Peter Cooper Part 3

IN many respects the industrial conditions under which Peter Cooper began his career had been revolutionized before he finished it. The apprentice system has well-nigh pa.s.sed away; and the old freedom with which an intelligent, industrious, and ambitious young man could turn from one occupation to another, seeking that road which offered greatest promise of preferment, is greatly hampered by the modern regime of "organized labor," which, whatever its advantages, presents its own peculiar perils for the workingman. But it remains forever true that under either of these systems, or any others that can be evolved or invented, knowledge is power, and the bestowal of it is the one gift which neither pauperizes the recipient nor injures the community.

As a struggling young apprentice, Peter Cooper regarded with intense sympathy the needs and limitations of the cla.s.s to which he belonged.

But his notion of a remedy was not that of paternal legislation, or belligerent organization, or social reconstruction. To his conception the atmosphere of personal liberty and responsibility furnished by the new democratic republic, offering free scope to individual endeavor and rewarding individual merit, was the best that could be asked.

What he dreamed of doing was simply to a.s.sist these social conditions by providing for those who were handicapped by circ.u.mstances the means of power and opportunity, to be utilized by their own a.s.siduity. This plan included not only what he then thought to be the most effective system for intellectual improvement, but also provision for such innocent entertainment as would supersede the grosser forms of recreation, which involved the waste of money and health.

Walking up the Bowery Road--then the stage route to Boston, but now a crowded down-town street--he selected in the suburbs of the city the site for his great inst.i.tution; and, as he acc.u.mulated the necessary funds, he bought at intervals lot after lot at the intersection of Third and Fourth Avenues, until he had acquired the entire block, paying for his latest purchases (made after the neighborhood had been solidly built up and had become a centre of business) very high prices compared with those he had paid at the beginning. At last (in 1854) he commenced the erection of a six-story fire-proof building of stone, brick, and iron.

This work occupied several years, and during its progress a period of great financial distress threatened to interrupt it. But he persisted in the undertaking, at great risk to his private business; and the building was finished at a cost (including that of the land) of more than six hundred and thirty thousand dollars. Subsequent gifts from Mr. Cooper, together with the legacy provided by his will, and doubled by his heirs, and still later donations from his family and immediate relatives, make up a total of more than double that amount.[7]

Up to the time when the building was completed Mr. Cooper had taken little advice as to the details of his project. Its outlines in his mind were those which he had conceived a quarter-century before, and though he was doubtless conscious that new social and industrial conditions had intervened which would require some modifications of his plan, he had not formulated such changes.

The cla.s.ses which he wished especially to reach were those who, being already engaged in earning a living by labor, could scarcely be expected to take regular courses in instruction; and the idea of such instruction appears to have been at the beginning subordinate in his mind. He had a strong impression that young mechanics and apprentices, instead of wasting their time in dissipation, should improve their minds during the intervals of labor; and not unnaturally his first thought as to the means of such improvement turned to those things which had aroused and stimulated his own mind. Probably he did not realize that the ma.s.s of men were not like himself, and that something more than mere suggestion or opportunity would be required to develop the mental powers and enlarge the knowledge of the average workingman. However that may be, the original vague design of Mr. Cooper was something like this:--

There was in the city of New York a famous collection of curiosities known as Scudder's Museum. Barnum's Museum afterwards took its place; but that, too, has long since disappeared; and the small so-called museums now scattered through the city but faintly remind old inhabitants of the glories of Scudder's or Barnum's in their prime.

These establishments contained all sorts of curiosities, arranged without much reference to scientific use,--wax-works, historical relics, dwarfs, giants, living and stuffed animals, etc. There was also a lecture-room, devoted princ.i.p.ally to moral melodrama; and on an upper floor a large room was occupied by the cosmorama,--an exhibition of pictures, usually of noteworthy scenery, foreign cities, etc., which were looked at through round holes, enhancing the effect of their illumination.

