Page:A History of the University of Chicago by Thomas Wakefield Goodspeed.djvu/542

APPENDIX STATEMENT SUBMITTED TO THE BOARD OF TRUSTEES AT ITS FIRST MEETING, JULY 9, 1890, BY F. T. GATES, CORRESPOND- ING SECRETARY OF THE AMERICAN BAPTIST EDUCATION SOCIETY. To the Board of Trustees of the University of Chicago: GENTLEMEN: Dr. Goodspeed has presented to you a brief account of the origin of the present enterprise of re-establishing the work of higher education in the city of Chicago, and has traced the progress of the undertaking under the auspices of the American Baptist Educa- tion Society up to the completion of the initial fund. It remains to lay before you the engagements and obligations which the Education Society entered into with the subscribers to this fund; to show how in the main particulars these obligations have already been discharged by the Society. This it falls to the lot of a committee to do, consisting of Mr. Blake, Mr. Bowen, and myself, appointed by our Executive Board for this purpose. The engagements entered into by the Society with its subscribers are embodied in the series of resolutions adopted by our Executive Board and indorsed by the Society when the work of raising funds was undertaken. These may be found on pp. 16 and 17 of our first annual report, now in the hands of each of you. These resolutions the Society regards as covenants with the subscribers to the fund. They are based upon the report of a committee of nine eminent educators but written under the eye of Mr. Rockefeller on the day in which he made his great pledge. On these resolutions the pledge was based. Dated May 15, 1889, the pledge was by stipulation of Mr. Rockefeller held in escrow by the corresponding secretary until the Executive Board at its appointed meeting, two days later, should pass these resolutions. If the resolutions should fail of adoption without material change, Mr. Rocke- feller's pledge was to be returned to his hand. These resolutions were unanimously adopted by the Executive Board, May 17, 1889, and the following day were indorsed by the Society with equal unanimity, the Society thus assuming the obligations the resolutions impose. Mr. Rockefeller's pledge was released from escrow and publicly announced. As with Mr. Rockefeller, so with every later subscriber, the resolutions 474