POPULISM IN A STATE EDUCATIONAL INSTITUTION 393
many of the younger institutions of the West were purposely modeled after it in general course of study and adaptation to the preparation given in common schools. The four years' course, leading to the degree, Bachelor of Science, was thoroughly disciplinary in matter and methods, but at the same time so combined with training of hands and stimulating of purpose, as to lead evidently into the industries. Agriculture and horticulture in all their bearing had chief place, as was proper in an agricultural state, while mechanics had recently grown to a rank but little lower. For special preparation of teachers, investigators and expert workmen, postgraduate courses adapted to the special needs of each were devised.
Nearly seven hundred undergraduates were in this single course and more than forty graduates, several from university courses, were taking special training. These represented seventy-six counties of the state and 70 per cent, were from farm homes. Attendance was growing at the rate of 13 per cent, per annum. Graduates took highest rank as students in university courses at Ann Arbor, Cornell, Chicago and elsewhere, and as teachers and investigators all over the Union. Its plan of organization was published with approval in the proceedings of the National Educational Council, and its officers held highest places in the Association of American Agricultural Colleges and Experiment Stations. Its station work was commended by the best experts for purpose and accuracy. The form of its bulletin, adopted in 1890 was in 1897 commended by a special committee for all the stations of the Union. Adverse criticisms came only from boomers of special enterprises or from agricultural editors who mistook the station for a bureau of miscellaneous information in agriculture.
The faculty of twenty-four teachers and sixteen assistants, foreman and minor officers, had been selected because of special aptness for their positions as instructors in such a school. They were in thorough sympathy with the ideal of the college as related to agriculture and mechanic arts and more than one-half of the twenty-four teachers had been identified with its upbuild-
