YATE ATATMNE
SSS re te
SOME SHEFF. HISTORY.
The Main Points in the Develop-
ment of the School.
In 1846, two professorships, one of
Agricultural Chemistry and Animal
and Vegetable Physiology, the other of
Practical Chemistry, were established
by the Corporation of Yale College.
There was no provision for salary be-
yond a sum of $5,000, promised toward
the endowment of the Chair of Agri-
cultural Chemistry, under the condition
that $20,000 more be found for the same
purpose, a condition. which was never
fulfilled. On this slight foundation the
Scientific Department of Yale was be-
gun, under the direction of John Pitkin
Norton and Benjamin Silliman, Jr.,
who held respectively the professor-
ships of Agricultural and Practical
Chemistry. In 1847, after the organi-
zation of the two chairs into a School
of Philosophy and Arts, Professors
Norton and Silliman rented from the
Corporation the old frame building
which had been occupied by Presidents
Dwight and Day. Without rules, and
unmolested by examinations, the first
class, eight in number, began work in
the Autumn of 1847. In those days the
courses, especially for the scientific
student, were few; laboratory practice,
a course in Agricultural Chemistry
under Professor Norton in the second
term, and a course in Applied Chemis-
try and Metallurgy, under Professor
Silliman, Jr., in the third term.
In spite of Professor Silliman’s resig-
nation in 1849 the School continued to
prosper and at the Commencement of
1852 the degree of Ph.B was granted by
the Corporation to the graduating
class. On this same occasion Mr.
William A. Norton accepted the chair
of Civil Engineering—a position simi-
lar to the one which he had held in
Brown University—and in the Autumn
of 1852, his class having followed him
from Brown, the School of Engineer-
ing opened with twenty-six members.
But in September of the same year
the organizer and promoter of the
Scientific School, Professor John P.
Norton, died at the age of thirty, worn
out already by his labors. “Never,” says
Professor Lounsbury, “‘has science any-
where had a more disinterested fol-
lower. He devoted himself without
reserve to building up this department
of Yale College, and much of the late
success of the School has been due to
that example of self-sacrifice to its in-
terests. To it he gave for a few short
years his toil, his time, his money; he
ended at last by giving to it his life.”
MR. PORTER'S APPOINTMENT.
Mr. John A. Porter accepted the chair
of Analytical and Agricultural Chem-
istry in 1853, and in addition to his re-
gular work, did much toward in-—
troducing the present system of educa-
tion, upon broad lines of culture, as
well as scientific instruction. And be-
’ sides all that, it was through him that
his father-in-law, Mr. Joseph E. Shef-
field, was first interested in the Scientific
School. In 1855 Mr. George J. Brush
was elected to the chair of Metallurgy
and in 1856 Mr. S. W. Johnston be-
came Professor of Analytical Chemis-
try, to which Agricultural Chemistry
was afterward added. From then on,
the management of the school gra-
dually passed into the hands of these
two men.
A chair of Physics, to which the Rev.
C. S. Lyman was elected, was founded
in 1859. In this year Mr. Sheffield
bought the building which had hitherto
been used by the Medical College, and
having enlarged and refitted it, handed
it over to the Scientific School. In
addition he gave $50,000 for the endow-
ment of the three chairs of Analytic and
Agricultural Chemistry, Metallurgy and
Engineering.
Professor William D. Whitney, who
held the chair of Sanskrit in the Uni-
versity, in 1860, accepted in addition
the chair of Modern Languages in the
Scientific School. .To him more than
any other is due the success of the
movement to give languages their pro-
per position in the curriculum ofthe
School. It is probable that the Shef-
field Scientific School is unique in this
respect.
Income acquired from the fund of the
State, secured from the sale of public
lands, allowed an increase of the teach- .
ing staff in 1863. In that year Mr.
Daniel C. Gilman was osha t Pro-
fessor of Physical Geography and in the
following year Professor Brewer was
given the Chair of Agriculture, Profes-
sor Eaton the Chair of Botany and
Professor Verrill the Chair of Zoology.
In 1865 Mr. A. P. Rockwell was elected
Professor of Mining. Another import-
ant step was taken in the year 1871-2,
when the Professorship of Mechanical
Engineering was founded. Mr. Wil-
liam P. Trowbridge was chosen to the
new Professorship. In this same year
Thomas R. Lounsbury was made Pro-
fessor of English; Oscar D. Allen,
Professor of Metallurgy and Francis
A. Walker Professor of Political
Economy and History.
