My Reminiscences of Ezra Cornell

Excerpt from My Reminiscences of Ezra Cornell: An Address Delivered Before the Cornell University on Founder's Day, January 11th, 1890 On the first day of the year 1864, on taking my seat for the first time in the State Senate at Albany, I found among my associates a tall, spare man, apparently very reserved and austere, and soon learned his name - Ezra Cornell. Though his chair was near mine, there was at first little intercourse between us, and there seemed small chance of more. He was steadily occupied, and seemed to care little for making new acquaintances. He was, perhaps, the oldest man in the Senate; I, the youngest: he was a man of business; I was fresh from a University professorship: and, upon the announcement of committees, our paths seemed separated entirely, for he was made chairman of the committee on Agriculture, while to me fell the chairmanship of the committee on Education. And yet it was this last difference which drew us together; for among the first things referred to my committee was a bill to incorporate a public library which he proposed to found in Ithaca. On reading this bill I was struck, not merely by its provision for a gift of one hundred thousand dollars to his townsmen, but even more by a certain breadth and largeness in his way of making it. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.