THE TAPPAN WENTWORTH AND OTHER GENERAL FUNDS OF THE COLLEGE*

The Tappan Wentworth Fund, $501,432, the bequest (1875) of the Hon-Tappan Wentworth, of Lowell, Mass., A. M. (Hon.) 1850.

Mr. Wentworth was born in Dover, N. H., in 1802. Having been diverted from his studies while in preparation for college, he was for a time in business, but after a little entered law office of the Honorable William Burleigh, then a member of Congress from Maine. He practiced law for seven years in South Berwick and Great Falls and then removed to Lowell, where he remained until his death. He became a leading member of his profession, often filled offices of trust in city affairs, was in both houses of the State Legislature, and was a member of Congress from 1853-55 Gradually he accumulated a considerable property through his industry and integrity. His investments were chiefly in real estate in the city of Lowell. Mr. Wentworth was of the same stock with Governor Wentworth, through whom the charter of the College was obtained, a fact which doubtless turned his attention to the College. It is known that he took an honorable pride in his family name, and that he entertained a strong love for his native state. It is not known that he advised with any one in regard to the disposal of his property. A few years before his death he came to Hanover without the knowledge of any one, and made his investigations unaided. Upon his return to Lowell he simply remarked to a friend, "Well I have been to Dartmouth and have looked it over. I think thata little more money will do it no harm." It was a surprise to his townsmen as well as to the Trustees, when his will revealed the extent of his interest in the College. The extract from the will covering the legacy to Dartmouth is as follows :

"All my real estate, stocks and corporations and debts due me subject to the legacies and provisions aforesaid I give, devise and bequeath to Dartmouth College, .... in fee simple and forever but with this provision, that the same and the proceeds and income thereof shall be kept and allowed to accumulate until the whole including the principal shall amount to five hundred thousand dollars, after which the income of said fund so accumulated shall be used for the purpose of said college in such manner as the proper officers who may have the management and control of the general funds of the College may from time to time determine, and with this further provision that said fund shall forever be known and designated as the "Wentworth Fund." It is my intention that said fund shall accumulate until it amounts to half a million dollars besides all the legacies paid ... All the rest, residue, remainder of my estate of every name and nature, I give, devise and bequeath to Dartmouth College afore-said to be added to the "Wentworth Fund" aforesaid and the income thereof to be used in the same manner.

(Will of Tappan Wentworth), June 4, 1875.

At the time of Mr. Wentworth's death, shortly after his will was drawn, the property bequeathed to the College was estimated at about $300,000. The administration of this fund, until it should reach the sum indicated in the will, was shared by the executors and by a committee of the Trustees. In 1878 it was transferred entirely to the committee of the Trustees, in whose hands it remained until 1895 when the fund became available. The appraisal of the property was made in 1893 at the instance of Mr. C. W. Spalding, of the Trustees, by three appraisers, citizens of Lowell, nominated by the officers of one of the Lowell banks. For seven years the income was divided about equally between annuitants and the College. Since 1902 the whole of the income, about $15,000, has been available for the general uses of the College.

The Wentworth Fund remains for the most part in the real estate properties in Lowell in which it was placed by Mr. Wentworth. At the urgent request of several citizens of Lowell one of the more central pieces of property was sold, in 1905, to allow a larger block to be erected.

The Fletcher Fund, $90,059.89, the bequest of Judge Richard Fletcher, of the class of 1806, a native of Cavendish, Vermont.

Judge Fletcher read law in the office of Daniel Webster in Portsmouth, and practiced for a tew years at the New Hampshire Bar. His professional life was spent chiefly in Massachusetts. He was a representative of Boston in the State Legislature, a member of Congress from the State, and a judge of the Supreme Court of Massachusetts. From 1846 to 1857 he was a trustee of the College. Dartmouth conferred upon him the honorary degree of Doctor of Laws in 1846, and Harvard in 1849.

The will of Judge Fletcher provides (Art. 38): "All the rest and residue of my property and estate, of every description including the large amount which will come back to my estate upon the deaths of the different beneficiaries, so far as not needed to pay the foregoing legacies, I give, devise and bequeath to the Trustees of Dartmouth College in New Hampshire, which I direct shall be safely and permanently invested by the said Trustees, so as to yield a regular income, and the said fund hereby given to said Trustees, shall always be kept separate from the other funds of said College, and separately invested, and the net income shall be applied for the use of the College in any way the Trustees think will be most beneficial to the Institution, except the income of ten thousand dollars to be specially invested, which is to be applied as dirceted in the next article."