The first entrance examinations were
held in 1861, and covered Arithmetic,
Algebra, Geometry, Plain Trigonome-
try, English Grammar, Geography and
the elements of Chemistry and Phy-
sics. At the same time the course in
Chemistry was lengthened to three
years, and the “general course’ then
first established was made the same
length. It was not until 1863 that the
course of engineering was changed to
three years.
CHOICE OF PROF. BRUSH AS DIRECTOR.
In 1872, the governing body of the
School established as far back as 1856,
and composed of the professors and
the President of the College, elected
an execttive officer to take charge of
the general management of the School.
Professor George J. Brush was chosen.
For a long time he had been practi-
cally the manager of the institution,
and the disinterested devotion dis-
played by him to its interest, as well as
the energy, ability and clearness of
judgment which had characterized his
direction during the most trying
periods of its history, were recognized
by the other members of the Board as
fitting him for the direction of affairs.
Professor Brush has been reelected at .
the end of each term.
The School continued steadily to
develop its system and add to its corps
of instructors. Mr. John E. Clark was
appointed to the Chair of Mathema-
tics in 1873; Sidney I. Smith was
chosen Professor of Comparative Ana-
tomy in 1875, and in the same year
William G. Mixter was made Professor
of Chemistry. In 1877, A. Jay DuBois
was appointed Professor of Dynamical
Engineering in place of Professor
Trowbridge, who resigned that year to
accept a. professorship in Columbia.
Professor Henry W. Farnam joined the
Faculty in 1881, taking the vacancy
caused by the resignation of Professor
Walker to accept the Presidency of the
Massachusetts Institute of Technology,
and in 1882 the Professorship of Phy-
siological Chemistry was founded, and
Russell H. Chittenden was chosen for
it. In 1883 Professor DuBois was
transferred from the Engineering to
take the head of the Department of
Civil Engineering, left vacant by the
death of Professor Norton. The Pro-
fessorship of Mechanical Engineering
was then offered to Mr. Charles B.
Richards and was accepted by him. In
1884, the Chair of Physics and Astron-
omy, held by Professor Lyman, was
divided and Professor Charles L. Hast-
ings was chosen to the new Chair of
Physics. Ten years later two more
additions to the staff of instructors
were made, in the appointment of
Samuel L. Penfield as Professor of
Mineralogy and’ Horace L. Wells as
Professor of Analytical Chemistry and
Metallurgy. The further additions to
the Governing Board by the appoint-
ment of Charles E. Beecher to the
Professorship of Historical Geology
and Louis V. Pirsson to the Professor-
ship of Physical Geology, have been
spoken of in recent issues of the
WEEKLY.
THE SIZE OF CLASSES.
In 1852, the graduating Class num-
bered seven; in 1862, only six; in 1872,
twenty-three received diplomas, and in
1882 this number had risen to thirty-
six. In 1891 the Freshman Class num-
bered 207; in 1893, 228; and in 1804,
254. The withdrawal of free scholar-
ships by the tranference of land grant
moneys, the hard times and the in-
creased standard. of admission have
operated to reduce the membership
somewhat in recent years.
BUILDINGS.
The year 1872-3 saw the completion
of North Sheffield Hall, the second
building given by Mr. Sheffield, who
had expended over $100,000 in it.
[Continued on 8th page.]
WHEEKLY
JOSEPH EARL SHEFFIELD,
Sketch of the Life of the Founder of |
the Scientific School.
Joseph Earl Sheffield was born June
19, 1793, in Southport, Connecticut.
His father and grandfather were ship
owners who, during the Revolutionary
War, had maintained an armed vessel
in the interests of the Colonies. His
mother, Mabel Thorpe, was the daugh-
ter of Captain Walter Thorpe, also of
Southport, a ship owner engaged in
the West India trade. The Sheffields
and Thorpes were both financially
crippled by the Milan and Berlin ~de-
crees of Napoleon, so in 1808 Joseph
Sheffield, in accordance with his own
wishes, became a clerk in the store of
Mr. Stephen Fowler, of Newbern,
South Carolina. As a result of his in-
dustry and ability, he became a partner
in a firm doing business in Newbern
and New York City, in 1830. In spite
of the hard times of 1815, Mr. Sheffield
continued to prosper, and after travel-
ing over a large part of the South, he
moved his business to Mobile, Ala.
