The Butte inter mountain. [volume] (Butte, Mont.) 1901-1912, 1901-12-27

State Teachers Association BY agree
ment with the author of the able paper
just presented, my part in this discus
sion is to consist of very brief review
of mining education in this country.
The terms, high school, college, uni
! versity and academy are well understood
! by our people. The professions of law,
| medicine, theology and civil engineering
| have for a long time had their schools
| of special preparation, and for 40 years
| the beneficent results of the Morrill, act,
providing for the creation and support
of schools of agriculture, have been en-
joyed by nearly every state in the Union.
The mining school, properly so-called,
is an institution of more modern origin.
1t sprang into being somewhat suddenly,
not for the purpose of filling a long-felt
want, but in answer to a demand that
arose from the enormous development
of our mining interests that followed the
close of our civil war.
Before this date it is true that the
Rensselaer, Pyrotechnic institute and
the scientific departments of Harvard
and Yale colleges offered instruction in
mining engineering, but I am not aware
of any important work they ever ac-
complished in that direction.
Colleges Establish Mining Department.
The first really efficient step toward
securing a thorough education in mining
and mining engineering was that taken
by Columbia college in 1868, when it
created a department in that institution
called the Columbia College School Of
Mines.
For the next 10 or Is years this school
practically had the field all to itself, and
attracted very large number of stu
dents. Though 1t has ceased to be the
leader in this department of education,
owing to it's early start it's graduates in
this line equal in number the sum total
sent forth by all the other mining schools
put together.
During the decade from 1870 to 1880 a
score or more colleges followed the ex-
ample of Columbia college and estab-
lished departments of mining and min
ing engineering. Some of these schools
have been we'll patronized and have been
fairly successful: others have not done
SO well.
1t is not too much to say that
this and the following decade constituted
formative or evolutionary period in the
history of the mining school. Naturally
some differences of opinion arose as to
the proper location for such a school and
n L
should undertake. Those who felt that
the chief emphasis shoul1 be given 10
the study of mining and metallursy, con-
sidered as science, thought, very natu-
rally, that the best location for such IL
school would be as department in a
large. Weli-endowed and well-estaplished
college.
Those who regard it as very i'm
portant part of the work of the school
to instruct its pupils in the practica;
work of the mining engineer and metal
lurgist. believe that the mining school
should be located only in a great mining
center, where the student may have the
opportunity of seeing in constant opera
ton the best aud most extensive appii-
cations of the principles OF mining, the
latest and best mechanical devices anu
the most successful metllols of manage
ment
L do not intend here to argue tho
controversy between the advocates of tie
two classes OF schools. The state Of