[Sketch by Prof. John R. Commoms, A. M.]

Oberlin is a development from the missionary and reform movements of the early quarter of our century. Its direct impulse was the new spirit of active benevolence which tested old doctrines by experience and by their fitness for organized philanthropy. Its foundations were laid 23 years after the organization of the American Foreign Missionary Association, 7 years after the first Americau temperance society, 15 years before the first public move to extend the rights of women, and in the same year with the American Anti-Slavery Society. All of these reform movements were more or less united in the Oberlin movement. The founders were themselves home missionaries in the West and among the Indians, and Oberlin has ever since been vital with the missionary spirit. From the first, alcoholic beverages have been excluded. Although not adopting the extreme doctrine of woman's rights, yet Oberlin was the first college in the world to admit young women to all its privileges on equal terms with young men; and as for its antislavery leanings, it had received colored students into its classes 28 years before emancipation.

Such bold disregard of the old landmarks was not attractive to the power and wealth of the country, and so for fifty years Oberlin owed its life to the sacrifice and devotion of its founders and instructors; and to-day the record shows that its benefactors have been people of small means, who have periodically contributed small sums from scanty earnings. It also shows that Oberlin has trained and educated a greater number of students in proportion to its financial endowment than any other institution in the land. In the eight years following the celebration of its semi-ceutennial anniversary in 1883, its material prosperity has advanced more than during the entire fifty years preceding.

In 1831 John J. Shipherd, under commission from the American Home Missionary Society, entered upon his work as pastor of the church at Elyria, Ohio. The future of the great Mississippi Valley was to him an object of great solicitude. His pastoral work was one of intense activity. In the summer of 1832 he was visited by Philo P.

HIGHER EDUCATION IN OHIO.

Stewart, an old school friend in the days when they both attended the academy at Pawlet, Vt. Stewart, on account of the failing health of his wife, had returned from mission work among the Choctaws in Mississippi, but his heart was still burning with zeal for extending Christian work in the West. The two men after long consultations and prayer, finally concluded that the needs of the new country could best be met by establishing a community of Christian families with a Christian school which should be "a center of religious influence and power which should work mightily upon the surrounding country aud the world-a sort of missionary institution for training laborers for the work abroad"-the school to be conducted on the manual labor system, and to be open to both young men and young women. It was not proposed to establish a college, but simply an academy for instruction in English and useful languages, and, if Providence should favor it, in "practical theology." In accordance with this plan the corporate name, "Oberlin Collegiate Institute" was chosen. Not until 1851 was a new and broader charter obtained, this time under the name of "Oberlin College." The name Oberlin was chosen to signify the hope that the members of the new enterprise might be moved by the spirit of the self-sacrificing Swiss colporteur and pastor, John Friederich Oberlin.

In October, 1832, Mr. Shipherd resigned his pastorate, and the two men set themselves with enthusiasm to accomplish their enterprise. Several offers of beautiful sites were rejected, because the community which they had in view must be apart from older settlements and have room for self-development into a peculiar Christian society. Such room was at length secured on the present site of Oberlin, 12 miles from Lake Erie, and 30 miles west of Cleveland, within the limits of the Connecticut Western Reserve, from the owners, Messrs. Street & Hughes, of New Haven, Conn. It consisted of a gift of 500 acres for a manual-labor school, and an arrangement to purchase an additional 5,000 acres at $1.50 per acre, to be sold to the colonists at an advance of $1 au acre to secure a fund for establishing the school.

It was in New England, too, that the colonists were to be secured, and the manner in which this was done indicates the character of the enterprise. Two hundred years before this time a band of pilgrims who had settled in that part of our continent had signed a famous compact in the Mayflower, which breathed a spirit of religion and patriotism. In that instrument they had declared that the voyage they had undertaken was "for the Glory of God and the advancement of the Christian Faith, and Honor of our King and Country." So now, these descendants of theirs, going again westward on a new migration, entered upon a new compact based upon religion and patriotism, "The Oberlin Covenant." It was the aim of the founders that this covenant should make Oberlin a distinctively Christian community. It was hoped that worldlyminded people would be turned away from the enterprise by a contem

plation of the conditions it imposed. The covenant, a quaint and remarkable document, is here presented in full:

THE OBERLIN COVENANT.

Lamenting the degeneracy of the church and the deplorable condition of our perishing world, and ardently desirous of bringing both under the entire influence of the blessed gospel of peace; and viewing with peculiar interest the influence which the Valley of the Mississippi must exert over our nation and the nations of the earth; having, as we trust, in answer to devout supplications, been guided by the counsel f the Lord: the undersigned covenant together under the name of the Oberlin Colony, subject to the following regulations, which may be amended by a concurrence of two-thirds of the colonists:

1. Providence permitting, we engage as soon as practicable to remove to Oberlin Colony, in Russia, Lorain County, Ohio, and there to fix our residence, for the express purpose of glorifying God in doing good to the extent of our ability.

