Mark Twain Speaking

186. C.C.N.Y. Dedication

MARK TWAIN SPEAKING 621 new board ofdirectors / On the board were Robert Collyer, the Reverend Percey Stickney Grant, and Stanley Hall, president of Clark University. reformed her burglar / "Editha's Burglar" (1888), a story by Frances Eliza Hodgson Burnett (1849-1924), was dramatized by Augustus Thomas. In a Broadway production (1888) Elsie Leslie played the role of Editha, and E. H. Sothern that of the burglar.· 186 · Dedication ceremonies at the City College of New York attracted dignitaries academic and political. At the exercises in the main hall, Mayor McClelland spoke, British AmbassadorJames Bryce, Joseph H. Choate, and Mark Twain. The latter, a vivid splash ofcolor in the red gown ofOxford, told reporters that he was not at all embarrassed by such a conspicuous garb. Undergraduates swarmed around him with so much noisy attention that the Times obseroed the day after: "It was the City College's day and Mark Twain's." Speech Dedication ofthe College ofthe City ofNew York, May 14,1908 How difficult, indeed, is the higher education. Mr. Choate evidently needs a little ofit. He is not only short as a statistician of New York, but he is off, way off, in his mathematics. The four thousand citizens of Greater New York, indeed! But I don't think it was wise orjudicious on the part of Mr. Choate to show this higher education he has obtained. He has said that seventy years ago he sat in the lap of that great educator, Horace Mann. I was there at the time-and see the result, the lamentable result. Maybe if he had had a sandwich here to sustain him the result would not have been so serious. For seventy-two years I have been striving to acquire that higher education which stands for modesty and diffidence-and it doesn't work. 622 MARK TWAIN SPEAKING And then look at Ambassador Bryce, who referred to his alma mater, Oxford. He might just as well have included me. Well, I am a later production. If I am the latest graduate, I really and sincerely hope I am not the final flower of its seven centuries; I hope it may go on for seven ages longer. Text / Composite, based upon: "Jubilee Dedication For City College," Times, May 15, 1908; "Dedication Speech," MTS(10):41. Horace Mann / (1796-1859). American educator. As secretary of the Massachusetts Board of Education (1837-48), he reorganized the state's school system, popularized the cause of common schools, lengthened the school year to six months, increased teachers' salaries , and got larger educational appropriations. In Congress (1848-52), he was an antislavery Whig opposed to sectarian control ofschools. As president ofAntioch College (1852-59), he advocated coeducation and higher academic standards. Bryce / James Bryce (1838-1922). British historian and statesman. Liberal member of Parliament (1880-1907), he was chancellor for the Duchy of Lancaster (1892), chief secretary for Ireland (1895), and ambassador to the United States (1907-13). He was a delegate to the Hague tribunal (1913) and one ofthe founders of the League of Nations. Among his many books, the best known is The American Commonwealth (1888). ...