McGill and its Story, 1821-1921 — John Stuart Mill — John Shaqi
McGill and its Story, 1821-1921
John Stuart Mill · en
Sir William Peterson was Principal of McGill University for a period of
twenty-four years, one quarter of its century of life. During that time
many honours came to him. He occupied the presidency of many learned
societies; he was knighted in 1915; he received honorary degrees from
the leading universities of Britain, America and Canada; he was Chairman
of the Board of Trustees of the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement
of Teaching; he won great distinction as a scholar and a writer. It
would be unwise here to attempt to estimate the significance of his work
as Principal of the University. We are perhaps too close to judge it
with correctness or with justice. The McGill he left in 1919 was not the
McGill he found in 1895. In the intervening years its development on the
sure foundations that had already been laid was extraordinary and
unprecedented for a university. Among the external evidences of growth
during that time are the McGill Union, the centre of student activities;
the Conservatorium of Music, with courses leading to the degree of
Bachelor and Doctor of Music; the establishment of a Department of
Dentistry, now grown to the stature of a Faculty; the acquisition of the
Joseph property at the southwest corner of the Yard, and the new Molson
and Law properties, consisting of 25 acres, the site of the Molson
Stadium, and of the gymnasium and student residences of the future; the
new Medical building; the establishment and development of the Graduate
School, and of the Departments of Commerce, Social Service and Physical
Education, and above all, the addition of Macdonald College with its
vast acres at Ste. Anne de Bellevue, where the work of the Faculty of
Agriculture, Household Science and the training of teachers is carried
on. In these twenty-five years the number of students more than doubled.
Financially, too, there was a change. In 1895 endowments amounted to
over a million and a half of dollars, in 1919 they were over twelve
millions, a sum to which the citizens' response to the appeal for funds
in 1911 largely contributed; the income in 1895 was two hundred thousand
dollars and the disbursements one hundred and eighty thousand; in 1919
the income and disbursements each amounted to approximately one million
dollars. In addition to these visible evidences of progress many new and
improved courses were established; the teaching staff was greatly
increased, and the reputation of the University was enhanced at home and
abroad. Externally and internally the newer and greater McGill bears
testimony to the energy and determination of Sir William Peterson during
his twenty-four years' occupancy of the Principalship. With the
criticisms of his administration--that as Principal Sir William was an
Imperialist first and afterwards a Canadian, and that in making
professorial appointments he did not often consider Canadian scholars,
with at least equal qualifications--we are not here concerned.