Many historical papers are difficult for the ordinary individual
to obtain, so it is thrilling to actually hold a one hundred
year old document. I am fortunate to have been allowed to read
an original copy of the Lake Placid Proceedings (published in
1901) owned by Dean Sharon Nichols, of the University of Georgia
in Athens, Georgia. Reading it is somewhat of a deciphering
trick. The terms used are not ones that we employ, and familiar
terms do not have modern meanings. However, the document can
give us a sense of what the writers were thinking in a way not
possible from a report about that document, so my paper here is
only a poor substitute for the real thing. At the turn of the
nineteenth century, most colleges and universities in the United
States were just beginning to be formed. They did not have many
departments, nor did they have a large body of study. Science
was the driving force in education-bacteria had just been
discovered and the country was on a tear to examine everything
under a microscope in