Peter Cooper doubtless often lingered in these museums, receiving the inspiration which came from visions of a world much wider than his individual horizon, from the curious and wonderful works of nature, and from the works of man in former times and in foreign lands. From the queer mechanical devices exhibited by inventors to the "Happy Family"

and the cosmorama, everything was full to his quick sympathy of intellectual, moral, or sentimental suggestion; and no doubt he felt, after an hour of such combined wonder and reflection, a satisfying sense of time well spent.

He wished that this means of mental improvement and recreation combined might be freely afforded to those whose scanty earnings would not permit them otherwise to make frequent use of it, and he resolved that the museum and the cosmorama should be included in his inst.i.tution.

Another agency of which Mr. Cooper had made fruitful use, and the efficacy of which he highly appreciated, was conversation and debate. If people could be brought together and made to talk he thought they would learn a great deal from each other. In this he had undoubtedly grasped one of the great principles of progress. To meet and interchange our ideas of books and by personal discussions is indeed the mightiest factor of modern improvement. But the mere meeting to talk _about_ things unless it is combined with the disposition and the apparatus for _studying_ things is but barter without production, and may degenerate to a barren exchange of words, as unprofitable as that described in the Yankee proverb, "swapping jackknives in a garret." This aspect of the truth Mr. Cooper doubtless came to appreciate; but at the outset, habituated as he was to get ideas from everybody he met and everything he saw, it seemed to him that free discussions would be an unmixed benefit to all, and he resolved that his inst.i.tution should contain rooms, devoted to the several handicrafts, where the pract.i.tioners of each could meet and "exchange views."

It was also his intention that the lower part of the building he erected should be occupied by stores and offices, the annual rent of which should pay the running expenses of the inst.i.tution. In the course of time the Cooper Union came to need for full efficiency both more money than this source would supply and more room than was left to it after subtracting the rooms thus rented. These needs have now been met in some measure by further endowments, so that before long the whole building will be devoted to educational uses. But the wisdom, at that time, of Mr. Cooper's plan has been vindicated by the great work done with the modest means thus provided.

The building of the Cooper Union represented his original ideas. Above the shops and offices to be rented was an immense room intended for the museum. A large part of the building was cut up into small meeting-rooms for the conferences of the trades; in an upper story another great room was provided for the cosmorama; and the flat roof was to be safely inclosed with a bal.u.s.trade, so that on pleasant days or evenings the frequenters of the inst.i.tution might sit or promenade there, partake of harmless refreshments, listen to agreeable music,[8] and enjoy the magnificent prospect of the city below,--the heights beyond the East River on one side, the Hudson on the other, and the magnificent island-studded harbor.

A noteworthy feature of this scheme was the complete obliteration of all distinctions of cla.s.s, creed, race, or s.e.x among its beneficiaries. It is a significant fact that through nearly half a century, while these distinctions have been the subjects of vehement and sometimes bitter social and political discussion, the Cooper Union has gone quietly on educating its thousands of pupils without the least embarra.s.sment in its discipline, and apparently without even the consciousness on the part of its founder or its trustees that in this perfect solution of what was supposed to be a difficult problem they had accomplished anything extraordinary.

When Mr. Cooper, consulting with wise and practical advisers, addressed himself at last to the final arrangement of details, he surrendered one after another many parts of his youthful design. The name, "The Cooper Union for the Advancement of Science and Art," epitomized this change.

His primary purpose was unchanged; but he perceived that systematic education would be of more value to the cla.s.s he sought to aid than mere amus.e.m.e.nt or miscellaneous talk. The great free reading-room of the Cooper Union was subst.i.tuted for the museum; the conversation parlors for the various trades became cla.s.s-rooms for instruction; the cosmorama yielded to lecture-halls and laboratories; and the roof was abandoned to the weather. To all these changes, and to many other novelties adopted afterwards, Mr. Cooper was reconciled by one conclusive argument; namely, the proof afforded by their results that the Cooper Union was giving to the working cla.s.ses that which they needed most and most desired. Now and then perhaps a sigh might escape him for the dream of his youth. I remember one occasion when I accompanied him to the roof of the building, where some new construction was going on which he wished to inspect. The old man stood for some time admiring the view in all directions, and at last, recalling how he had once imagined happy crowds enjoying the delights of that "roof-garden," and casting a mournful glance at the central spot where the band was to have been, he said, "Sometimes I think my first plan was the best!"[9] But such regrets did not occupy his mind. He was satisfied to know that the inst.i.tution he had founded, building better than he knew, had proved its fitness by its success in the eager and grateful use made of it by those for whose benefit it was intended and in the actual evidences of such benefit.

