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PREFACE

A surprisingly small number of books on Yale University are accessible to us. President Clap's quaint "Annals" of 1766 can now be consulted only in the few rare copies that have survived; Ebenezer Baldwin's dry compilation of 1831 has long been out of date; President Woolsey's fine Anniversary Address of 1850 is no longer in general circulation; the late William L. Kingsley's monumental "Yale College" was published as long ago as 1879. These old-time books, together with a few chapters in Bagg's "Four Years at Yale" (now out of print), and Professor Dexter's brief epitome of the University's history, together with such other narratives as may be found in periodicals and in American college history compilations, comprise practically all that has appeared in book form regarding Yale history. Much fresh material concerning these bygone days has come to light, of course, since 1879. Professor Dexter's researches, for instance, have brought out new facts and revised old statements. Delvers into Yale's past must needs become acquainted with his numerous papers in the publications of the New Haven Colony Historical Society, with his exhaustive collection of facts in his "Yale Biographies and Annals," and with his "Documentary History of Yale University," to be published this year. Anson Phelps Stokes' "Memorials of Eminent Yale Men," published in 1914 by the Yale University Press, has brought together a great amount of hitherto scattered information regarding a number of graduates of the early days. Colonial town records have become much more accessible during these thirty-five years; letters and diaries have been discovered and pub

lished; new treatment has been given the whole Colonial period by numerous scholars, including our own Professors Fisher, Andrews, and Walker. As a result, much that had previously been accepted as true (as stated by such supposed authorities as Clap and President Quincy of Harvard and his school of followers) has had to be revised. The present writer has spent many an off-duty hour poring over these original sources, ransacking town-record offices and town and church histories, and visiting the scenes where Yale had its beginnings. Where considerable portions of this book give the modern understanding of certain epochs in Yale history, I presume that these latter-day corrections of the old views are responsible. Where I have given perhaps a new interpretation to certain other movements in this history, no one may be called to account but myself. Mr. Diedricksen's illustrations for this book should form not the least interesting and useful feature of it. Most of them have been drawn from ancient woodcuts and photographs; where an imaginary reconstruction has been attempted, only myself may be blamed for such anachronisms as may have crept in.

It has been my plan to treat the several Colonial periods covered by these chronicles in such a way that one might first renew his acquaintance with the broad events of the times, and then follow the participants of the several acts of the drama in a perhaps more intimate way against that background. These three main periods are: the Davenport epoch, during which New Haven was founded as a Separatist church-state and attempts at a college were made; the Pierpont period, during which the Collegiate School was founded and carried on at the modern Clinton and the old Saybrook; and the Andrew-Cutler-Edwards era, during which Yale College was established and took root at New Haven. It is a coincidence, but a happy one, that this book

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on these beginnings of Yale appears at the time of the twohundredth anniversary of this latter event. That these easy-going pages may serve to give something at least of that new realization of how Yale's beginnings came about which the author came to have in writing them, is the cordial hope of the writer.

EDWIN OVIATT.

Ogden Street, New Haven, September 4, 1916.

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