I EAST LODGE N JUNE of 1900 Wellesley College will celebrate its twenty-fifth anniversary and the twenty-first birthday of its first graduating class. During these twenty-five years this youthful college for women has made rapid material growth and kept even pace with the educational advance of this last and most progressive quarter of the nineteenth century. Some events that will greatly increase its influence and ability for service have recently brought Wellesley before the public eye, -the gifts of two new dormitories and an astronomical observatory; the dedication, last June, of the Houghton Memorial Chapel, and the choice and inauguration, last October, of the new president, Miss Caroline Hazard. century with these advanced facilities for training young womanhood to meet the ever-increasing demands upon her intellect and soul, it seems not unfitting to review the history of the college's inception and growth. Wellesley, like the Leland Stanford Junior University, rose from the deep waters of sorrow of stricken parents for an only son. This gift, unlike that of many others, was bestowed during the lifetime of the founders, who were then in the prime of life, and their whole-hearted devotion and service went with it. No Mr. Henry Fowle Durant, the founder of Wellesley, was a rare personality. one looking upon his face could ever forget it, so much of the fire of a noble purpose shone therein. Its beauty in repose recalled the portraits of the poet Milton. In early manhood he was a successful Copyrighted, 1900, by THE WERNER COMPANY. All rights reserved. Wellesley's story has been often told. But as it stands at the gate of the twentieth 1 (1) lawyer. After the loss of his only son, in 1863, he abandoned his practice at the height of his fame and became for a brief time a Christian evangelist. Meantime the idea of a college for women to which he should devote his life and his fortune was taking shape in his thought. In PRESIDENT CAROLINE HAZARD September, 1871, the corner-stone was laid of a college for the "training of Christian teachers, Christian women, and Christian mothers." A Bible was placed in that corner-stone with this inscription: "This building is humbly devoted to our heavenly Father with the hope and the prayer that he may always be first in every thing in this institution.» In Mr. Durant's subsequent relation to the college he showed himself, as an early student expressed it, "great enough to found Wellesley College for the women of America, and small enough to plan a trifling pleasure for the least girl within its walls." Wellesley's title, "the College Beautiful," has been its proud possession from the first, given by acclamation of both students and guests. Its four hundred and fifty acres of woodland, lake, sunny hillsides, streamlet, and meadow form an ideal spot for a university. The first building, now known as College Hall, stands upon one of a group of low hills overlooking Lake Waban,* whose silvery waters reflect the college morning and evening. This exquisite sheet of water has been in the highest sense "a joy forever" to the Wellesley student, who, whether in the glorious spring days, when, "Young oak leaves mist the hillside woods with pink,* amid the gorgeous autumn foliage, or when the winter wind ripples the lake into diamonds and silver, can say of her Alma Mater from the heart, "In every changing mood we love her, The artistic soul of Mr. Durant clearly discerned the ennobling influence of beauty upon student life and aimed to supplement nature with art, keeping everything at Wellesley in harmony with its surroundings. Since his death the trustees and alumnæ have vied with Mrs. Durant in their efforts to carry out his thought by preserving, as far as practicable, the wildness of shady nook and woodland path, and by placing new buildings where there is the least sacrifice of grove and tree. College Hall was designed by Hammett Billings, the sculptor architect of the Plymouth Monument. It is a double Latin cross, four hundred and seventyfive feet long, and three hundred feet in extreme width. The building is of brick with a mansard roof. In the centre of the spacious hall, the balconies of which rise tier above tier to the lighted roof, tropical plants always flourish. The art collections of Wellesley were never confined to one hall, but were placed in the centre and corridors of the college, where the student came in daily contact with many choice selections from the art treasures of the world, both in painting and sculpture. An art school was early organized, and Mr. Durant's desire for a permanent home for the gifts which he and his friends were frequently bestowing upon this department found fulfilment in 1888 in the bequest by his lifelong friend, Mr. Isaac D. Farnsworth, of one hundred thousand dollars for a School of Art. In some respects Wellesley is unique among colleges for women. Many of her founder's ideas were of the most radical type. He provided that both men and women should constitute the Board of *The lake takes its name from Chief Waban, whose conversion by the Apostle Eliot and confession of faith has become one of the romances of early New England history. Trustees, but that the Faculty (including the President) should be composed of women alone. He also decreed that there should be no system to indicate class rank or class honors, but that knowledge should be loved and won for itself alone and as a means of service to others. The ideal of scholarship and method of instruction was high from the first, though the grade of studies was lowered to meet the needs of the early students; for of the first three hundred only forty were found to be ready for the freshman class. Several years in advance of other colleges Mr. Durant arranged a generous system of