Every year managers of the different departments took pains to report to him instances in which students already earning wages had increased their earnings through the added knowledge or skill acquired in the evening cla.s.ses; and this was the feature of the annual statements upon which he dwelt with the greatest satisfaction.

The charter of the Cooper Union was finally adopted in its present form by the legislature of the State of New York, April 13, 1859; and the deed of trust, executed in compliance therewith, on the 29th day of the same month, by Peter Cooper and his wife, Sarah, conveyed to the board of trustees the t.i.tle to "all that piece and parcel of land bounded on the west by Fourth Avenue, on the north by Astor Place, on the east by Third Avenue, and on the south by Seventh Street, . . . to be forever devoted to the advancement of science and art, in their application to the varied and useful purposes of life."

Even through this dry legal phraseology, it is not difficult to discern the frank and simple joy of the patient enthusiast, who was at last able to speak of the land which he had laboriously acquired, lot by lot, through many years, and the building which he had raised, stone by stone, through many more, as _one_ "piece or parcel," his to dedicate forever.

The delivery of this deed to the board of trustees was accompanied with a long letter, setting forth the wishes, hopes, and plans of the grantor, in the formal and diffuse rhetoric peculiar to his generation, and, perhaps, too much contemned by ours. To say the least, we are no more warranted in despising the utterances of n.o.ble, self-sacrificing philanthropists, because they are clothed in phrases now deemed verbose and stilted, than we would be in disparaging the deeds of historic heroes, because they wore armor now antiquated and struck their doughty blows with weapons obsolete. When Peter Cooper wrote, in the letter now before me, "The great object I desire to accomplish by the establishment of an inst.i.tution devoted to the advancement of science and art is to open the volume of nature by the light of truth--so unveiling the laws and methods of Deity that the young may see the beauties of creation, enjoy its blessings, and learn to love the Being 'from whom cometh every good and perfect gift,'"--he was not guilty of cant, because cant is the use of language expressing an emotion which the user does not really feel. And the same may be said of the elaborate additional exposition, contained in this letter, of the writer's faith in G.o.d and man, and of his confident hope in the future of his race, and particularly of his country.

The letter shows some traces still of his original plan. Thus, he writes:--

"In order most effectually to aid and encourage the efforts of youth to obtain useful knowledge, I have provided the main floor of the large hall on the third story for a reading-room, literary exchange, and scientific collections--the walls around that floor to be arranged for the reception of books, maps, paintings, and other objects of interest.

And when a sufficient collection of the works of art, science, and nature can be obtained, I propose that gla.s.s cases shall be arranged around the walls of the gallery of the said room, forming alcoves around the entire floor for the preservation of the same. In the window s.p.a.ces I propose to arrange such cosmoramic and other views as will exhibit in the clearest and most forcible light the true philosophy of life."

Other characteristic paragraphs are here quoted,--the whole letter being too long for full republication.

"To manifest the deep interest and sympathy I feel in all that can advance the happiness and better the condition of the female portion of the community, and especially of those who are dependent on honest labor for support, I desire the trustees to appropriate two hundred and fifty dollars yearly to a.s.sist such pupils of the female school of design as shall, in their careful judgment, by their efforts and sacrifices in the performance of duty to parents or to those that Providence has made dependent on them for support, merit and require such aid. My reason for this requirement is not so much to reward as to encourage the exercise of heroic virtues that often s.h.i.+ne in the midst of the greatest suffering and obscurity without so much as being noticed by the pa.s.sing throng.

