sistent has been the endeavor to raise the intellectual tone, and to make both college and grammar school second in thoroughness to none in the country.

Up to the present date the college has lacked those endowments which are essential to give permanency to the work. With the exception of the several prize funds, as stated in the catalogue, the only endowment Racine possesses, besides its ninety acres of land and its substantial buildings, is the Taylor foundation of thirty thousand dollars for the benefit of orphan sons of the clergy and candidates for holy orders. This was derived from the legacy of Mrs. Isaac Taylor in 1866.

In this state of things the loss in 1879 of that commanding genius which had for so many years guided the destinies and shaped the life of the college, was a severe blow. But the work of DeKoven has proved strong enough to endure, and, without any departure from the great principles of education so long maintained, it is believed that the internal organization and discipline were never better, the intellectual work never more effective, than at present. There is every ground of hope that with a body of officers and instructors sincerely committed to the principles which have been here asserted, a Board of Trustees exercising a wise guidance of her substantial interests, and an army of devoted sons who have gone forth from her fostering care during these thirty years, and who never fail to respond to appeals in her behalf, Racine College may fulfil the designs of her founders and vindicate the great principles of education for which she has invariably contended.

The above sketch is taken from the Year Book of Racine College, 1887-88. A Historical Sketch of Racine College was prepared for the Centennial Exposition.

VI.

MILTON COLLEGE.

In the summer and fall of 1841 au humble structure for the use of an academic school was erected in the village of Milton. The institution was established with no other purpose than to accommodate the young people of the immediate vicinity. There was no expectation that it would ever become a first-class academy or college.

The nature of the locality and the character of the inhabitants have materially aided the enterprise. The intermixture of small prairies and woodlands with rich alluvial soils attracted, in an early day, the notice of the pioneers of the East, and led to the closely compact settlement of the country. The position, on a broad, rolling upland, one of the highest elevations between Lake Michigan and the Mississippi River, and one hundred and thirty feet above the beautiful Rock River, which flows around in nearly a half-circle at the distance of six to eight miles, is one of exceeding healthfulness. The scenery is surpassingly delightful.

The present inhabitants migrated principally from New England and New York. A few families came from Scotland and Pennsylvania. All were acquainted with the workings of public schools, and some with the advantages of an academy. The ideas of education first formed by an experience under the school system of Massachusetts, and remoulded afterwards in the midst of the thrift and greatness of the Empire State, guided those who built up and patronized the school. One of the first teachers in the institution says: "Nowhere else have I ever witnessed the exhibition of more zeal and public spirit in the behalf of education." It was ex pected that a few of the young people of this section might here fit themselves to enter some college, either in the West or in the East; but the instruction to be given in the school was designed almost exclusively for two purposes, viz, to aid young men in qualifying themselves for the ordinary business pursuits, and both young men and young women to prepare themselves for teaching in the public schools. From the beginning every advantage which was to be offered to young men in the academy was also to be offered to young ladies. They both were to recite in the same classes. A school of this kind, it was thought, would tend to induce families coming into this new country to settle in the vicinity of the place. Many persons were moving at the time into this region, and a well-regulated and enterprising academy would compensate them in part for the educational facilities which they left be. hind them in the East.

The academy was opened in December, 1844, as a select school. For the first two or three years the average annual attendance was about seventy.

In the winter of 1847-48 the citizens of the place combined together to secure a charter for the school, and to place it under the control of a Board of Trustees. Up to this time it had been solely under the management of Hon. Joseph Goodrich, who had sustained all the losses for the teacher's salary and the incidental expenses. The advantages which the school had conferred upon the community were marked and satisfactory. It was settled that a school with academic privileges could be maintained here. The people had been partially educated to foster such an institution, and to look forward to its assuming a higher and more permanent position. Accordingly, an act of incorporation was obtained from the Wisconsin Territory February 28, 1848, granting to seven trustees the exclusive control of the school, which was entitled the "Du Lac Academy,” a name that was never popular, nor used beyond the charter and the correspondence of the officers of the school. In 1849, under the guidance of energetic and enthusiastic instructors, a decided impulse was given to the school. Young people from localities twenty or thirty miles distant joined the classes, and the attendance was raised to over a hundred a year.

For the want of suitable accommodations the school was suspended two-thirds of the year in 1853. It became evident that better facilities by way of buildings, apparatus, and cabinets must be furnished or the enterprise must be abandoned. A larger Faculty must also be secured, and regular courses of study be adopted. A greater number of the people in the section must be enlisted in the support of the acad emy and money contributed to place it in a better working condition. With this result the history of the school as the Du Lac Academy ended.

