The Portland daily press. [volume] (Portland, Me.) 1862-1921, 1892-09-17
A DAY AT OLD BoWDolN.
The Great improvements Going On in the
College Town.

ever attractive and interesting to the
visitor, and we have had the pleasure OF
spending few days there this week, and
especially of looking over the campus OF
Bowdoin College. and noting the i'm
provements going ON at this ancient and
favored institution of learning.
And first, it was pleasant to notice the
new Mall, which has been laid out re-
| Gently in the upper part of Main street in
front of the college grounds, similar to
| the old mall that stood in the middle of
| the same street, which extends from the
hill below the church to the Tontine no.
tel. 1t is graded up higher than the
roadway on each side, and is laid down
to fine lawn grass, with several mounds
of flowers and large tropical foliage
plants interspersed.
The work of erecting the new Walker
Art building is progressing we'll, and
when completed it will be an elegant,
classic and ornamental ediflce. The do
nation of 100000 or more was made by
the Misses Walker, of Waltham, Mass,
and the building is set upon the right
side of the front entrance to the campus
fronting the College chapel. The ma
terials employed are dark, hard-burned
bricks, with trimmings of Indiana lime
stone, and the building will resemble a
new buildings in Boston, notably the few
Algonquin Club House on Commonwealth
avenue. There will be no windows on
the sides of the building, but the light
will enter from round central window
in the top of the dome, and two sky
lights in the roof. Messrs. Mckee, Mead
and White, of Boston, are the architects,
and the celebrated Messrs. Norcross
Brothers, of Worcester, who are building
the extension of the State House and 9TH
er expensive structures, are the able con-
tractors, with Mr.. George Conner as gen
eral superintendent of the work.
There will be two large medallion
stones placed in the front, on which the
names of the great masters in art of the
world will be inscribed, viz: Michael
Angelo, Da Vinci. Raphael, Guido,
Titan, Rubens, Thorwaldsen, ct ais.
The structure, it is expected, will be
finished by next Commencement and APP
propriately dedicated when the present
fine art collection will be removed thith-
er. This edifice will become an educa-
tional and artistic acquisition to the col
lege in future years, and will stimulate
taste for art and be worthy memorial
of the liberal donors.
Next spring another new hall will be
commenced for the purpose of teaching
some of the exact sciences, as physics,
chemistry and biology. This is to be the
liberal gift of Mr.. Edward F. Searles, and
it will contain three OF four laboratories
and lecture rooms, and will be placed in
a line with the art building, but on the
left side of the main entrance, nearly
fronting the chapel.
These new halls, with the fine Memo
rial Hall, old Massachusetts Hall and the
other college buildings, and possible
new library building, which will be de-
manded in the not-far-distant future, will
form an appropriate quadrangle similar
to those of the great English UNIVERSE
ties.
Old Maine Hall is now undergoing a
thorough renovation and improvement
interiorly. The plastering and lathing has
been entirely removed and new lathing
and two coats of plastering put on The
rooms are to be finished in hard wood,
with new windows of four-pane glass,
and water, steam heat and electric lights
introduced, all at an expense of 100000
These modern Improvements will make
the students rooms as handsome and
comfortable as those Of any other college
in the country. The other two college
domitories, Appleton and Winthrop halls
will be treated in like manner next year
and the year following.
Two new dwelling houses for new pro-
fessors have also been erected by the col
lege on Main street beyond the grounds
during the past year.
The nnw observatory is in excellent
condition under the superintendent of
Prof. Hutchins who has set up the tele-
scope and other apparatus personally.
He is very able and ingenious man and
he could even grind the lenses of tele-
scope himself very accurately; and in
fact he did make the case of the tele-
scope and placed the lenses in it.
The observatory affords all the aid to as
Economical study which student in the
general college course requires.
In the gymnasium Prof. Whittier, who
by the way is well known in our Port
land schools in connection with physical
science, has inaugurated an exact and
personally graded system of physical
training which is designed to fit the
case of every student and to extend in an
unusually developing extent over the
whole course of an Undergraduate, the
hours week. Every man is measured
and examined and treated by himself ac-
cording to his strength and is then care
fully advanced in gymnastic training as
his strength increases. Mems scnd IN
corpore sGno'' seems to be the motto of
the college in this regard.
Dr. Sargent the physician and superin-
tendent Of the Harvard Gymnasium, re-
Gently visited Bowdoin and he pro-
nounced the physical culture and care of
the students here indicated to be of the
highest order, and this of course is very
great praise.
President Hyde and his faculty should
look well to it that mere physical devel-
opement is not carried too far, or rather
that moral and intellectual education
keep up with bodily training, so that the
students may not graduate as mere fol-
lowers of such athletes as John Law
renee Sullivan or James J. CorbeUt!
The salaries of the professors have
been raised of late so that no other col
leges not even Chicago University may
extend higher call to any of them with
any expectation of drawing them away
to broader fields of usefulness.
There is one other pressing need at
Bowdoin which clamors for realization
L. e..