electives; he anticipated much of the modern laboratory work in this country by five years. The biological department was the first established in any college in this country. At the same time he offered every inducement for the study vate library of about eighteen thousand volumes. To these he added rare editions of Chaucer, Shakespeare, Spenser, and Milton, many choice volumes from famous libraries, as those of Coleridge and Dickens, and beautiful painted missals and office books picked up for him from OldWorld collections. There is at Wellesley a famous collection of Bibles, including an Eliot Bible and a Latin Bible of Philip Melancthon, the latter being always used for the selection on Commencement Day. Later the library received a munificent endowment from Professor Eben Horsford, of Cambridge, which within a few years enabled it to number over forty thousand volumes and was expected to provide for its future. None of Mr. Durant's ideas have caused more comment than the decision that Wellesley should have a woman for a of the classics, and most of the early students will remember his playful, quizzical manner of encouraging the study of Greek. He considered the use of the text-book in the study of history and literature as unworthy of a college student or instructor. In all things he was planning for the future, and his prophetic eye could see not only an advanced standard of scholarship, but a college building on every hill,-a chapel, an observatory, an art school, and a medical college: a dream that so far has only partially materialized. Among the most precious gifts of the founder to the college was that of his pri President. After much searching Miss Ada L. Howard, an alumna and teacher at Mount Holyoke Seminary, was appointed to the office. For seven years she worked in perfect harmony with the founders, and with much practical wisdom, to develop the embryo college for its high destinies. When, in 1882, she resigned because of ill health, the trustees appointed Miss Alice E. Freeman, of Michigan University, and Professor of History at Wellesley, as her successor. Miss Freeman came to the presidency at a critical period in the history of the college. The guiding hand of Mr. Durant A loyal had been removed by death. The preparatory department had been discontinued. Questions of internal organization and of standards of scholarship required rare tact and executive ability. body of students gathered about the youthful President, who was then only twenty-eight, eager to follow her leadership, and an able and faithful Faculty worked with her. She led the institution from its preparatory stage into the fulness and freedom of a broader college life, reorganized the course of study, and established friendly relations with other colleges and the educational world at large. During this period the college grew rapidly in numbers and in influence, speedily taking place in the front rank of educational institutions. It seemed MISS ADA L. HOWARD, FIRST PRESIDENT a grave disaster when Miss Freeman resigned, after six years of brilliant success, to become the wife of George H. Palmer, of Harvard University. But again the trustees found a member of the Faculty well equipped for the position in Miss Helen A. Shafer, an Oberlin woman, for eleven years Professor of Mathematics at Wellesley Wellesley has always given larger opportunities for specialization than any other college for women, thus greatly increasing the expense for instruction, class room and laboratory. Under Miss Shafer's skilful guidance the college broadened its elective system to meet the constantly increasing demand for special lines of study. These electives are arranged in groups subject to the approval of the Faculty, and always include a training in either mathematics or the classics, Bible, English, philosophy, one language, and two natural sciences. The departments of English language and literature were gradually expanded until more than twenty elective courses offer most tempting opportunities for special and graduate work. During Miss Shafer's administration the college met many difficulties incident to its rapid growth and the financial conditions of the country. From the first the gifts of new dormitories had failed to keep pace with the increasing demands for admission. It became necessary to lodge most of the freshman class with families in the town, thus depriving them of the refining influence of the college home life and making it difficult to bring their young minds into harmony with the aims and ideals of their Alma Mater. The demand for new class rooms and laboratories was imperative. In fact the college was struggling in every department with an equipment wholly inadequate to its numbers and with no means to enlarge it. The financial crisis deprived Mrs. Durant of the property left her in trust for the college, and the library of the income of the funds provided by Professor Horsford. It has been difficult to convince the public that Wellesley has no endowment and that Mr. Durant had not provided for its every need. Hence, when safety and health forced the trustees to build a chemistry building and make necessary repairs, a debt was incurred. The alumnæ are now making every effort to cancel this debt and to secure an endowment fund before the twenty-fifth anniversary. In the midst of these difficulties the college was deprived of its able and beloved President by death. As the change from a required to an elective system of study was still in transition, it seemed to the trustees that a member of the Faculty who was familiar with the conditions and the recent legislation and plans of the Academic Council should succeed Miss Shafer. In this crisis Mrs. Julia Irvine reluctantly consented to leave the more congenial work of Professor of |