New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1911-05-21
Great House and Charming
Site To Be Taken Over
This Week by Stevens
Institute.

Among the walters. reporters ana t"e
like persons whom Fate sends TO o'her
neoples' banquets. the words the oi1
scbool on the hill" have come by long
FAMILIARITY to be a byword and a mock
cry. Probably there is not a schooi IN
America that IS not old. Certainly there
is none that is not set high enough 10 coun'
as being ION the hill, though the eleva.ion
be no more than the ripple of SOIL tha'
eve years ploughing will raise between
:-asirie fields.
So,t those who laugh miss the rea! po'i'
T-e Greeks looked up 10 their hh'oPs anu
nut their temples there. The genue roo
hers OF the Middle Ages looked ana Dun.
fortresses. Each followed the spec'ai
genius Of the age The modern European
after the genius Of his age' adorhs 'iS
hills vith-hotels. as often as not. here III
America we save our high places for our
schools and colleges. meaning to hohor
them II is not uniting in a great denoc-
racv.
The news to-day is that We are TO have
q new "old school on the hill' In our
neiehborhood The school is stevens IN
s,itute. in Hoboken. The hill Is caste
Point. the high green headland That stahuS
cornandinelv over the Hudson and It's
shining and looks beyond the crowded
river TO the shores Of lofty Manhattan
II is a wonderful site for school or
mansion Look up from the river al us
ta1 old trees and great brown house an"
Won will see that II is a place 70 ueasuIe
M the love and loyalty Of generations III
fact. the place has been the home OF one
DISTINGUISHED family for more than nun
dred wears. and has grown rich with assoc
Citations that ought 10 give ii hold on Inc
gratitude Of every American.
Pljt on Saturday. May q, a crowd OF COL
lege men will storm Castle Point with
triumphal rout and take possession OF Cas-
tie stevens Fine as its history. that Is
as il should be. Americans are jealous OF
commanding headlands and are not sorry
10 see them fall into the schoolmasttTs
hands Besides with all the zest and raci-
ness Of a college celebration, the men OF
Stevens will make their jubilee pageant
Of Castle Points remarkable history.
For instance. on the level ground which
is now the athletic field Of the institute
perhaps a hundred yards landward from
the castle. a narrow wooden track Will be
laid out in a circle Of half a mile in cir
ounferenoe on 1t a ridiculous little 1000
motive. like a small derrick engine put on
a handcar. will wheeze around the circle.
carrying half a dozen men in loose shirts
tight trousers and old fashioned stocks.
That is a precise copy Of a railroad when
Colonel John Stevens built and ran on his
property. on the same spot. in fact, in the
wear 1926. II was the first steam railroad of
which there is any authentic record that
bti IN m
will he worked and played with by the
graduates from Stevens Institute of the
class Of 1890. Pine wood will he the fuel.
such as was used by the colonel in his eX-
periments.
But that is only a detail. Three great
engineers of the Stevens family left
record Of achievement and patriotic service
that will never he forgotten. and the col
lege men will gaivanize some of their
strange new inventions into life and show
them in their procession.
still il is a college procession. after all.
and must be a fantastic one. First Will
march the men who were graduated in the
years from 1873 10 1855. dressed. wissed and
whiskered to "reincarnate' the professors
of the Institutes original faculty. num-
her Of these graduates, to-day grown into
seaatc and middle accd engineers, have been
practising for weeks TO hit off the tricks
OF speech and manner that characterized
their old masters
on their heels will come more history
in the shape OF tribe Of wild Indians re-
cru!ted from the recent graduates Of 1905
They have promised TO do a war dance,
torture and scalp feast precisely as such
limit