YALE ALUMNI
WEEKLY
YALE ALUMNI WEEKLY
SUBSCRIPTION, - $3.00 PER YEAR.
Foreign Postage, 40 cents per year.
PAYABLE IN ADVANCE.
Single copies, ten cents each. For rates for papers
in quantity, address the office. All orders for papers
should be paid for in advance.
Checks, drafts and orders should be made payable to
the Yale Alumni Weekly.
All correspondence should be addressed,—
Yale Alumni Weekly, New Haven, Conn.
The office is at Room 6, White Hall.
ADVISORY BOARD.
H. C. RosBtnson, 53. J.R. SHEFFIELD, ’87.
W. W. Skippy, ’65S. J. A. HarTweELt, ‘89 8.
C. P. LInDsLEY, 75 S. L. S. WELCH, ’89.
W. Camp, ’80. E. VAN INGEN, ’91 5.
W.G. DaGGeETT, ’80. P. Jay, °92.
EDITOR.
Lewis S. WELOH, ’89.
ASSOCIATE EDITOR.
WALTER Camp, ’80.
ASSISTANT EDITOR.
E. J. THOMPSON, Sp.
NEWS EDITOR.
FRED. M. Davrss, ’99.
ASSISTANT.
PRESTON KUMLER, 1900.
Advertising Manager, O. M. CLARK, "98.
Assistant, BURNETT GOODWIN, 995.
Entered as second class matter at New Haven P. 0.
New HAVEN, Conn., APRIL 12, 1899.
WHY SHOULDN'T YALE GET 1T?
In almost every paper we take up
nowadays is some news of President
Harper’s requests for money for the
University of Chicago. Different jour-
nals report him as wanting very soon
anywhere from one to nine millions of
dollars. We will not take the trouble
to look it up and see just how much
he does want at this particular time, for
what he does not want now he will be
sure to request at an early date in the
future. .
Furthermore, what he asks for he will
get, and we are glad that that state-
ment can be made with reasonable con-
fidence. But we beg to ask a question.
If President Harper can, in his quiet
and sufficient way, demand money in
the millions every little while and not
get discouraged, but, on the contrary,
approach the opportunities of the
future with increasing confidence, shall
Yale’s present appeal be considered a
very serious tax on the Yale portion of
the United States of America?
Yale has not for a long time asked for
a sum of any size, as sums go nowadays.
It was, of course, a fine thing for Yale
graduates and undergraduates to put up
a $200,000 Gymnasium by themselves.
That is a pretty small sum really. It
was years before that when she last
asked for-any sum of size.
And here she is two hundred years
old; has ten thousand children living,
and tens of thousands more of warmest
friends whom she has won by years of
splendid service. And what she wants
is only two million dollars. Just enough
to do the necessary business with—to
build a hall where the Yale family can
all get together, where they can set —
up their household gods, now stored
away in cellars or getting dusty on the
shelves of the Library, and where, in
the name of the University, great events
of culture and civilization shall take
place; and second, enough besides that
to just keep the whole plant going in
an even, stire way.
Of course, there are any number of
things that Yale can use money for and
surely will get it for, and they run on
to large sums. But here is the least
which she can get along with, and she
asks it of her own. They cannot deny
her, but it will not come unless every-
one makes a sacrifice.
A NEW ALUMNI PAPER.
No. 1 of Volume I. of the Cornell
Alumni News is on our exchange table.
We are not surprised to see another
alumni paper brought to life by the
loyal graduates of Cornell. We would
pick them out as those who would be
very desirous of having some connect-
ing link all through their life with their
University and with each other.
They have started out to have a good
one. There is no question about that if
one may judge from the contents of
the first number. It is an eight-page
paper, about the size of the ALUMNI
WEEKLY and not unlike it in its make-
up. The athletic news appears on the
second page, and the alumni notes and
obituaries on the third. The Alumm
News has begun by publishing illustra-
tions, the first number containing the
portraits of Mario Garcia Menocal,
Cornell, ’88, now Chief-of-Police of
Havana, and of four professors of the
University.
The Alumni News decided at the out-
set that, being a paper for the alumni,
it would better be published and edited
by alumni. We think our Cornell con-
-temporary is absolutely sound on this
point and also on the point that it is
wise to use as assistants, undergraduate
journalists. Both of these lines of
policy have been followed by the
AtumMNI WEEKLY with satisfaction. It
is intimated in the opening number that,
if the Alumni News is successful, one
of the undergraduate publications may
unite its interests with the Alumni News.
