Page:A History of the University of Chicago by Thomas Wakefield Goodspeed.djvu/411

 CHAPTER XIV SOME IMPORTANT DEPARTMENTS A volume might well be written on the educational history of the University. Each of the departments of instruction has a history which deserves to be told. At the end of the first quarter- century a number of men who organized the work of their depart- ments and determined its character had already passed away. That part of the history of the University's educational work which they could have written is for the most part lost and cannot be recovered. But in most cases at the end of the first quarter-century the men perfectly qualified by their knowledge and ability to tell these stories of origins and early developments were still in active service. It has not been the purpose of the writer to undertake this, but there are certain outstanding features of the University's work which must find a place in this narrative and which thus far have received only incidental mention. It would, for example, be impossible to write the history of the University without some more extended reference to the Morgan Park Academy. When Mr. Rockefeller made his first million-dollar subscription in September, 1890, one of the conditions of the gift was that in the buildings of the Theo- logical Seminary, then located at Morgan Park, which would be left vacant by the Seminary's transfer to the grounds of the Uni- versity as its Divinity School, there should be established a "thor- oughly equipped Academy on or before October i, 1892." It was clearly Mr. Rockefeller's expectation that the University would find means, independently of his gifts, to establish and equip this Academy. It was the hope of the Trustees that, once well started and well equipped, it would be a self-supporting school. Neither the expectations of the Founder nor the hopes of the Trustees, however, were realized. Such great sums were required for the college and university work that it was found impossible to raise money for an academy also. None was raised, and quite 357