May 9, 1827, the Trustees of Williams College voted “That a sum not exceeding one hundred dollars be appropriated to the procuring and erection of apparatus necessary to the practice of the gymnastic exercises, if the Faculty should think proper to introduce the same at this College.” At a meeting of the Faculty held June 15 “The President and Tutor (Mark) Hopkins,[215] a committee who had been appointed for this purpose at a former meeting, reported a plan of a gymnasium, and recommended a site for its location. The same committee were authorized to prepare the ground according to the plan reported.” The Trustees, again, on September 5, of the same year, voted “to appropriate a sum not exceeding $50, in addition to the $100 granted at the last meeting, to be expended on the Gymnasium.” The _Boston Medical Intelligencer_ for September 25, 1827 (Vol. V, p. 311) contains this note: “A traveller observes, ‘On a portion of the College grounds, in Williamstown, I perceived one day a large number of students at work, headed by their venerable President, and on examination found that they were preparing a Gymnasium. Here is a fine spot for exercise, and we may hope that our students will no longer, as in former years, leave college with emaciated frames and pallid countenances, through want of proper exercise.’” The following extracts are taken from a long letter[216] to the editor of the _Boston Medical Intelligencer_ by a correspondent who signs himself “G. F.” and writes under date of September, 1827. “Having lately been in Providence, Rhode Island, I have had the best opportunity of informing myself with respect to the success of the Gymnastic Exercises in Brown University, and knowing the interest you take in this subject I submit to your disposal some remarks on it. On the 11th of June last, near the commencement of the present term, the exercises opened under the most auspicious and flattering circumstances. Nearly all the students, with the exception of the senior class, to the number of about seventy, presented themselves on the exercise ground. The exercises were countenanced, and consequently enlivened, by the presence of the president, professors, and tutors of the university.... The officers, as I stated, appeared with the students, and under the direction of the teacher of gymnastics performed the exercises.... The students have taken a great interest in the exercises throughout the term, though not so much at the latter part of it as at first....” Late in July of 1827 Charles Follen spent a day in Providence on his way to Newport, and refers to the visit as follows in a letter to Beck: “I was for the most part with Dr. Wayland,[217] and my ex-assistant Haskins, and held in the evening a strict Gymnastic review. I spoke much with Dr. Wayland on education. He stated many fine views and seemed to be respected and beloved by the teachers. He exercises with all.” The University catalogue of 1827-1828