The Editor of the paper is Clark S.
Northup, ’93, and the Managing Editor,
as he is called, is Herbert B. Lee, Class
of ’99. The Assistants are drawn from
the classes of ’98 and ’99. The paper is
published under the auspices of a Board
of Alumni Advisors, fourteen in number,
eraduates of classes from 9S 4D OF.
There is an Executive Committee of
three from this Board.
We beg leave to offer our best wishes
to the Cornell Alumni News. If it con-
tinues as well as it begins, it is bound
to be a success. If it is a stccess, it
will help Cornell. Anything that ad-
vances the interests of Cornell, advances
the interests of high American educa-
tion.
Our very valuable contemporary, the
Cambridge (Eng.) Review, is generally
very accurate. We therefore feel a bit
ungracious in calling its attention to
the fact that it is not Yale, but Chicago
University, that has a good friend will-
ing to duplicate anything given to the
University in a reasonable time, up to.
ten million dollars. Yale has a two-
million problem on hand, but it is not
as yet as cheerfully conditioned as this
one of Chicago.
aa
a
>
> 4
CORPORATION CANDIDATES.
Whose Already Named—Mr. Dimock
and Cornell University.
The daily increasing interest in the
elections for the Corporation has re-
sulted in an early and very keen study
of the names of those who have been
proposed for the vacancies. It seems to
be a general feeling that membership in
the Corporation in the near future will
require even a higher standard of
ability than before.
The problems that will crowd upon
Yale with the very inception of the new
administration will be so many sided
and so serious, that only the best minds
and the closest study of the University’s
needs can properly pass upon them,
even after they have come through the
Faculty and President. These ques-
tions will cut very deeply into all sides
of Yale’s life, and the question of her
material welfare, of however great 1m-
portance, will be secondary to other
matters involving the very life and real
character of the place. Those who have
read the papers on the “The Next Ad-
ministration” can realize to some extent
how trying and how far-reaching these
problems will be. The issues involved
are so great and so far beyond personal
considerations, that the WEEKLY is in-
clined to be very free in admitting a
discussion of these matters in our
columns.
The candiates who have been directly
or indirectly brought before the readers
of this paper are these:
HH: .Dimock. Yale, *63; N.-¥: City:
Eli Whitney, Yale ’690, New Haven.
A. L. Ripley, Yale 78, Boston.
W. H. Taft, Yale, ’78, Cincinnati.
N. G. Osborn, Yale ’80, New Haven.
It looks now as if there would be
other nominees including Professor
William H. Welch, Yale ’70, of Johns
Hopkins University.
As soon after May first as it is practi-
cable, the names of those who have re-
ceived twenty-five votes and who have
withdrawn their names will be an-
nounced by circular to the graduates.
The ballots will be received by the
Secretary of the University, Mr. Dexter,
and can be sent by mail or can de de-
posited in person in New Haven at a
certain time of Commencement week.
The announcement is generally made at
the Commencement dinner.
An alleged fact has been constantly
referred to in connection with Mr.
Dimock’s candidacy, to wit: that he
was a Trustee of. Cornell University
and for that reason, was considered by
a great many people ineligible to the
Yale Corporation. The facts in the
case are, that Mr. Dimock declined a
suggestion that he be elected, and that
in spite of this he was chosen to a
trusteeship. He nevertheless held to
his stand that he was unwilling to ac-
cept, and formally declined it. A friend
of Mr. Dimock informs the WEEKLY
that he took this stand because he was
unwilling to hold a position in any other
University than Yale. : |
ALUMNI IDEALS.
More Suggestions about the Presi-
dency from Graduates.
A SCHOLARLY ADMINISTRATOR.
There has been a canvass of senti-
ment in Cleveland by two or three Yale
alumni, who give this expression of
opinion:
“Tf we limit ourselves to two words
of description, the phrase would be ‘A
Scholarly Administrator.’ Perhaps this
sounds like the impossibility so often
suggested at such times. It means‘to
us that a man at thé head of Yale must,
first of all, be a man of affairs, capable
of managing men, a senate or legisla-
ture; but that it is of equal necessity
that he be a scholar (not a clergyman,
by any means), but of such attainments
as to have the country recognize the
choice as that of a scholar.
