The New International Encyclopædia/California, University of

CALIFORNIA, University of. A leading American university, situated at Berkeley, California. The university was established in 1868, under the general provision for agricultural colleges made by the Congressional act of 1862, which united with it the College of California, chartered in 1869. Instruction was begun in Oakland in 1869, and the university was transferred to its present location in 1873. The government of the university is vested in the Regents of the University of California, a corporation, consisting of the higher State officers, the presidents of the State Agricultural Society, of the Mechanics' Institute of San Francisco, and of the University of California, all acting as members ex officio, and of sixteen other members appointed by the Governor of the State. The university is in effect a State institution, receiving various State appropriations for specific purposes, and in addition receiving the benefits of a tax of 2 per cent. on each $100 of assessed valuation. As a State institution, it is obliged to make reports to the Legislature, and to be under that body's general jurisdiction.

The university comprises the following departments of instruction: In Berkeley, the colleges of Letters, Social Sciences, Natural Sciences, Commerce, Agriculture, Mechanics, Mining, Civil Engineering, and Chemistry; on Mount Hamilton, in Santa Clara County, the Lick Astronomical Department; in San Francisco, the Mark Hopkins Institute of Art, Hastings College of Law, Medical Department, Post-Graduate Medical Department, Dental Department, California College of Pharmacy. Among the colleges at San Francisco, the Institute of Art, founded by Edward F. Searles in 1893, is occupied by the San Francisco Art Association, affiliated with the university and maintaining the California School of Design, founded in 1874. The Medical Department was organized in 1873 by the absorption of the Toland Medical College. The Post-Graduate Medical Department (the San Francisco Polyclinic) was affiliated with the university in 1892. The Dental Department was organized in 1888. The Lick Observatory on Mount Hamilton was founded in 1875 by James Lick, who devoted $700,000 to the purpose, among other things, of constructing “a telescope superior to and more powerful than any telescope ever made.” The Department of Anthropology, organized primarily for research, conducts excavations in Egypt, Peru, and North America, and pursues linguistic and ethnological investigations.

In consideration of its official relation to the State and of the funds given to it yearly by the State, the University of California makes no charge to students resident in California for courses in the colleges of Letters, Social Sciences, Natural Sciences, Commerce, Agriculture, Mechanics, Mining, Civil Engineering, and Chemistry. The instruction in all the colleges is open to properly qualified persons, without distinction of sex. Students not residents of the State are charged a nominal fee for tuition. Since 1888, when its total student body numbered only 306, the university has grown very rapidly. A large part of this growth should probably be ascribed to the establishment and equally rapid growth of Leland Stanford Junior University, by which a friendly rivalry in educational matters was instituted. In 1902 there were 4006 students enrolled in the University of California, of whom 952 were in the College of Social Sciences, 284 in the College of Letters, 248 in the College of Mining, 194 in the College of Natural Sciences, 190 in the College of Mechanics, 186 in the Mark Hopkins Institute of Art, 156 in the Medical Department, and 171 in the College of Chemistry, 825 in the summer session, and 37 in the short course in dairying. The undergraduates numbered 2248, the graduate students 230, omitting summer-session students. At the same time there were 481 professors, instructors, lecturers, and administrative officers, of whom 201 were in the academic department. Nearly one-half of the university's students are women. A relatively large proportion of the students pursue the general academic courses, as compared with the technical or professional courses. It is to be noted, furthermore, that a relatively large proportion choose courses which may be termed humanistic; those namely in languages, literature, history, and philosophy. Hardly more than 5 per cent. of the student body are non-residents of the State.

In 1896 Mrs. Phœbe A. Hearst, already a large benefactor of the university, offered to bear the expenses of an international architectural competition for the purpose of securing a general plan for a great campus on the Berkeley site; and Mrs. Hearst also agreed to erect two of the necessary buildings thereon. Preliminary competitive plans were voted upon by an international jury at the Royal Museum of Fine Arts in Antwerp in 1898. The successful candidates then prepared final plans, and these were voted upon by the same jury in San Francisco in 1899. The final plan adopted was that of M. Emile Bénard, of Paris. The plan provides not only for a campus, but for a complete series of university buildings. The estimated cost of carrying out the plans in their entirety is from $10,000,000 to $12,000,000. Mr. John Galen Howard, of New York, has been appointed supervising architect. The first building which he will erect will be the Hearst Memorial Mining Building.

The present value of the buildings and grounds belonging to the University of California is (1901) $4,516,824. Its endowment and special funds aggregate $3,035,027, and its total income derived from all sources is about $550,000. The library contains over 88,000 volumes, but a strong effort is being made to increase this number largely, since the university, separated as it is from the book centres of the East, stands in relatively greater need of books than would an Eastern university.

The presidents of the university have been Henry Durant, Daniel C. Gilman, John LeConte, W. T. Reid, E. S. Holden, Horace Davis, Martin Kellogg, and Benjamin Ide Wheeler, Ph.D., LL.D., formerly professor of Greek and comparative philology in Cornell University, elected in 1899.