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‘yaLE ALUMNI WEEKLY
is called her “unique contribution to
the cause of American education.”
Many question whether the contribution
is worth the making. If they are right,
the contribution should cease. Many,
on the other hand, agree that it is worth
the making, and that Yale has evolved
a system of undergraduate training far
superior to the full elective system of
Harvard, or the group system of Johns
Hopkins. If they are right, then the
peculiar system should be rather empha-
sized and accentuated than modified or
abandoned. The slight introduction of
the elective principle already made in
the scheme of Sophomore year is costly
and disintegrating. More election,—
“REV. CHARLES RAY PALMER, D.D:
Member of Yale Corporation.
and this is the natural tendency of
things, would still further complicate
the administration and weaken the
efiiciency of what is wished to be essen-
tially a required curriculum.
THE GREATEST ANOMALY.
By far the greatest anomaly in the
situation is the one enlarged upon by
Mr. D. Cady Eaton in a recent letter
io the New Haven Journal and Courter.
The University having grown out of the
old College, the Faculty of the College
proper, or Academical Department, is
often called upon to deal with questions
which affect the University. It is in-
competent to do this. A great step in
advance is taken, when, as a faculty of
the Graduate School, the various Pro-
fessors of the Academical Department,
of the Sheffield School, of the School of
the Fine Arts and the School of Music, -
meet together. But this is too un-
wieldy a body, and the relation of the
Graduate School to the undergraduate
departments too nebulous, to be pro-
ductive, thus far, of much tangible good.
What is urgently needed, and what the
new President will perhaps secure, is
a University Senate, composed of the
Deans of the Medical, Law, Theo-
logical, Graduate and Sheffield Schools,
and of the Academical Department,
together with one or more Pro-
fessors from each, both Dean and Pro-
fessors elected by the several faculties
to represent them, the Dean ex-officio.
Over this body, and not over the several
faculties, the President of the Uni-
versity should preside. This would and
should relegate to the Dean of the
Academical Department most of what
used to devolve upon the President of
the College. If, further, the President
of the University desired to have all
the faculties more fully represented,
he could convene all the full Pro-
fessors into a University House. These
are matters of detail, of course. The
great principle, however, of University
government by a University faculty, and
of departmental government by de-
partmental faculties, needs clearer state-
ment and practice. .
If the Graduate School is put fully on
a par with the Medical, Law, and Theo-
logical Schools; if it can secure a
faculty at leisure to devote itself exclu-
sively to graduate work, and free from
the distracting details of undergraduate
government and instruction, a great
advance will be made. A position on
the Faculty of the Graduate School
should be a promotion, a reward for
faithful service and scholarly achieve-
ment. As it is, its older and abler mem-
bers are hampered by details of under-
graduate work which are incompatible
with the highest efficiency in graduate
work. Many of the courses now offered
as Graduate courses should belong to
‘ : sees et
the Elective courses, and all Graduate
courses should have an exclusively Uni-
versity character. es
THE GREAT OPPORTUNITY.
With greater differentiation of the
Graduate from the Undergraduate De-
partment, it would be easier, if desired,
to preserve intact the distinctively col-
legiate features of the two lower years,
or even to emphasize them. Here
seems to: lie, after all, Yale’s great
opportunity, if her future growth is to
be on the line of evolution rather than
revolution. The undergraduate facul-
ties of the College and the Sheffield
School do not form one body, as is the
case with the corresponding faculties
at Harvard. Each department has,
therefore, thus far, preserved the integ-
rity and distinctiveness of its own course
of study. Yale has a collegiate classi-
cal and a collegiate scientific course of
two years’ required work on the old-
fashioned recitation plan. Greek may
or may not be required in the classical
course. That is a minor detail. If now
the third year of the Sheffield School,
with a free application of the elective
principle, could be blended with the
Junior and Senior years of the present
Academical Department, so that gradu-
ates of either the collegiate classical, or
the collegiate scientific courses could
pass with equal privileges of election to
two years of elective work and the same
B.A. degree, much grievous duplication
of effort and waste of resources would
be avoided, and the demands of society
and secondary schools upon the Univer-
sity could be squarely and generously
met. One of President Dwight’s most
salutary achievements is the rapproche-
ment between Sheffield School and Yale
College. It paves the way for what
may be the greatest achievement’ of his
successor, the harmonious union of
these departments as feeders of the
elective courses of Junior and Senior
years, and of the purely University work
of the Graduate Schools.
