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Caption: Book - History of the University (Powell)
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570 History University of Illinois VALUE OF THE LOCATION OF THE INSTITUTION IN A PEOUNIABY VIEW. Good judges estimate the cash value of the endowment made by Congress at $400,000, yielding, at 6 per cent, interest, an annual revenue of $24,000. This can only be applied to the purposes of instruction. It is contemplated that a farm of 500 or 600 acres be established in connection with the institution, both for its experimental purposes and as an economical aid in its suppport. By the aid of such a farm, brought to the highest state of productiveness, the board of the pupils would be so reduced as to make the institution, in point of economical support, by far the most advantageous of any others in the country. t Aside from the peculiar nature of the course of instruction, the economical nature of the institution would become an attraction such as would bring numbers of pupils now shut out of unendowed colleges. Suppose the charge to pupils to be $3.50 per week—a sum considerably below the tuition and board charges of other institutions—and rating the number of pupils at 1000, we have an annual expenditure of money in the locality of the institution of $157,000 for terms of thirty-eight weeks duration—the revenue of the endowment being added. In this is not included the incidental expenses of the pupils for clothing and other extras, mostly obtained in the vicinity of the institution, the whole making an amount of money annually expended in the county of at least $200,000. We are convinced that these figures are strictly within the truth. The number of pupils may have absolutely no limit, save in capacity of the institution to receive them. The institution will have large advantages over others, hardly to be enumerated here, but which cannot fail to insure its permanency and success beyond a question. Its permanent Congressional funds—secured absolutely upon a pledge of the whole treasury of the State of Illinois, its exemption from all taxation, its freedom from any possibility of sectarian or political bias, its inevitable hold upon the patronage from the people of the whole State, will give it all the elements essential to a full success from the very start. Its attractions for students must be without a parallel. No professors are to be paid from the rates paid by them, no interest on first cost of buildings, no apparatus to be paid for—all is provided save the bare expenses of living while pur-
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