Article 39 sets apart $10,000, the income of which is to be given once in two years for "a prize essay setting forth truths and reasonings calculated to counteract worldly influences, and impressing on the minds of all Christians a solemn sense of their duty to exhibit in their godly lives and conversation, the beneficient effects of their religion, and thus increase the efficiency of Christianity in Christian countries, and recommend its acceptance to the heathen nations of the world." After prescribing the method of judging the relative value of the essays offered, it provides that "if no essay is found worthy of the prize in any year, the trustees shall pay the five hundred dollars offered for the prize to some charitable institution in New Hampshire, at the discretion of the trustees."

Essays have been accepted and published from time to time in accordance with the terms of the will, but of late years so many manuscripts have been rejected by the judges, that the Trustees are. about to ask leave of the Courts to substitute some other method of carrying out the devout intention of Judge Fletcher which shall insure the result which he had in mind.

The Wilder Fund, $75,000.00. This fund, to which reference was made in the article on the funds of the College for specified uses, is separate from the gift of Mr. Wilder for the Physical Laboratory and for the departments of Physics and Astronomy. It was given in four distinct parts each bearing an annuity. The annuity on one part ($15,000) has expired, and the amount thus set free has been transferred to the reconstruction account, of which notice will be taken later. The income of the remaining portions is at present chiefly absorbed in annuities.

The Winkley Fund, $19,287.94 (supplementary to the fund for the Winkley professorship), of which amount $6,989.54 was in 1891 placed in the New Hampshire Professorship.

The Downer Fund (1890) $10,022.56, the bequest of the Hon, Jason Downer, class of 1838, Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of Wisconsin. Dartmouth was named residuary legatee on equal terms with Beloit.

The Richard Bond Fund (1887) $22,213.84, the bequest of Mr. Richard Bond of Roxbury, who made Amherst, Williams, and Dartmouth residuary legatees in equal parts to his estate.

The Spalding bequests, Isaac, $5,000 (1877), and Lucy, his widow, $10,000 (1904), both of Nashua, N. H., through Doctor Edward Spalding as Executor.

The Hutchins Fund (1891) $5,0000, the gift of Henry Clinton Hutchins, Esquire, of Boston, of the class of 1840.

The Henry E. Parker Fund, $4,937.90, the bequest of Henry E. Parker of the class of 1841, Professor of Latin 1866-92. The bequest was received in 1898 and applied to the Henry E. Parker Fellowship. See Catalogue.

The Shapleigh Memorial Fund, $1,043-73 (1892) given by "certain of the heirs of Richard W. Shapleigh, late of Brookline, Mass., believing that had he made a will certain institutions would have received legacies thereby."

Accumulating Funds—the Chase Wiggin Scholarship Fund of $2,000, one-third of the income of which is to be added to the principal and to accumulate until it becomes $100,000 and the Waterhouse Fund, $5,000, the gift (1896) of Professor Sylvester Water-house of Washington University, St. Louis, to accumulate until it becomes $500,000.

The Salter Fund, $4,452 (1907), a portion (advanced through sale of house) of the estate of the late Captain Thomas P. Salter of Portsmouth, N. H., of which Dartmouth College is the residuary legatee, the prospective interest being valued at $200,000 to $250,000.

The Fayerweather Fund, $223,381, the bequest of Mr. Daniel B. Fayer weather, a wealthy merchant of New York who divided his large estate among many educational institutions. The estate was for several years in litigation. The counsel for Dartmouth during the entire period of litigation was the Honorable Horace Russell of New York, of the class of 1865.

The Fayerweather Fund has been the most seryiceable of all recent funds in that it enabled the Trustees to meet the inherited indebtedness of the College, and to proceed with the policy of reconstruction, which would otherwise have been impracticable. The payments extending from 1891 to 1901, at once relieved the College of debt, and gradually contributed a fund to be drawn upon for annual deficits incident to the process of reconstruction.