“Tf you had not suggested the avoid-
ance of personalities, I could have given
no more appropriate name than Profes-
sor Blank. His age would make this
an inspiring appointment.
“We have grown strong in poverty
and are a little inclined to fear the in-
fusion of too much worship of gold.”
MUST BE IN COLLEGE WORK.
A lawyer, and a man of much public
service, has laid special stress on the
importance of previous connection with
college or university work:
“Assuming the possession of all the
usual qualities of an able man,—dignity,
sincerity, straightforwardness, impar-
tiality, firmness and sympathy,—the new
President of Yale should have two lead-
ing qualifications: first, fine scholar-
ship; second, fine executive ability. In
addition, the work of a University Pres-
ident is so far differentiated from other
work as, in my judgment, to make it
necessary that he should be one whose
previous life has been connected with
a college or university. I do not think
it possible for any man who has fol-
lowed other pursuits till middle life to
turn to the conduct and direction of a
great university with full success. Ex-
ecutive ability, tact in dealing with
men,—associates and students,—a firm
hold on public attention, each of these
counts for much; but there is nothing
that can fully take the place of an inti-
mate practical knowledge of university
life. This cannot be gained except by
long experience, which there is no time
to gain except at great loss after one
has undertaken such duties.
“Therefore, I think the wise choice of
the next Yale President is limited to
those who have already becomé prac-
tically familiar with university life. It
is the same rule as should be applied in
selecting the head of a great court,—he
must first of all be a lawyer.
“This does not make it necessary, or
strictly essential, that the choice here
should be of one who is a Yale gradu-
ate, though other things being nearly
equal I think a Yale graduate, for some
pretty obvious -reasons, ‘should be pre-
ferred,—a rule, however, to which I ad-
mit there might be exceptions. For
example, if Professor George P. Fisher
were to-day otherwise eligible to the
Presidency, the fact that he is not a
graduate of Yale would not weigh with
me in determining my choice.
“To my mind, the finest combination
of these three desiderata,—a man of
university life, a man of high scholar-
ship, and a man of large executive
ability,—is the man on whom the choice
should fall. To my mind, too, these
qualifications may be safely named as
the irreducible minimum.
“It would not be difficult for me to
name such a man if it were desirable to
do so, but any man anywhere possessing
these qualifications would make a Pres-
ident who would carry forward the great
work which Yale ought to do in the
next twenty-five years.
“I wish to add that I think it most
desirable that the coming President
should not be over forty-five years of
age.
; HERE'S A LARGE IDEAL.
A Massachusetts graduate of about
fifteen years standing has built a presi-
dent on strong, broad lines:
“TI suppose my opinion is that of the
body of alumni. The trouble comes in
estimating a candidate so truly that the
theory is not left unrealized in the man
selected. The office must find in the
man great reserves of power in multi-
form directions. Otherwise, we must
meet the disappointments so frequent in
the selections of heads of schools of
learning.
“And at best, our new President will
be an experiment until tested by time.
This position calls for a administra-
tor. It demands therefor a just man,
an approachable man, an even-tempered
man, a man with a good digestion and
one who knows how to keep his blood
fresh with a fair mixture of out-of-doors
with indoors.
“The position demands an executor.
It calls, therefore, for a man who knows
affairs and men. He must have posi-
tive convictions and his own mind. He
must be a man of method—an organ-
izer—and must be able to choose speci-
fically competent lieutenants and must
forego the pleasure of doing every-
thing himself. This ability not to ex-
pend energy on details seems to me of
supreme consequence, and it is~ the
mark and crown of successful conduct
of great affairs. :
A very well known New Haven man
constructs this ideal:
“My ideal President of Yale is a man
of commanding presence, a _ fluent
speaker and natural leader of men. He
must have attained eminence in some
one branch of learning, but, at the samie
time, must be a man of broad culture,
also a man of affairs with marked or-
ganizing and executive ability. Though
firm and decided, he must have affable
manners and be easily approachable.
He must be a good judge of men.
“Of the above-mentioned qualities, I
consider executive force, ability to
judge men, broad culture, affable man-
ners and readiness in public speaking
as absolutely essential.”
Yale Law School.
For circulars and other information apply to
Prof. FRANCIS WAYLAND,
Dean.