"In order to better the condition of women and to widen the sphere of female employment, I have provided seven rooms to be forever devoted to a female school of design, and I desire the trustees to appropriate out of the rents of the building fifteen hundred dollars annually towards meeting the expenses of said school.

"It is the ardent wish of my heart that this school of design may be the means of raising to competence and comfort thousands of those that might otherwise struggle through a life of poverty and suffering. . . .

"Desiring, as I do, to use every means to render this inst.i.tution useful through all coming time, and believing that editors of the public press have it in their power to exert a greater influence on the community for good than any other cla.s.s of men of equal number, it is therefore my sincere desire that editors be earnestly invited to become members of the society of arts to be connected with this inst.i.tution. . . .

"It is my desire, also, that the students shall have the use of one of the large rooms (to be a.s.signed by the trustees) for the purpose of useful debates. I desire and deem it best to direct that all these lectures and debates shall be exclusive of theological and party questions, and shall have for their constant object the causes that operate around and within us, and the means necessary and most appropriate to remove the physical and moral evils that afflict our city, our country, and humanity." . . .

Other paragraphs indicate his plan that the students shall, in the first instance, frame the rules which shall control the discipline of the inst.i.tution. Thus he says:--

"It is my desire, and I hereby ordain, that a strict conformity to rules deliberately formed by a vote of the majority of the students, and approved by the trustees, shall forever be an indispensable requisite for continuing to enjoy the benefits of this inst.i.tution. I now most earnestly entreat each and every one of the students of this inst.i.tution, through all coming time, to whom I have intrusted this great responsibility of framing laws for the regulation of their conduct in their connection with the inst.i.tution, and by which any of the members may lose its privileges, to remember how frail we are, and how liable to err when we come to sit in judgment on the faults of others, and how much the circ.u.mstances of our birth, our education, and the society and country where we have been born and brought up, have had to do in forming us and making us what we are."

In this scheme Mr. Cooper antic.i.p.ated the plan of self-government now followed in some of our colleges; and while he expected too much of the students of the Cooper Union, and was himself afterwards obliged to consent to the restriction of their autonomy, it may be fairly said that the spirit of his hope and exhortation has never ceased to be felt; and, to the great honor of the Cooper Union, it may be recorded that questions of discipline have been well-nigh unknown within its walls.

This n.o.ble trust was accepted by a body of men who have discharged it with unwearied fidelity, zeal and wisdom. The original board consisted of Mr. Cooper, his son Edward Cooper, his son-in-law Abram S. Hewitt, and John E. Parsons, Wilson G. Hunt, and Daniel F. Tiemann. Three of these, Messrs. Cooper, Hewitt, and Tiemann, have been mayors of the city of New York. All of them were well-known and eminent citizens, burdened with the duties of active business; and the time they gave so freely to the management of the Cooper Union was not the superfluity of leisure.

The difficulty with "business men" too often is, that, when nominally charged with the administration of organized charities, they slight the work because they have not time to attend to it. But the United States can show not a few instances in which the affairs of religious, educational, or benevolent inst.i.tutions are carefully managed by the active directors of great private enterprises; and their management, when it is thus thorough, is generally much better than that of literary or philanthropic amateurs. This is conspicuously shown in the history of the Cooper Union.[10]

This is not the place for a detailed account of the development of the Cooper Union, or even of its present scope and prospective operations.

Such an account would worthily occupy a separate volume; for the inst.i.tution, in the hands of its wise directors, was a pioneer and model in many respects in which later enterprises, with larger means, have, perhaps, surpa.s.sed it. I must content myself here with brief mention of a few particulars.

