Page:Oregon Historical Quarterly vol. 6.djvu/151

145 ORIGIN OF PACIFIC UNIVERSITY. 145 of college life. Athletics, in the form of football and track team work, took a regular place as part of the college life. Oratory, and especially debating, were developed more systematically than before, intercollegiate contests of va- rious kinds took place, a college paper, the Index, was started. Christian activities were stimulated by supplant- ing earlier societies by the Young Men's and Young Women's Christian Associations ; the cultivation of col- lege loyalty in its better sense was encouraged. All of these features were in line with college life generally and had the effect of attracting students to enter the rigid dis- cipline of a prolonged college course and help them to persist to the end. Notable as an event of President McClelland's adminis- tration must be mentioned the celebration of the semi- centennial of the founding of the institution. It was ob- served with appropriate exercises and the delegates of the National Congregational Council of the United States then meeting in Portland came out in a body to spend the day. Many college and university presidents and noted clergy- men from the East and from England took part. Peter Hatch, a member of the original board of trustees, was present and was able to address the audience for a few minutes, arousing much enthusiasm. A check from Doc- tor Pearsons of something over $30,000 was another cause of enthusiasm. Thus the representatives of the very forces which brought the institution into being were able to come and see the thing accomplished. The institution was on a permanent basis, its heroic age was passed, it had become a part of the history of the State, its graduates were mature men occupying important places in the new West, one of them, its first graduate, had a place on the program. The institution by the close of President McClelland's administration may be said to have achieved its distinctive