The Goldfield news and weekly tribune. [volume] (Goldfield, Nev.) 1911-1947, 1915-10-16
Mining Colleges

that are Spr1ng1nS up over night suggests naturally lndt
not all of them are necessary, says L. b. Mcdonald, an
assistant editor of the Mining and Scientific Press, in an
editorial in the current issue of that publication. Obvf-
ously the quantity as we'll as the quality of mining engi-
neers that can be absorbed advantageouSly into the min
ing business has limits. Equally obvious is that fact that
incapable colleges, with a backing of %bumptious super
ficiality, will detract both in students and standing from
institutions of worth. The point then is: What is a real
mining college and what is merely an imitation9 What
is the prime requsite-a building, advertising, an appro-
priation, location, equipment, professors? How is the
prospective student to choose a college? In which lnst1-
tuition will he really learn mining and metallurgy and alb
sorb the spirit to succeed in the profession; and in which
will he find mining merely a farce, where d1lletant1 take
geology with the girls or otherwise fail to appreciate the
arduous career.
The essentials for a real mining college can be divided
under two heads; the first class includes such practical
matters as location and equipment; the second pertains to
the less material but equally important consideration OF
the men behind the institution, graduates, professors and
instructors, trustees or board of control, and the students.
A school of mines must have either a location in a
broad-gauged mining district where operating mines can
be visited and inspected, or it must have a large and costly
equipment to show, in miniature, what mines, mills and
smelters are in reality. A college having neither adjacent
mines nor adequate equipment is in no position to inculcate
a knowledge and understanding of mining in young men,
many OF whom never saw a mine and most of whom have
extremely hay ideas asto what underground operations
look like. The variegated and elaborate equipment for a
extremely hay ideas as to what underground operations
can scarcely be accumulated in a hurry. Time and expert
ence are required to develop the combination best suited to
fulfill the requirements. There is a great deal to be said
ior a mining college that teaches nothing but mining.
Where all efforts and endeavors are bent toward produc-
ing a single effect, the result is especially helpful to a sub
iect SO difficult to teach as mining.
But by far the most important side OF a school of mines
is the men who make it. 1t is we'll, in Judging a college,
to look at the men it has produced. There IS a certain in
definite quality or stamp placed on the men that have
graduated from particular institutions. The idea behind
this factor is indicated by the recent remark of a president
of a wellknown mining college. 1t was as follows: The
minute a professor begins to think more of his remuneration
than of ideals of teaching, he is no longer fit for his posi-
ton. 1t makes no difference how much he knows, he has.
lost his usefulness" A college with ideals contributed by
the men who have been associated with it is a real college.
A building, no matter how ornate; an appropriation, no
matter how magnificent, and a professor of mining without
ideals serve to furnish only an imitation of a thing that
does not stand initiating at all we'll. A man without prn-
cipes is not worth a damn; neither is a mining college.
Both can make a splurge for a while, and can muster Up
a make-beieve that may look like the real thing. Luz
both are equally useless in the end and are likely to do
more harm than good.
A popular university, a year or two ago, decided to
install a course in mining. For the head of the new depart
ment, the institution offered to an unusually capable as
sistant professor of mining, in a mining college of high
standard, a substantially better salary than he was then re
ceving. To the ast%onishment of the university officials,
the assistant professor in the small college declined with
thanks the opportunity to become head of the new de-
partment of mining III the large university. This is not an
isolated instance; other cases of the same kind are on rec
ord. To the average outsider, a man who refuses to better
his position and salary-particularly his sa1ary-seems so
unusual in these modern days as to be more or less of an
oddly, and to betray poor Judgment. But it is to be re-
membered that seeming to be doing something is not al
ways more productive than actually doing something, e-I
pecially when a long period of time is considered.
A student picking out a mining college to attend might
do well to keep in mind that the one which makes the most
noise is not necessarily the best for him. Nor need
the one that is nearest be the surest to put him farthest in
the long run. 1t is not where he is at twenty-five years of
age that counts it is where he will be later on. The infu-
ence of a good training will extend over the whole life of
its graduates.
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