From the increased privileges of the
Elective department such groups of
courses could easily be formed as would
be accepted by the various Graduate
Schools in lieu of one year of their dis-
tinctive courses. Professor Simeon E.
Baldwin has recently voiced the strong
demand for this abbreviation of the
mecessary preparation for a professional
career, AP:
i Be
THE YALE CORPORATION,
Something About the Members of
the Governing Body.
With all eyes turned upon the govern-
ing body of Yale, it may be of interest
to those who have never studied the
personnel of the Corporation, to look
at some of the facts about each of the
lay and clerical members.
Besides these mentioned in this article
are the Governor, Hon. George E.
Lounsbury, Yale ’63, and the Lieu-
tenant-Governor, Hon. Lyman J. Mills,
who are ex-officio members. The
President of the University, Dr. Dwight,
is a member of the Cornoration and its
presiding officer. Dr. George Leon
Walker: of Hartford is not mentioned,
as he is incapacitated by illness.
REV. DR. BURDETT HART, D.D.
Rey. Dr. Burdett Hart is a native of
New Britain, a graduate of Yale
in the ,Class of Forty-Two and of
the Yale Divinity School in 1846.
He was installed as pastor of the
First Church in Fair Haven, Conn.,
immediately after his graduation and re-
tained his pastorate there fourteen years.
Resigning on account of poor health he
went abroad for travel and on returning
engaged in mercantile pursuits in Phila-
delphia, giving much time meanwhile
to the charitable and benevolent insti-
tutions of the city and aiding in the
founding of a Congregational church
there. In 1873, his health being re-
stored, he returned to his old congrega-
tion in Fair Haven and preached there
till 1889, when the resigned and was
made pas’eor emeritus. Dr. Hart has
published a number of religious books
of much circulation. His election to
oe Yale Corporation was in October,
1885.
2
REV. JOSEPH BACKUS, D.D.
Dr. Joseph W. Backus, 746, was hoe
February 19, 1823 in Franklin, Conn.
He fitted for College at the Bacon
Academy, Colchester; and after gradu-
ating from Yale with the Class of Fifty-
Six he spent five years in teaching.
After completing his theological course
at Yale Seminary, he was licensed to
preach in 1851, and since that time has
had charge io several different churches
in Massachusetts and Connecticut. He
was elected to the Corporation in June,
1875, and lives in Farmington, Conn.
HON. FREDERICK J. KINGSBURY, LL.D.
Hon. Frederick J. Kingsbury, LL.D.,
was born in Waterbury, Conn., Jan. 1,
1823, and after graduation from Yale in
his twenty-third year, took up the study
of Law. He was admitted to the Bos-
ton Bar in 1848 and the next year
opened an office for the practice of his
profession in his native town. Every-
thing seemed to point to a bright legal
career for the young man, but after
a few years he gave up his practice
and began an active banking and manu-
facturing life. Fifty years of success-
ful life in the business world, during
which period he has filled positions of
great importance and handled large
monied interests, have shown that the
step was not a mistake. Mr. Kingsbury
has been often characterized as a typical
Yale man, aggressive, progressive, yet
conservative. With every move for the
public good in the municipality in
which he lives, he has been identified,
and as Director, Treasurer and Presi-
dent of the Scovill Manufacturing
Company his reputation as an execu-
tive has extended far beyond the con-
fines of the State. He represented
Waterbury in the legislature in 1850,
1858 and 1865, and was a member of the
committee on the revision of the Con-
necticut statutes. His election to the
Yale Corporation was in June, 1881.