On February 8, 1892, the trustees voted that "all gifts and bequests of funds, or of property to be converted into funds, coming into the College-Treasury without conditions, shall be placed to the credit of the general fund and shall be transferred by the Finance Committee from said fund to the credit of such Trust or Trusts as the College may be indebted to until all the indebtedness of the College to its Trusts shall be paid."

In accordance with this vote, existing obligations of long standing to the amount of $66,500 were discharged by the use of the Fayerweather Fund, and acting upon this precedent subsequent votes assigned the balance of the fund, apart from $10,000 paid for litigation, to the reconstruction fund—a profit and loss account running from 1893-1906, at which time deficits due' to this account ceased. The name of Mr. Fayerweather is perpetuated in the Fayerweather Row of dormitories, but the effect of his bequest cannot be localized. It made possible the growth of the College since 1893. No fund of many times its value, if it had been restricted in its uses, could have served an equal purpose in the development of the College.

Other undesignated funds, relatively small, contributed to the same end:

The Wilder Fund to the extent of $15,000.

The Edward Spalding Fund to the extent of $5,000.

The E. C. Thompson Fund to the extent of $4,889.64.

The Laura E. Merriam Fund to the extent of $5,192.50.

The Edmund Randolph Peaslee Fund to the extent of $4,726.35.

The S. M. Cutcheon Fund to the extent of $1,000.

The entire cost of the reconstruction period, extending over thirteen years, 1893 to 1906, measured by the use of undesignated funds to meet annual deficits, has been $186,027.62. The College having within the past three years reached a normal state of income and expendituure, annual deficits have changed to a balance in favor of the College.

Moor's Charity School Funds, a part of which are held in conjunction with the College.

The funds of the Moor's Charity School consist of $15,349.36 in securities, and of real estate in the township of Wheelock, Vermont, the annual rental from which seldom exceeds $200.

The act of the General Assembly of the Freemen of Vermont, conferring rights in the township of Wheelock up-on the Moor's Charity School and the College is as follows:

"The said Wheelock as President, and for his successors in office to have and te hold the one moiety of said premises as above described solely and exclusively for the use and benefit of said School forever; And the said Trustees, and their successors in office, to have and to hold the other moiety solely and exclusively for the use and benefit of said Dartmouth College forever. All the appurtenances and privileges thereunto belonging and appertaining are hereby also granted to the President and Trustees for the purpose aforesaid, on the following conditions and reservations; viz. : that one hundred and fifty acres of land be reserved for the use, benefit, and support of the ministry in said township or precinct forever; one hundred and fifty acres of land for the use and support of an English school, or schools, in said township or precinct forever, to be located as near the center of said township or precinct (on good tenable lands), as the situation thereof will admit."

It is of local interest to note that the above act was passed by the Vermont Assembly, in Norwich, in the old Meeting House on Meeting House or Goddard's Hill.

STATE FUNDS AND APPROPRIATIONS

The State Funds, entirely for New Hampshire students at Dartmouth, now amount to $150,177.17 (Second College Grant $140,177.17, State fund of 1883 $10,000). Although these funds were referred to under funds for scholarships (Art. 11, December number of BI- MONTHLY) they are now treated more fully in connection with the Grants of the State to the College.

The Charter of the College was given Dec. 19, 1769. On Jan. 25. 1770, Governor Wentworth granted the College a tract of land known as the township of Landaff. The grant, however, became the subject of protracted litigation. The actual cost to the College of defending the grant and of improving the tract amounted to $10,000. One of the first acts of the state (1789) after it ratified the Constitution of the United States, was to bestow another tract of land upon the College (rights in the township of Landaff having been relinquished) known as the "First College Grant." The sale of this tract enabled the College to recover the amount lost in the Landaff litigation, but added nothing to its funds. In 1807 the State made the grant known as the "Second College Grant" which has proved of permanent and increasing value. In recommending the Grant to the Legislature, then in session at Hopkinton, Governor Langdon urged this action in the following terms:

"That as it is highly impolitic and derogatory to the dignity of the independent republic of New Hampshire to rely on other States for the education of her sons; it is the indispensable duty of the Legislature to make further provision at this time for the support and advancement of literature in the State; and that for the promoting of this laudable object a grant of the unappropriated lands of the State, amounting at least to a township or a tract of six miles square, be made to Dartmouth College."

