Excerpt from Addresses Delivered at the Inauguration of the Rev. John Gordon, D. D., President of Howard University The exercises of the afternoon opened in the Andrew Rankin Memorial Chapel on the University Campus at 2.30 p. m., the Rev. Teunis S. Hamlin, D. D., President of the Board of Trustees, in the Chair. After prayer by the Rev. Francis J. Grimke, D. D., the following addresses were delivered: Dean Isaac Clark, D. D. Dean Isaac Clark, D. D., for the Theological Department, said: It was November 17, 1866 - Monthly Concert night of the First Congregational Church in Washington, D. C. The leader of the meeting was Rev. Dr. C. B. Boynton, pastor of the church. The theme of the evening was the duty of the country and of the church to the Freedmen lately made free by the Lincoln proclamation. Mr. Henry A. Brewster spoke of a great missionary society, like the American Board, as the need of the day for the evangelization of those who had lately been freed. Rev. Benjamin F. Morris, then in Government service, told of the surprise and delight with which he had listened that afternoon to an examination in theological studies of a half dozen colored young men - students in what was then known as Wayland Institute, a school having only a single teacher. In closing his remarks he expressed the wish that the day would come when a theological school would be established by the Congregational Church in Washington, D. C. To this Rev. D. B. Nichols responded with instant interest and springing faith, "Why not now?" This was the good seed sown in good ground which sprang up, and has borne fruit an hundred fold in the multiplied departments and manifold and beneficent activities of Howard University. On the following Thursday a conference was held and a committee was appointed to prepare a plan of action. A week later a plan was presented recommending the opening of a night school to begin with, and that three chairs of instruction be established - one on Evidences of Christianity and Biblical Interpretation, a second on Biblical History and Geography, and a third on Anatomy and Phisiology in their special relations to Hygiene. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.