The semi-weekly messenger. [volume] (Wilmington, N.C.) 1897-1908, 1898-02-18
Ghe Wlrsselwer.
He DGSrING UI5H ED LUMNI
OF UNIVERSITIES AND ORATORS

~.
sten Reserve University, upon educa-
4son in northern month1ies. 1t appears
xQlat aae has published four volumes on
the subject, which appears to be ex-
cessiye labor covering vast reading
space. He shows among other things
huw the great schools have educated
the leaders of our country. If you
naSn consul Appleton's one-sided, I'M
fair, sectional C~yclopaedia of Biog-
raphy, you will find the south neg
7ected to a very great extent. Many
of it's leaders-men of marked ability
and inluence-are ignored altogether,
while in New England every little
local fellow of some little repute
among his ~neighIbors in the village in
which he lives finds a place in these
massive volume of immortality CD
The Messenger years ago exposed at
some length this injustice. We were
unwise enough to invest money in
this work so Indifferent and unjust to
the south. Our great North CAROLYN
Gan, George 70. Badger, has a short
article, not perhaps half or one-fourth
so long as obscure Yankees Of whom
Ehe best and dnOse generally read Am
orleans never heard so much as their
names. We would not be surprised to
learn that DR.. Thwing never heard. of
the University of North Carolina, al
though in its second century of SER
vice and with a really remarkable re-
cord. It's dist Of able, gifted, accom-
plished alumni is both long and i'm
pressive. 1t has done admirable work
for this southland and for the Ameri-
can MO We have not seen De-.
Thwing's books. We get this from the
Atlanta Constitution:
sIn the first place DR.. Tnwing OBJ
serves that the number of men whom
the colleges and universities of the
country have trained for public life in
ats most important phases is largely
In~excess of the number of men which
have sprung from other sources. To
prOVe>this statement, he cites the fact
t1haf Harvard university mas given to
He nation three presidents, two vice
presidents, seven ministers to England
and hosts of Judges, congressman,
United. States senator's, cabinet officers,
diplOmatists and governors. With res
pect to the contributions of Yale col
lege to the official life of the nation,
-@- AA 'AAo SoSo ShAAi LStA nv AAiINF So
tail. Yale has produced one vice presi-
dent, seventeen cabinet officers, one
chief justice and three associate JUS
tees of the supreme court of the
United States, fifty senaors, one hun-
Ered and ~eighy-SeVen congressman,
twenty-five ministers to foreign coun-
tries and forty governors"
All his is much to the credit of these
two old and richly endowed institu-
tfons. They began very ~early-have
cad probably double the age of any
souflern university or institution of
learning. No one would question
their fame OF SERVICE, or lessen the
splendid role of it's eminent graduates.
DIR IynWing also gives Princeton's re-
cord. and it is every way most credi-
table. He says it has given to the
country one president, three vice presi-
dents, twenty cabinet officers, twenty
eight governors and one hundre and
seventy-one congressman. Let US say
Here that one of the great sources OF
strength of these three famous schools
of learning is the large moneyed en-
sfowments. Southern colleges and uni
versities have languished no little from
tne want of means. They have
struggled for foOthOld because OF
zneagre appropriations and bequests.
But the University of Virginia, and
Ehe University of North Carolina have
done excellent work, and others of the
Older southern schools have wrought
wonders and turned out many men OF
marked distinction and usefulness.
Some time ago the Messenger avail
sd itself of statistics and names pub
Sshed by that faithful laborer in
che neglected field of letters in North
Carolina, Dr.. Stephen b. Weeks, who
has already published several vol
mmes of ~real interest to our people.
Remembering how great dvantag
Harvard and Yale have over the Uni
versity of North Carolina in age, in
Ssur esteemed neighbor up the Cape
Fear, the Fayetteville Observer:
sit is probable that our university
comes next to Princeton, II 1t does not
surpass it. Its list of alumni includes
one president (Polk); one vice presi-
dent (King); one acting vice president
four secretaries of the
NAVY (Branch, Graham, Mason, Dob
bin)-we were about to say five. but
MIR. Badger was a raduat OF 1ale-;
one attorney general (Miller); one sec
rotary of the interior Jacob Thomp-
sonl. ane a large number of governors,
diplomats, senator's. bishops, Judges,
and men of distinction in every walk
Id life"
AT one time, we recall, perhaps forty
wears ago, there were seven North
Carolinians by birth in the United
S&,E1, ranota m, of y-h0ro wpra 1lni-
versity of North Carolina men,. 1t is
with southern schools as with south
.ern authors, they are overlooked by
northern newspapers and literary pub
~Iications. We have within a year or