University of Virginia Library

At a meeting of the Board of Visitors of the University
of Virginia held June 27th 1870

Present B. Johnson Barbour, Rector, and Samuel Watts,
Thomas L. Preston, J. R. Woods, R. W. Hughes and Thomas J.
Pretlow.

The Board was called to order by the Rector and the
following Committees appointed.

Finance - Hughes & Woods

Grounds & Buildings - Watts & Preston

Apparatus - Woods and Pretlow

Library - Hughes and Pretlow.

The minutes of the last annual meeting nd of the called
meeting in September last were read approved & signed by the
Rector.

The Annual Report of the Faculty was read and on motion
referred to the Executive Committee.

On motion of Mr. Watts

Resolved that the Rector is hereby authorized to dispose
of the remaining 8 per cent Bonds on the best possible terms.

On motion Resolved that the Secretary be instructed to
call the attention of the proper officers of the Washington
Society to the loan of $500 made by the Board at its last annual
meeting, and to enqire if any and what steps had been taken
by the Society to meet its obligation in paying back the amount.

Resolved that the Rector be instructed to memoralize the
Legislature asking that the Proctor may be Ex-officio a Peace
Officer with power of arrest within the limits of the University.

Communications were recieved from the Chairman in reference
to the debt of the University due to Mrs. Lewis M. Coleman
and asking for a payment of $500 on the 1st of October-also
in relation to the Bonds of the University for the purchase
of Carr's Hill held by C. W. Gill who asks payment of the bond
due July 1st and interest. On motion these Communications were
referred to the Finance Committee.

A communication was received from Dr. J. E. Chancellor
Demonstrator of Anatomy asking for an increase of compensation

On motion

Resolved that the Rector be requested to inform Dr.
Chancellor that the Board is compelled to decline granting
him an increase of salary by reason of the depressed condition
of the finances.

Resolved that the following words of Sec. 8 Ch. 5 page 57
of the Enactments "end of every session" be stricken out and
the following words inserted in lieu of them "Annual Meeting
of the Board of Visitors".

Resolved that the Board deem a strict compliance with
Sec. 8 Ch. V of the Enactments a matter of grave importance-and
the Librarian is instructed hereafter to enforce the
penalty against all those whether Professors or others who
shall hold books from the Library in violation of law.

The Board then adjourned until tomorrow morning at 9
Oclock.

The Board met according to adjournment. Present the same
members as on yesterday and also W. E. M. Word.

Col Watts from the Committee on Grounds & Buildings submitted
the following report

The Committee on Grounds & Buildings have, according to
order, given their attention to the subject, and it affords them
pleasure to report that they find the property of the University
to which their arrention has been directed, in as good order,
in view of the condition of the finances as circumstances
would admit of- The Rotunda has been much improved by the

removal of decayed cornice and the substitution of new work,
and by the addition of paint on those parts which were in immediate
want of it. Much remains yet to be done to put that
building and the Hall connected with it in good order, and
they recommend an appropriation for that purpose as soon as
the finances of the University will admit of it. The buildings
on the lawn are all in want of paint, and it would be advisable
in view of economy as well as comfort and ornament to have the
work done as speedily as possible especially the cornice of
the dormitories. The Laboratory under the charge of Prof. Mallet
is in perfect order. Owing to the want of money resources,
not much has yet been done with the proposed experimental farm.
But a beginning has been made. The ground has been selected
and fenced in, and a few experiments upon a small scale have
been commenced, Root cuttings of the Ramce plant have been procured
from Louisiana, and planted out with a view of ascertaining
the possibility of its culture in this vicinity & latitude-seed
saved from Sea Island cotton raised here last year have
been sown and the plants produced set out, in order to examine
their tendency to return to the upland type of Sea Island cotton
planted in the interior & at a distance from the hebredizing
influence of the ordinary replaced Cotton. A fresh planting of
very superior Sea Island cotton seed from Charleston has been
made with a view of pursuing further investigation. A remarkably
prolific replaced cotton from Venezuala has also been tried.
Some interesting experiments have also been made upon the influence
of various simple contituents of Manures on tobacco, in
the neighborhood of New Glasgow, near Lynchburg, and practically
examined at the Laboratory- Sundry specimens of Marl from
Westmoreland County have been examined, and the attention of
the Laboratory students has been in part given to Chemical analysis
as applied to agricultural purposes, and one of the students
has devoted himself exclusively to this line of study-Your
Committee believe that the Experimental Farm will be an
important Department in the University at an early day. Nothing
is required to give it success, but an improvement in our
money resources.

The Board met according to adjournment.

Present the same members as on yesterday.

Resolved that Professor Boeck be designated to communicate
the thanks of the Board of Visitors to Leander J. McCormick Esq.
for his very valuable present of a Mower to the Agricultural
Department.

Resolved that $750 be appropriated for Printing and
Advertising.

Ordered that the election of a Chairman of the Faculty
for next Session be postponed until the September meeting and
that the present Chairman continue to discharge the duties of
the Office until that time.

Resolved that in view of the fact that the abolition of
a maximum income for the Professors by Resolution in 1865 was
made under a total misapprehension of the state of affairs at
the University- and furthermore in consideration of the present
financial exigency, the Board is compelled to restore the principle
of a maximum salary as it existed prior to the war, and
to enact that hereafter and beginning with the next session,
no professor shall receive more than three thousand dollars,
and without guaranteeing that amount to any who shall fall below,
it is hereby ordered that whenever the salary and fees of
any professor shall exceed three thousand dollars, such excess

shall be paid into the Treasury of the University to be used
for general purposes.

Resolved in consequence of the adoption of the above
resolution the arrangement by which the Faculty contributed
two thousand dollars is necessarily abrogated- and the payment
of the salaries of Professors Mallet and Boeck is assumed
by the Board of Visitors.

Resolved that the Proctor be authorized to expend a sum
not exceeding $350 in increasing the height of the Reservoir
Wall.

The Secretary of the Board of Trustees of the Miller Fund
presented the following extracts from the minutes of their
proceedings which were ordered to be recorded.

"Resolved that the Trustees appropriate $1000 for next
year, for the rent of the laboratory, $1000 for the salary of
Prof. Mallet, $300 for the rent of Prof. Boeck's house and $200
towards the salary of Prof. Boeck."

"Resolved that the Board of the Visitors be informed that
the trustees of the Miller Fund estimate their fund for the
current year at about six thousand dollars, making it practicable
and advisable in their judgment with the concurrence
of the Visitors to appoint a Professor of Practical & Scientific
Agriculture, and under that impression they recommend the
Visitors to advertise for such appointment by the 6th day of
September 1870 when the trustees will meet them for conference
and nomination, and that in the meantime the Visitors be respectfully
requested to provide for the complete organization
of this School of Agriculture, under such plan as they deem
best for the execution of the declared trusts of Mr. Samuel Miller
decd."

The Committee on Apparatus submitted the following report

The undersigned recommend the following appropriations to
the Scientific Schools for the purchase of apparatus

       

Chemistry	150
Physiology	100
Anatomy	100
Nat. Philosophy	270

The Professor in the last named school having procured at his
own expense apparatus amounting to $170, finding it indispensably
necessary in view of illustrations required in the advancement
of Experimental Physics.