The immense free reading-room, with its average daily attendance of nearly 1500 to 2000 persons, was Mr. Cooper's special delight; and well it might be so; for the sight is one almost without a parallel--not in the architecture, size, or furnis.h.i.+ng of the place, but in the extent and constancy of its use by the public. Entrance is free to all who are not unclean, intoxicated, or disorderly. In the main, the privileges thus given are not abused, but occasionally the evils almost inseparable from so large an attendance have been felt. At one time, the curator earnestly represented to the trustees the necessity of doing something to check the mutilation of books--a practice which public librarians know well as one of their most troublesome foes. It appeared that some unknown persons, who combined a love of the beautiful in language with a barbaric ignorance of it in conduct, were accustomed to slash out with their penknives favorite pa.s.sages of poetry for preservation, treating in this matter newspapers and books alike. It was found difficult to keep whole the volumes of Tennyson and Longfellow. But a more frequent and injurious practice was the cutting out of plates from ill.u.s.trated books. This was not for love of art, as the other for love of poetry.

The object was to sell such engravings for two or three cents each to the print-shops in the city, where they were bought by refined amateurs, for the purpose of "ill.u.s.trating" special volumes. This fas.h.i.+onable hobby has been the indirect cause of the ruin of many a choice book; and buyers of fine old editions are well aware that they must look well to their bargains, lest they find that the thief, at the bidding of the "collector," has plundered the volumes of the plates which once adorned them.

When this subject came up for discussion in the board of trustees, Mr.

Cooper was so full of pity for the poor fellows, who were obliged to sell stolen engravings at two cents a piece to keep body and soul together, that he could scarcely be brought to take a severe view of the offense. Nor was he willing (and in this his fellow-trustees agreed with him) to impose any restriction or censors.h.i.+p upon admittance to the reading-room. Even if the books suffered, the room must continue to be free. The great ma.s.s of well-behaved people must not be annoyed by measures intended to exclude a few rogues. The result vindicated the sagacity, as well as the charity, of this view. The officers in charge, not being permitted to adopt any sweeping measures of prevention, simply redoubled their vigilance, and finally caught one or two offenders and "made examples of them;" and the nuisance was immediately abated, though perhaps not entirely and permanently abolished.

The report of 1900, after mentioning the great (legitimate) wear and tear of the books, of which 12,000 had to be re-bound, adds:--

"The decorum of the visitors has been excellent, and it is remarkable, in view of such a very large number of persons visiting the room, that so few mutilations and injuries occur to the periodicals and books, and that so few books, probably not more than half a dozen in the course of a year, and those of small consequence, are stolen."

It seems then, after all, that Peter Cooper's faith in the people was justified.

The great hall in the bas.e.m.e.nt is another noteworthy feature, and worthy of wider imitation than it has yet received. Such a hall, if located upstairs in such a building, would have been open to three objections: it would have monopolized, for occasional use only, s.p.a.ce which was required for constant use; it would have been intolerably noisy, by reason of the roar and rattle in the streets which surround the building on all sides; and it would have been dangerous, as all such places are, when great audiences must make their exit by going down stairs. Nothing has ever been invented that will prevent people from being crushed and trampled when they are crowding down a stairway. In all these respects, the great hall of the Cooper Union is admirable. It occupies s.p.a.ce not otherwise valuable. It is quiet, and acoustically perfect. The means of exit and entrance are ample and safe. Even in case of an unreasoning panic, there is little danger that a crowd, tumbling up the stone stairways to the street, would cause the horrible maiming and killing which so often attend the efforts of a frightened mult.i.tude to get down.

Finally, the ventilation is excellent, for the simple reason that natural or automatic ventilation of such a large, low bas.e.m.e.nt room could not be expected, and consequently mechanical ventilation by means of a large fan, run by steam power, was provided. The efficiency of this system has sometimes been severely tested. On one occasion, during a scientific lecture, the experimental ill.u.s.trations of which were on a large and imposing scale, the learned professor on the platform had the misfortune to crack an immense gla.s.s jar, in which he was exhibiting the brilliant combustion of phosphorus in oxygen gas. The white fumes of phosphorous acid floated out into the air, and began to diffuse themselves through the hall towards the ventilation outlets at the sides and rear. To one who knew the irritating nature of these fumes it seemed inevitable that the hall must be emptied of its crowded audience in a few minutes. Already coughing had begun on the front seats, when Mr.

