Repository: UIHistories Project: Board of Trustees Minutes - 1914 [PAGE 195]

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1913]

PROCEEDINGS OF THE BOARD OF TRUSTEES.

193

DESIRABILITY OF MAKING T H E PRESIDENT OF T H E ILLINOIS FARMERS' I N S T I T U T E A MEMBER OF T H E BOARD EX OFFICIO. On motion of Mr. Blair, it was voted that it is the sense of the Board of Trustees that it would be desirable for the law prescribing the membership of the board to be changed so as to make the President of the Illinois Farmers' Institute a member of the Board of Trustees, ex officio. RESOLUTIONS IN REGARD TO T H E SERVICES OF MESSRS. HATCH AND GROUT. Mr. Blair moved that a committee be appointed.to formulate a suitable expression of the board's appreciation of the distinguished services rendered to the University by Messrs. Hatch and Grout, whose terms expire on March 11, 1913. This motion was passed unanimously. At this point Mr. Blair withdrew. CROCKER LAND EXPEDITION.

President James presented for consideration the following statement in regard to an invitation extended to the University to contribute to. the expenses of the Crocker Land Expedition, a proposed expedition to the polar regions under the auspices of the American Museum of Natural History and the American Geographical Society. The purposes of the Crocker Land Expedition are purely scientific. Harvard University, Yale University, several smaller colleges, various scientific societies, and the United States Government through several of its departments, intend to participate. The expedition has received the official endorsement of the Royal Geographical Society of London. Ensign Greene, of the United States Navy, has been detailed by the Federal Government to accompany the expedition. The Federal Government also is supplying the necessary instruments for geographical, meteorological, and similar work. Mr. Donald B. MacMillan has been appointed the scientific leader of the expedition. Mr. Walter Elmer Ekblaw, Assistant in Geology in the University of Illinois, has been appointed a member of the scientific staff. A contribution of $10,000 is requested from the University. It may be made in three installments, the first $5,000 and the second and third of $2,500 each, payable at intervals of one year. The American Museum of Natural History in the city of New York has entire charge of the expedition, and in it will rest the complete ownership of and title to all the scientific results of the expedition. The Museum proposes, however, after the expedition returns (it may be gone for a term of three years), to make such a distribution of the material collected among the contributing institutions as a just consideration of all interests shall, demand. This matter, was discussed at some length, but no action was taken. The board adjourned. W. L. ABBOTT, President. C. M. MCCONN, Secretary.

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