Carnegie Institution

“ Carnegie asserts that the aim of his institution is 'To increase the efficiency of the universities and other institutions of learning throughout the country, by utilizing and adding to their existing facilities, and by aiding teachers in the various institutions for experimental and other work, in these institutions as far as may be advisable.' The purpose of one is to destroy existing institutions—the intention of the other is to build them up. ”

“ There are possibilities that appeal to the imagination in an institution that can play the part of a special providence throughout the country, scattering money just where it will bring forth fruit a hundredfold and discovering the struggling genius to give him the work he is best fitted to do. But there are difficulties and even dangers in such an undertaking. Under its new president the Carnegie Institution will be in a far better position than hitherto to carry out a policy of this kind. ”

“ It would not be possible to select more representative trustees than those of the Carnegie Institution, but they are men of affairs, engaged in the conduct of important enterprises, and can not be expected to devote their attention to the policy of the institution. ”

“ Carnegie, which more than fulfill the generalization of the acute author of a late Scotch novel, “The House with Green Shutters,” who says that while a Scotchman has all the great essentials for commercial success, “his combinations are rarely Napoleonic until he becomes an American.”
When one looks at the apparently uncertain, but really tentative steps taken by the trustees of the Carnegie Institution at Washington, one sees how much must yet lie before us in our provisions for intellectual progress. ”

“ In addition, the Carnegie Institution will appoint from time to time a number of persons to be known as research assistants, who may or may not reside in Washington, and who shall undertake to carry on such special investigations as may be entrusted to them by the institution. ”

“ These and other conditions on the contract seem to be almost an affront to men of science, calculated to profit the Carnegie Institution at the expense of others. It is perhaps premature to criticize the institution when so little is known in regard to its plans. ”

“ Nowhere could close cooperation of this kind be better accomplished than under a system such as the Carnegie Institution of Washington has developed, whereby the research associates of the Institution and others of its staff may call in the assistance of men in related fields. ”

“ This is, in fact, admitted, and it is often asserted by the most wise and able and successful of this very class, and Andrew Carnegie is founding libraries, is promoting technical education and is organizing a great technical institution as the noblest contribution of which he can conceive for the benefit of those working men to whom he owes so much and indebtedness to whom he so freely acknowledges. ”

“ Andrew Carnegie of $10,000,000 to establish in Washington an institution for the encouragement of 'investigation, research and discovery.' These two foundations represent more than an addition to the sum annually spent on scientific work. They stand for the spirit of science, not confined by place or buildings, titles or degrees. In foreign countries we are often called worshipers of wealth and ostentation ”

“ Carnegie are men of tried administrative ability; but they are too busy and too widely scattered over the country to attend to the details of the scientific work of the institution. We should view with much satisfaction the establishment of a board of scientific directors who should at the same time be research professors, spending part of the year at Washington and part at their present universities or institutions, receiving ample salaries and having the best facilities for work. ”

“ While the work of the Carnegie Institution is mainly in the natural and exact sciences there are departments cf economics and sociology and of historical research, certain classics of international law are being republished and appropriations are made to the American schools of classical studies at Athens and Rome. ”

“ Let cynics smile at a process which they may describe as bribing the colleges to be good by pensioning their superannuates, but unquestionably the work of the Foundation has resulted in a new uprightness, a new firmness of standards, a higher efficiency that bodes well for the future of American education. Parents may give material encouragement to this movement by reading the publications of the Carnegie Foundation, as well as college catalogues and advertisements, before they determine upon an institution for the education of their children. ”

“ It was from my own early experience that I decided there was no use to which money could be applied so productive of good to boys and girls who have good within them and ability and ambition to develop it, as the founding of a public library in a community which is willing to support it as a municipal institution. ”

“ Many of these are the gifts of rich men, whose funds have been used for the building, and in some cases for the books also, the communities being required to maintain and to develop the libraries; and to this feature I attribute most of their usefulness. An endowed institution is liable to become the prey of a clique. ”

“ He built up his fortunes through successive grades until he became the dominating factor in the great iron industries, and paved the way for that colossal achievement, the Steel Trust. Whatever may be the tendencies of this corporation, there can be little doubt of the democratic ideals of Mr. Carnegie himself. With lavish hand he has strewn millions through the United States for the promotion of libraries. The effect of this library movement in perpetuating the democracy that comes from an intelligent and self-respecting people can hardly be measured. ”

“ Bruised skulls here; broken skulls there; corpses yonder; fellows with raw heads and aching bones, crawling rapidly into the cover of the tall grass; imprecations filling the air. A scene of peaceful industry transformed into a shambles. Grinning at his club, Carnegie would stroll back to his rail-perch, usually Skibo.” In 1885 he began a series of lectures and essays on the natural rights of labor, and a year later he published “Triumphant Democracy,” a vehicle for his advanced views on the political and social equality of all men. ”

“ For example, a very able and candid English editor, in speaking of Mr. Andrew Carnegie's address as Rector of St. Andrews University, last October, which he pronounces one of the most remarkable addresses ever delivered in Great Britain, practically admits that America has outstripped the mother country in this respect at least. He says, "Mr. Carnegie is a personage. A man who has risen from nothing to the summit of American finance is a man to be reckoned with. ”