In 1822, Mr. Sheffield married Miss
Maria St. John, daughter of Colonel J.
T. St. John, of Walton, Delaware Co.,
New York. About this time he be-
came associated with prominent busi-
ness men in all parts of the country,
notably Mr. Henry Kneeland, of New
York and Mr. Nicholas Biddle, of
Philadelphia. As a result of this-in-
timacy which sprang up between him
and Mr. Biddle, he was offered the
Presidency of the Mobile branch of the
United States Bank, which offer he
refused.
In 1835, Mr. Sheffield moved North
and settled in New Haven, where he
lived until his decease in 1882. During
his residence in New Haven Mr. Shef-
field kept up his business connections
and was interested in several very im-
portant enterprises. .
In addition to the Scientific School
which bears his name, other institu-
tions have received benefactions from
Mr. Sheffield. While these were very
large in porportion to his moderate
fortune it is impossible to form any
accurate estimate of the value of his
gifts. It is enough to say that in 1879,
his benefactions to educational institu-
tions alone, exceeded six hundred
thousand dollars.
At the time of his death, Mr. Shef-
field had given the School approxi-
mately four hundred thousand dollars.
In-his will he added a seventh part of
his estate, treating the School as one
of his children. This further gift was
not less than half a million dollars,
making the total gifts of Mr. Sheffield
to the School which bears his name not
less than one million dollars.
a ee
Yale Men at the University of
California.
The Faculty of the University of Cali-
fornia contains the following Yale men,
thirteen in all:
Martin Kellogg, A.B. 1850, LL.D.
1893, President.
Thomas R. Bacon, A.B. 1872, B.D.
1877, Professor of European History.
Edward B. Clapp, Ph.D. 1886, Pro-
fessor of Greek.
Cornelius B. Bradley, Divinity
School 1869, Professor of Rhetoric.
William A. Setchell, A.B. 1887, Pro-
fessor of Botany.
Wm. B. Bosley, A.B. 1892, LL.B.
1894, Ass’t Professor of Law.
Louis Dupont Syle, A.B. 1879, Ass’t
Professor of English.
George M. Stratton, A.M. 1890, Ass’t
Professor of Psychology.
Thomas F. Sanford, A.B. 1888, Ass’t
Professor of English.
_ Clifton Price, Ph.D. 1896, Instructor
in Latin.
Clive Day, A.B. 1892, ‘Instructor in
History. , : ,
Arthur C. Alexander, Ph.B. 1880,
PheD: 1804, Instructor in Physics.
Herbert C. Nutting, A.B. 1895, Ph.D.
1897, Instructor in Greek and Sans-
krit.
————++4—__
In the College Pulpit.
Following is a list of the preachers
who will occupy the pulpit f
three Sundays: oo
October 31—Prof. G i
Andover tae eorge Harris,
November 7—Prof. Ladd, New
aven.
November 14—Rey. R
D.D., Brooking ee euen Thomas,
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CHARLES 1. PENNELL,
Successor to Wm. Franklin & Co.,
IMPORTING TAILOR,
AO Center St., New Haven, Conn.
J. EDWARD SOMERS,
IMPORTING TAILOR,
63 Center Street,
NEW HAVEN, - CONN.
F. R. BLISS & CO.,
TAILORS
CHURCH AND CHAPEL STREETS,
New Haven, Conn.
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“No, boys; I have not been burning the
midnight oil to get all that material for
my address. I have not spent hundreds for
books of reference. I could not have got
these up-to-date facts and figures in that
way.
ve] simply send to Romeike for
Press Clippings.
“Day by day he sent me editorials and
original articles collected from thousands of
newspapers and periodicals which are read
in his offices, and I only had to arrange the
material.”’
ROMEIKE’S
Press CUTTING BUREAU
will send you all newspaper clippings which
may appear about you, your friends, or any
subject on which you want to be “up to
date.”
A large force in my New York office reads
650 daily papers and over 2,000 weeklies
and magazines; in fact, every paper of im-
portance published in the United States, for
5,000 subscribers, and through the European
Bureaus, all the leading papers in the civil-
ized globe.
Clippings found for subscribers are pasted
on slips giving name and date of paper, and
are mailed day by day.
Write for circulars and terms.
HENRY ROMEIKE,
139 FIFTH AVENUE, NEW YORK.
Branches: LONDON. PARIS. BERLIN. SIDNEY.