The Legislature approved the recommendation of the Governor through the act establishing the Second College Grant, introducing the act by the following preamble:

"Whereas, the promotion of knowledge among all classes of people is highly necessary for the security of their equal rights as citizens and for their prosperity as a nation—and whereas the establishment of Dartmouth College has under Divine Providence been especially useful in diffusing science in the various professions, academies and schools throughout this State; and considering the situation of that Seminary as favorable to the acquirement of science, the cultivation of good habits, and procuring a public education in all the higher branches of literature at small expense:

...Therefore to give countenance and encouragement to that laudable Institution, and to render it still more useful in all future times in promoting literature among mankind, and especially among inhabitants of this State, more particularly by being enabled to educate the sons of the more needy and indigent citizens, Be it enacted. ..."

Various sums, not large at any one time, were realized from the sale of timber. In 1840 the policy was adopted of investing a part of the proceeds from the cuttings in a permanent fund. The result of this policy has given the following result: Second College Grant Account in 1840, $1,710; 1850, $7,762; 1860, $9,554; 1870, $22,-596; 1890, $31,. 000; 1900, $60,938; 1905, $140,177.17.

The increment from 1900 to 1905 was due in considerable degree to the settlement for damages for unauthorized cuttings by parties to whom the lease of 1888 had been sublet. The lease has been recovered to the College, and the tract is under treatment according to the best methods of forestry, in charge of Professor J. R. Eastman of the Board of Trustees, and Mr. Phillip W. Ayres, the State Forester.

The more recen appropriations of the State to the College, apart from the appropriation of 1883 ($10,000) for scholarships, has been for general uses. They have been made in distinct recognition of the principle that the State, having no State University, is concerned in the higher education of its students at Dartmouth, and obligated in a moral sense to aid in their education. The principle has been fully acknowledged in the preamble to the appropriations of the last three Legislatures:

"Whereas, in the education of New Hampshire students, Dartmouth College is annually expending more than twenty-five thousand dollars', above all amounts received for tuition or from grants by the State or its citizens, and the policy of aiding the College in its educational work by annual appropriations has become definitely established by the State—Be it enacted . . ."

The following exhibit showing the cost to Dartmouth College of educating N. H. students in attendance in 1906 beyond any return received through tuition or scholarships was presented to the Legislature making the appropriation for 1907-8:

Total expense $230,000 Number of undergraduates 950 Cost per man $242 Number of N. H. men 235 Cost of educating N. H. men 235 x $242 $56,870 Receipts from N. H. men through tuition or from Scholarship Funds $23,500 Cost to College above such receipts $33,470

The State appropriations for the general uses of the College since 1893 have been as follows (The sessions of the Legislature are biennial.):

1893-94 1897-98 1899-00 1901-02 1903-04 $15,000 $10,000 $20,000 $30,000 $40,000 1905-06 1907-08 $40,000 $40,000

The next article in this series will be upon the Properties of the College, chiefly in buildings, which constitute the College Plant. Before leaving the funds of the College which constitute its invested endowment, it may be of interest to note the growth of these funds decade by decade after the period of endowment really began. It was not until 1840, half way in its existence, that the College began to plan for endowments. Up to this time all funds which could be secured went at once into maintenance. The only thing to show or gifts and coil and sacrifices was con tinued existence. But this was every-College had the advantage Schoo. Probably one one half of the Moor Charity school. Probably one-half of the English went subscription of $50,000 (in 1765) went over into the enlargement of the School into the College in 1969. Forty four thousand acres of land were given. one-half of which became in time productive, though in very small amounts. Many friends, notably John Thornton of London, were constant in their benefactions. The Continental Congress in 1773 under motion of Patrick Henry voted $500, and again, through the influence of General Schuyler, $500 in 1776. The State granted from time to time the right to set up a lottery. The College itself was also in part a-pioneer enterprise and as such, through its mills and farms, was to a degree self-supporting.

On the other hand the College had hardly begun its course before it began to suffer grievously from the death or loss of friends. George Whitefield, who made the English subscription possible, died in 1770, the year the charter was granted. John Thornton made his last personal contribution in 1774. The Trustees of the English fund declined to give any further aid in the early part of, 1775, and later in the same year Governor Wentworth gave up his commision as provincial governor and sailed for England.

