hese, Butler, at Irvington, formerly known as the
Northwestern Christian University, was the first to admit women
to a "female course," which its managers arranged to meet the
needs of the female mind. In its laudable endeavor to adapt its
requirements to this intermediate class of beings, the university
substituted music for mathematics, and French for Greek. Few,
however, availed themselves of this course, and it was utterly
rejected by Demia Butler, a daughter of the founder of the
institution, who entered it in 1860, and graduated from what was
then known as the male course, in 1864, thus winning the right to
be remembered as the first woman in Indiana to demonstrate the
capacity of her sex to cope with the classics and higher
mathematics. From that time the "female course" became gradually
less popular, until it was discarded. One after another, private
and denominational schools have fallen into line, until nearly
all of them are open to women without humiliating conditions.

Up to 1867 the Indiana University exhibited the anomaly of a
great institution of learning supported by the State, and
regarding itself as the crown of the public-school system, free
to but one-half of the children of the commonwealth. Since that
date it has been open equally to both sexes in all three of its
departments--the State Normal School, located at Terre Haute, the
Agricultural College, located at Lafayette and commonly known as
Purdue University, and the State University proper, including
literary and scientific departments located at Bloomington. Of
this last branch, 30 per cent. are women. That there is no longer
any discrimination in these higher institutions of learning is
not true. Girls must always feel that they are regarded as
belonging to a subordinate class, wherever women are not found in
the faculty and board of managers. The depressing influence of
their absence in superior positions cannot be measured.

Very few women are found in college faculties in Indiana, and
none on boards of trustees. Those most conspicuous in ability are
Mrs. Sarah A. Oren,[342] who, having served two successive terms
as State librarian, was called from that position to fill a chair
at Purdue University, where she remained several years; Miss
Catharine Merrill, profe