Hewitt, who was seated on the platform, quickly rose, and pulling a cord, reversed the currents of ventilation and opened a new outlet into the street, behind and above the platform. The curling clouds of vapor paused, wheeled, and retreated, and in another minute the air was perfectly pure. The lecturer had not even been interrupted. It was a beautiful and timely "experiment" not on the programme, and, to use the words of one who was present, "It was just the sort of thing to please Peter Cooper to the bottom of his soul."

The great hall was dedicated from the beginning to free speech. Peter Cooper may have overestimated the value of mere talk. As I have already told, it was his first notion that conversation and discussion were the chief things required in education. He came to see that study, instruction, and training were equally essential, but he never surrendered his faith in free speech; and the great hall was at the service of all sects, parties, and cla.s.ses, religious, philosophical, political, scientific, literary, or philanthropic. It has been the scene of many memorable meetings and addresses. But nothing in its history has been more useful and noteworthy than the series of free popular lectures which were given, as part of the operations of the Cooper Union, within its walls. These lectures began in 1868, and continued until they were adopted by the city as part of the general scheme of free lectures which has been so successful during the last few years. In awarding due praise to the promoters and managers of this plan, it should not be forgotten that the Cooper Union inaugurated it, and maintained it for many years, during which the free Sat.u.r.day night popular lectures in its great hall were the only ones of their kind. They covered many sciences and arts, chronicles of travel and themes of history and literature. The most eminent authors, teachers, investigators, travelers, and orators of the generation were comprised in the list of lecturers; and many of them performed this service without other reward than the consciousness of contributing to a n.o.ble charity, and the evident grat.i.tude of the vast and eagerly attentive audience.

Mr. Cooper loved to attend these Sat.u.r.day evening lectures, and an arm-chair was always ready for him on the platform. Many a speaker on that platform has been surprised by an untimely outburst of applause and has turned to discover the cause in the entrance of the beloved founder.

Often the subject of the evening was beyond his experience or knowledge, but that made no difference in his respectful attention, or in the benign satisfaction with which he contemplated the attentive audience, and realized that they were receiving benefit. I have often felt that the scene exhibited almost every Sat.u.r.day night for many years during the latest period of his life could be equaled only by the spectacle presented at Ephesus, where the aged St. John the Divine fronted the congregation of loving believers, always with his one last message, "Little children, love one another."

But sometimes the old man would be intensely interested and aroused by the lecture. I remember such an occasion, when I was myself the lecturer, and had been laying down, with due scientific decorum and diagrams, the "law of storms." At the close of the lecture, Mr. Cooper arose, advanced to the front, and gave a vivid and animated description of a whirlwind which he had witnessed some seventy years before, which was received with rapt attention and tremendous applause. The lecture was undoubtedly eclipsed in interest by this unexpected after-piece; but the lecturer was amply compensated by his triumph in having thus stirred the spirit and aroused the recollections of the dear old founder.

With regard to the various schools and cla.s.ses of the Cooper Union, it must suffice to say briefly that under the elastic and comprehensive plan of the deed of trust, two objects were constantly kept in view by the trustees. In the first place, a complete four years' course was always maintained, for the benefit of those who could afford the time and who felt the need of such training. In the second place, cla.s.ses were inst.i.tuted in such special departments as were most likely to be useful and most evidently in demand; and with regard to these the demand and the evidence of usefulness were followed as guides in determining the extent of the facilities offered, up to the capacity and means of the inst.i.tution.

De Morgan, in his "Budget of Paradoxes," tells of an old fellow who, wis.h.i.+ng to have a chair that would fit him perfectly, sat for a while on a ma.s.s of shoemaker's wax, which he then carried to a worker in wood, and instructed him to "make a seat like that!" This homely ill.u.s.tration indicates the manner in which the special cla.s.ses of the Cooper Union have been established, enlarged, and regulated, to meet the evident demands of its const.i.tuency. It is pleasant to know that the future means and sphere of the inst.i.tution will be enlarged under the same wise management.

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