Meanwhile the Revolution, as it advanced, withdrew the interest and exhausted the resources of the Colonists. In 1779 Doctor Wheelock, who had used his entire property for the College, died, leaving the indebtedness of the College as the only inheritance to his family.

There was comparatively little time between the struggles incident to the founding of the College, and the legal struggle for its life. Within the first fifty years the College was really twice founded, with all the incidents of hardship and poverty attendant upon each event. A glimpse of the financial condition of the College at the beginning of the last century is given in Chase's History, Volume 1, page 633.

"In 1806 an account of stock was taken by a 'comptroller,' specially appointed by the board of trust. As nearly as can be ascertained, upward of $13,500 had been realized from the sale of lands, of which about a half was derived from the land given by the State in 1789. There remained from the State grant about six thousand acres, mostly very well situated; some twelve hundred acres of poor, rough land' in Wheelock, not leased; and a little over eight thousand acres of the earlier gifts, of which twenty-seven hundred were under lease and productive. Twenty-five hundred acres were reported as mostly very poor land and of little value, and upon the remainder (twenty-eight hundred acres) the title was in dispute and desperate. The whole of these unleased lands, aggregating over eleven thousand acres, were estimated as worth, in 1806, $9,500. The capital of the leases was worth $20,000 more. This, besides the buildings, apparatus, and library, comprised the entire property of the College. It was still indebted about $3,000, the most of it to President Wheelock for arrears of salary. The land grant of 1807, known as the "Second College Grant," was divided for leases by the Trustees in 1828, and began to yield a small income in 1830.

"The receipts from students were very small from 1779 to 1782, averaging hardly $266 a year. In 1785 they increased to $1,213, and from that time rapidly until they reached $2,070, and about $2,900 in 1806. The charge for tuition in 1780 was 20s. a quarter, in 1800 $4, and twenty-five cents for "incidentals," and in 1807 it was $5 a quarter.

"The annual expenses in 1806 were about $4,300, and the income estimated at a little over $4,500, of which about $1,200 were derived from rents, and the balance from charges against students. Owing to the system of credit, a large part of charges against students was necessarily lost. The College would by this appear to have been self-suporting; but the showing was deceptive, since there was a large and constantly increasing mass of uncollected and uncollectible assets, and with the help of the Col. lege commons, re-established in 1805, the .debt still increased until, in November, 1814, it amounted to about $7,500, of which nearly $6,000 were due to President. Wheelock for money borrowed and for acknowledged arrears of his salary. There were nominal personal assets of $11,000, consisting largely of disputed claims, and there was in that year the same delusive statement of estimated income of $5,140, and expenses of $4,850."

And yet in spite of its poverty the College flourished. During the third decade of its history, from 1790 to 1800, it was quite as flourishing as any of the colleges of its time.

In 1791 Dartmouth graduated 49 Harvard 27, Yale 27, and Princeton 27.

The total number of graduates from each college during the decade was. Harvard 394, Dartmouth 363, Yale 295, and Princeton 240.

The reorganization of the College upon the principles, arid according to the methods of college administration, as now understood, began with the administration of President Nathan Lord in 1828. Under his long and sagacious leadership, 1828 to 1863, the College took on the signs of permanent life, as evidenced in the older buildings now in existence, and in the beginnings of a permanent endowment.

The growth of the invested endowment of the College from decade to decade since 1840 is as follows:

1840 1850 1860 $19,316 $58,056 $153,278 1870 1880 1890 $397,011 $632,648 $994,343 1900 1905 $2,132,386 $2,468,493

In noting the increase between the decade 1890 and 1900 account should be taken of the fact that the Wentworth estate left to the College in 1875 as an accumulating property, then valued at $300,000, reached the designated sum, $500,000, in 1897, when the fund was transferred to the treasurer's books.

The above enumeration of productive funds, by decades, does not include the timber lands of the College (24,000 acres), the income from which is at present expended in improvements, nor bequests which have not as yet come under the control of the Trustees.

* This article is the third of a series of authorized statements which the Bi-Monthly will publish having to do with the resources and expenditures of the College.