“ On the day following his death, in the summer of 1919, a great New York newspaper began an account of his life with these paragraphs, a final tribute to an American by adoption:—
“Andrew Carnegie, the outstanding figure of nineteenth-century industrialism, will go down through the ages as the very personification of ‘Triumphant Democracy.’
“Overcoming almost insuperable obstacles by his unusual energy and sheer tenacity of purpose, Andrew Carnegie rose from a humble messenger-boy to wealth beyond the dreams of avarice. He rose from obscurity to a unique position in the world. ”

“ Carnegie, the great captain of industry, is a typical representative of the leaders of this age. It is well worth our while to stop to consider why he should devote a part of his great wealth to the founding of public libraries. ”

“ The public spirit and enthusiasm for the good of humanity, which have inspired an American citizen, Mr. Andrew Carnegie, in his administration of a great fortune, have led him to devote the adequate and ample sum of three-quarters of a million dollars to the construction of the building. ”

“ Andrew Carnegie has founded this splendid Institute, with its school system, at a cost already approximating twenty million dollars, and he must enjoy the satisfaction of knowing it to be the rallying ground for the cultured and artistic life of the community. The progress made each year goes by leaps and bounds ”

“ In the center of the arch, carved in the marble, was an open book with this inscription:
"He that cannot reason is a fool,
He that will not a bigot,
He that dare not a slave."
These noble words thrilled me. I said to myself, "Some day, some day, I'll have a library" (that was a look ahead) "and these words shall grace the mantel as here." And so they do in New York and Skibo to-day.
Another Sunday which I spent at his home after an interval of several years was also noteworthy. I had then become the superintendent of the Pittsburgh Division of the Pennsylvania Railroad. ”

“ I asked the superintendent to call together the three committees which governed the works—not only the blast-furnace committee that was alone involved, but the mill and the converting works committees as well. They appeared and, of course, were received by me with great courtesy, not because it was good policy to be courteous, but because I have always enjoyed meeting our men. I am bound to say that the more I know of working-men the higher I rate their virtues. But it is with them as Barrie says with women: "Dootless the Lord made a' things weel, but he left some michty queer kinks in women." ”

“ The Carnegie Foundation is quietly preparing all the states of the union for improvement in their laws about the chartering of colleges, and it is to-day the most effective agency that tends toward college standardization. ”

“ For my part, I do not like to think that these Americans 276 are to send Britain every good thing, and that the once proud country that led the world is to stand receiving as it were the crumbs from this rich land's table. In one department America can be kept second for as long a term as we need worry about—she has nothing to compare with the leading English reviews. ”

“ Even if he becomes president of a great corporation he is hardly his own master, unless he holds control of the stock. The ablest presidents are hampered by boards of directors and shareholders, who can know but little of the business. But I am glad to say that among my best friends to-day are those with whom I labored in the service of the Pennsylvania Railroad Company.
In the year 1867, Mr. Phipps, Mr. J.W. Vandevort, and myself revisited Europe, traveling extensively through England and Scotland, and made the tour of the Continent. ”

“ To have done well and then live up to your record is a serious matter. Responsibility is ballast. A town that has taken on a Carnegie Library is one big committee intent on making the thing a success. There is furniture needed, pictures to secure, statuary to select, books to buy. A Carnegie Library is usually an annex to the High School.
O most clever, cunning and canny Carnegie! did you know how great and wise was your scheme? Not at all, any more than when you were a bobbin-boy you could have guessed that one day you would own two hundred fifty million dollars in five-per-cent bonds. ”

“ And then we mean to send the message forth to hundreds of thousands of brilliant minds and brave hearts engaged in honest business, that they are not criminals but honorable men in their work to make good business in this Republic. Sure of victory, we even now say, "Go forward, American business men, and know that behind you, supporting you, encouraging you, are the power and approval of the greatest people under the sun. Go forward, American business men, and feed full the fires beneath American furnaces; and give employment to every American laborer who asks for work. ”

“ At the Meeting in Memory of the Life and Work of Andrew Carnegie held on April 25, 1920, in the Engineering Societies Building in New York, Mr. Root made an address in the course of which, speaking of Mr. Carnegie, he said:
"He belonged to that great race of nation-builders who have made the development of America the wonder of the world.... He was the kindliest man I ever knew. Wealth had brought to him no hardening of the heart, nor made him forget the dreams of his youth. ”

“ These and kindred institutions abound in England, and are ably conducted. Rich Englishmen do not leave their fortunes for uses of this kind as often as Americans do. The ambition to found a family, and the maintenance of an aristocratic class by means of primogeniture and entail, tend to divert fortunes from this nobler path into the meaner end of elevating a name in the social scale; but the general public in Britain is most generous, and immense sums in the aggregate are annually collected for charitable institutions. It is common for a class to support its own unfortunates. ”

“ This time he was made messenger boy in a telegraph office in Pittsburg at a salary of two dollars and fifty cents a week. In speaking of this period Mr. Carnegie said: “If you want an idea as to heaven on earth, imagine what it is to be taken from a dark cellar, where I fired the boiler from morning until night, and dropped into an office, where light shone from all sides, with books, papers, and pencils in profusion around me, and oh, the tick of those mysterious brass instruments on the desk, annihilating space and conveying intelligence to the world. ”