom Mr. Cannon informed me that the detail was already made, the order to take effect from the 15th of June next. The answers to my letters of enquiry lead me to believe that Lieut. Wood will prove acceptable to the Board and be able to do us good service. I have written to Mr. Cannon asking his influence to have the detail take effect from the opening of next term, or the 1st of April at latest, as the Battalion needs an instructor at once. The break in our Military instruction, occasioned by the recent disturbance in the Military classes, seems a favorable occasion to recommend to you a change in the Military Department, which has always seemed desirable to me. The steady increase in the number of students has swelled the Battalion beyond the capacity of the Drill Hall, making it impossible, during the winter term, to secure the battalion drill, when the weather forbids the use of the parade ground. It has become obvious, also, that four years of drill in tactics is an unnecessary burden upon so large a body of students, and the attempt to hold all the classes to such frequent drills often interferes with the class work in some of the colleges. If the Junior and Senior classes shall be excused and the military drill be confined to the first to years of the College course, it will still give us as many men in the Battalion as desirable for battalion movements, will bring the work within quite manageable proportions, and will obviate some of the worst interference with the work of the College classes. I would still admit to the military drill such preparatory students as are able to matriculate by the opening of the winter term. Such studends will ordinarily complete the first two years of their course with the Freshman class which they enter. The special class in Military Tactics may then be begun with the opening of the Sophomore year, and continue, it necessary, through the Junior year. In order to allow wider opportunity for the members of this special class to gain experience in command. I would recommend that the officers be chosen each term and serve for only one year in the same rank, the corporals and sergeants being chosen from the Sophomore class, and the commissioned officers, lieutenants and captains from the Junior. The Military organization of all the classes for the daily roll-call and chapel may be as easily maintained under this system as under the other. I would earnestly recommend, also, the change in the uniform advised last year, from the present light gray, too expensive and too easily soiled, to a dark blue blouse, with pantaloons to match, the purchase of which would be no hardship, as it would not exceed the cost of ordinary clothing, would be equally effective as a uniform, and may be worn by the students after leaving the University. The adoption of such a uniform would save the Faculty from the perpetual stream of petitions to be excused from the purchase of uniforms. Another point in the Military Department demands attention. The Governor was asked and consented to grant commissions to students of conspicuous merit who had attained the requisite experience as officers, and were recommended by the Faculty for their high qualities as gentlemen and scholars. It was designed that these commissions should be offered as high honors to stimulate young men to more excellent work. The recent difficulties in the Military class grew chiefly out of the desire of this class that the commissions should be given not as special honors, but rather as the College diploma is given— to all who properly complete their course. The usage of the Faculty has been to require an unanimous vote for these recommendations, and annually some students have been refused on the ground of lack of scholarship or of the requisite high character. If this usage is changed, the chief value of the commissions to the University will be lost, nor would the commissions themselves have the same value as they now have to the parties receiving them. It may be desirable to consult the Governor of the State as to his wishes in the case, and as to its bearing upon the Military interests of the State.

THE LIBEABY.

The report of the Librarian ought to receive the careful attention of the Board. He urges at length, and with sound arguments, the propriety of the early employment of a Librarian who may devote his whole time, or a large part of it, to the library work. We have now over 12,000 volumes; and to make these fully available to the students, and even to the Faculty, there is needed a man who shall be familiar with the contents of the Library, in a general way, and able to point out to the readers the authorities possessed on the various branches of knowledge. The care of so large and costly a collection of books is too important to be entrusted to inexperienced hands, and the work of preserving the old and selecting new books, has become one of the most important and onerous, imposed upon any department of the University. The knowledge of the Library and its contents already gained by Prof. Crawford, in his long service as Librarian, renders him