2. We will hold and manage our estates personally, but pledge as perfect a community of interest as though we held a community of property.

3. We will hold in possession no more than we believe we can profitably manage for God as his faithful stewards.

4. We will, by industry, economy, and Christian self-denial, obtain as much as we can, above our necessary personal or family expenses, and faithfully appropriate the same for the spread of the gospel.

5. That we may have time and health for the Lord's service, we will eat only plain and wholesome food, renouncing all bad habits, especially the smoking and chewing of tobacco, unless it is necessary as a medicine, and denying ourselves all strong and unnecessary drinks, even tea and coffee, as far as practicable, and everything expensive that is simply calculated to gratify the palate.

6. That we may add to our time and health, money for the service of the Lord, we will renounce all the world's expensive and unwholesome fashions of dress, particularly tight dressing and ornamental attire.

7. And yet more to increase our means of serving Him who bought us with His blood, we will observe plainness and durability in the construction of our houses, furniture, carriages, and all that pertains to us.

8. We will strive continually to show that we, as the body of Christ, are members one of another; and will, while living, provide for the widows, orphans, and families of the sick and needy as for ourselves.

9. We will take special pains to educate all our children thoroughly, and to train them up, in body, intellect, and heart, for the service of the Lord.

10. We will feel that the interests of the Oberlin Institute are identified with ours, and do what we can to extend its influence to our fallen race.

11. We will make special efforts to sustain the institutions of the gospel at home and among our neighbors.

12. We will strive to maintain deep-toned and elevated personal piety, to provoke each other to love and good works, and live together in all things as brethren, and to glorify God in our bodies and spirits which are His.

In testimony of our fixed purpose thus to do, in reliance on divine grace, we hereunto affix our names.

With regard to this covenant, President Fairchild says in his History of Oberlin :

In so far as it goes beyond a general expression of Christian consecration, it subsequently afforded occasion of earnest discussion, and sometimes, perhaps, of uncharitable judgment. It was at length found necessary to leave the determination of personal duty in practical affairs to the individual conscience, and thus after a year or

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two the covenant was no longer appealed to in the settlement of differences of opinion upon these subjects. It doubtless had its part in giving form to the social and religious life of the place.

Although not fulfilled to the letter, yet the simplicity which the covenant prescribed was jealously adhered to, and among the early public. discussions that agitated the colony, the virtues of brown bread and veg. etable diet held turn in place with the admission of negro students and the foundations of obligation.

The object of the founders is again set forth in the first report, pub. lished in 1834. It reads:

DESIGN OF THE INSTITUTE-Its grand object is the diffusion of useful science, sound morality, and pure religion among the growing multitudes of the Mississippi Valley. It aims also at bearing an important part in extending those blessings to the destitute millions which overspread the earth. For this purpose it proposes as its primary object the thorough education of ministers and pious school teachers; as a secondary object the elevation of female character. And as a third general design the education of the common people with the higher classes in such a manner as suits the nature of republican institutions.

It will be seen from what precedes, and from the further course of the narrative, that a history of Oberlin College includes a history of the town and colony. The town has grown up for the sake of the college, and the two make in a peculiar sense a single organism.

The first settler under the Oberlin compact was Peter P. Pease, who, April 19, 1833, moved into a log house which he had erected on the southeast corner of the future college campus. Near it was what has now become the "historical elm," under which Shipherd and Stewart, when they first visited the tract, had knelt and prayed for divine guidance. Mr. Pease was member of the "Board of Trust," the other members being, as appeared from the charter secured a year later, J. J. Shipherd, Henry Brown, E. Redington, Joel Talcott, Addison Tracy, P. P. Stewart, J. L. Burrell, and John Keys. Soon other colonists arrived and the work of clearing the primeval forest was heartily entered upon. A steam engine, bought with the college funds, was soon exerting itself upon a flour mill and a sawmill, the latter transforming the logs into shape for college buildings and colonists' dwellings. A wooden building 35 by 40 feet in dimensions, and two and one-half stories in height, contained the entire college for more than a year, including the principal's office and study, dining room, schoolroom, chapel, church, dormitories for young women on the second floor and for young men in the attic. In these quarters school was opened on December 3, 1833, with forty-four students-twenty-nine young men and fifteen young women, half of whom were from the East. The teachers whom Mr. Shipherd had engaged in the East were not yet on the ground, and temporary charge was given to John F. Scovill, a student from the Western Reserve College at Hudson, Ohio.