The awakening of a new interest in the school led to the formation of a larger association of the citizens; and a new charter was obtained from the Legislature March 31, 1854, naming the institution the "Milton Academy."

From the opening of the fall term, 1851, Prof. A. C. Spicer had the supervision of the academy most of the time for seven years. After his resignation in 1858, the trustees, failing in several efforts to obtain a successor, prevailed upon Rev. W. C. Whitford, then the pastor of the Seventh Day Baptist Church of Milton, to assume the charge during the following fall term. Afterward he consented to remain in the same position the balance of the year. Finally he resigned the pastoral charge of the church, and became permanently connected with the school as the principal.

At the time scarcely any other place could have been more uninviting. Heavy debts for the erection of the buildings had been contracted; the community was sharply divided on questions which were connected

with the management of the academy; a rival institution had been opened in the place; and several academies within twenty-five miles of Milton had sprung into existence.

The institution closed its operations under the charter as an academy July 2, 1867, in consequence of its incorporation as a college. A review of its history for the last thirteen years, under the title of the Milton Academy, wil! furnish the reasons why its friends sought and obtained the college charter. Beginning with the attendance of about one hundred students per year, the school registered, in 1866, four hundred and twenty-one pupils. Seventy-three students-thirty-nine gentlemen and thirty-four ladies-had graduated in all the courses of the academy. The opposition academy organized in the place had perished soon after its opening. All classes of people were united in maintaining the school at a high standard. While the institution had been sustained mainly by the means and labors of the Seventh-Day Baptists, yet it was very largely patronized by the young people from the other religious denominations in this section. Over five thousand dollars of the indebtedness had been cancelled. In all these thirteen years not the debt of a single dollar for teachers' salaries had been contracted, nor an obligation against the institution, in any form, had been added to the indebtedness. The philosophical and chemical apparatus had been enlarged, and some valuable collections had been made for the botanical and geological cabinets. The basement of the main hall had been refitted for boarding accommodations, and the grounds ornamented with shade trees. Several thousand dollars in subscriptions had been received for the enlargement of this hall, and about five thou sand dollars for an endowment fund.

Three courses of study had, most of the time, been sustained; namely, the normal and English, the scientific, and the classical, each extending over a period of four years. In the normal department a large part of the work of the institution was performed. It was organized under the regulations of the normal regents of the State from 1858 to 1865, and received some aid each year from the normal school fund. During the last eight years nearly one hundred teachers were annually prepared for the public and private schools. The report of the State Superintendent for 1866 states that one hundred and fifty-nine students were in the normal classes of the academy, and that eighty-one of this num ber taught during that year. The Wisconsin Journal of Education for 1864 said that "no academy in the State furnishes so many teachers for the surrounding schools as this." The members of this department were trained for their profession, not only by daily recitations in the studies of the prescribed course, but by lectures and discussions on the different principles and methods of education. The students who were pursuing the scientific and the classical courses had an opportunity to fit themselves for the Junior classes in our colle ges. In these the modern and the ancient languages were most carefully taught. Marked

attention was given to the natural sciences and the higher mathemat ical studies. The more advanced students-both gentlemen and ladiesoften expressed the wish that the institution would add to its curriculum the studies of the last two years of the college courses. Eighty-five students were found, at the close of the academic year for 1867, ready to form the Freshman and Sophomore classes, under the organization of the college.

It was no hasty or ill-advised movement on the part of the friends of the school in obtaining a college charter with university privileges. The responsibility and toil in building up such an institution were carefully considered, and the risks to be encountered were thoroughly canvassed. The act incorporating the college passed the Legislature of the State in February, 1867, and was formally accepted by the stockholders of the institution March 13th following. The charter grants the privilege of conferring degrees, and prohibits the exaction of any religious test or qualification of any trustee, officer, professor, teacher, or student of the institution.

It was resolved to unite both the academic and the collegiate courses of study, an arrangement which the institution has since pursued in common with most of the colleges in the West. There are now three courses of study-a classical course, a scientific course, and a teachers' course. The classical course embraces all the studies of both the preparatory and the collegiate departments, excepting those in the modern languages. Graduates from this course receive the degree of bachelor of arts. The scientific course accommodates those students who prefer the study of the German and the advanced English languages to that of the Greek. Graduates from this course receive the degree of bachelor of science. In the teachers' course special attention is given to the preparation of students for teaching in the public schools of the State.

The above sketch is in part taken from the Historical Sketch of Milton College, prepared for the Centennial Exposition, 1876.

The other chief sources of information respecting the college are the annual reports to the Bureau of Education at Washington, to the Superintendent of Public Instruction of Wisconsin, and to the Education Society of the Seventh-Day Baptists of the United States.

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