REV. THEODORE T. MUNGER, D.D.
Rey. Dr. Theodore T. Munger is one
of the clerical members of the Corpora-
tion who helps wonderfully to strengthen
the argument for continuation of cleri-
cal control. He is adapted by nature
to university service. Men who have
sat under his. preaching or read his
books, of whom there have been thou-
sands of graduates, know what this
means from an intellectual standpoint.
He is a very excellent judge of teachers,
and his counsel and information are
particularly valuable when new instruc-
tors are needecti. He has been very
HON. CHAUNCEY M. DEPEW, LL.D.
Member of Yale Corporation.
successful in raising money for different
purposes. :
Dr. Munger was graduated from the
Academic Department of Yale in 1851
and five years later from the Theologi-
cal Department. He has held several
pastorates in Massachusetts, and during
a stay in California he established a
Congregational church in San Jose in
1875. He came from North Adams to
the United Church in New Haven,—
the northern of the three churches on
the Green,—in 1885, and was made a
member of the Yale Corporation in
1887. His best known book is “On the
Threshold.” Others of his writings
are “Freedom of Thought,” “Lamps
and Paths,” and “The Appeal to Life.”
$$.
Dr. Munger has always been ad )
and liberal in his theology and eee
fifteen years ago was the target for a
great deal of criticism for alleged
heresy. .
REV. JOSEPH ANDERSON, D.D.
Rev. Joseph Anderson, DD. at
Waterbury, Conn., represents well the
broadest scholarship of the Christian
ministry in the Congregational Church
of Connecticut, in which he has labored
for forty years. A believer in wide
liberty of thought, a sound thinker, and
@ man of great thoroughness, he has
been for many years one of the fore-
most figures in the Congregational
Church in the East, and for the cause
of education in Waterbury has done in-
estimable good.
Dr. Anderson was one of the or-
ganizers of the American Congress of
Churches and was a delegate to the
International Council of Congregational
REV. EDWIN P. PARKER, D.D.
Member of Yale Corporation.
Churches held in London in 1891. He
has twice been Moderator of the General
Association and once Moderator of
the General Conference. Among the
learned bodies of which he is a mem-
‘ber are the American Antiquarian So-
ciety, the American Philological So-
ciety, and the Historical and Social
Science Associations. Dr. Anderson is
a graduate of the College of the City
of New York in 1854 and Yale gave him
the degree of D.D. in 1878. He was
elected to the Corporation in October,
1884.
HON. HENRY E. HOWLAND, M.A.
Hon. H. E. Howland, M.A. is known
to practically all Yale men as a promi-
nent lawyer of New York and a public
speaker of unusual ability. He was
born in Walpole, N. H., graduated
from Yale in 1854 and then studied Law.
During a portion of the Civil war, he
served with distinction in the United
States Army. In 1873 he was appointed
Judge of the Marine Court of New
York City. Five years later was
formed the partnership of Anderson,
- Howland & Murray, which was changed
some years ago to Howland & Murray.
He became a member of the Corpora-
tion in June, 1892. He keeps closely
in touch with Yale affairs.
REV, CHARLES RAY PALMER, D.D.
Rev. Charles Ray Palmer, D.D., of
New Haven, graduated from Yale in
18ss and from the Andover Theological.
Seminary four years later. His first
pastorate was in Salem, Mass., at the
Tabernacle Congregational Church,
where he remained twelve years, Re-
signing on account of the uncongenial
climate, he accepted a call to the First
Congregational Church of Bridgeport,
Conn., and preached there until 1895,
being at present pastor emeritus of that
church, but living in New Haven.
Dr. Palmer was for ten years a mem-
ber of the School board of Salem, and
during that time did a great and lasting
work in building up the public school
system in that town. He represented
Yale at the opening of Mansfield Col-
lege at Oxford, England in 1889, and
two years later was a delegate to the
International Council of Congregational
Churches in London. He was also
commissioned as Yale’s representative
