young man, but his record of accomplishment has great
promise for the future. He was born in Brooklyn, Iowa, August 30, 1874,
and was therefore forty-five years old at the time of his election. His
earlier education was received in the schools of Minneapolis and at
Carleton College, Northfield, Minnesota, where he was graduated with the
degree of A.B. in 1900. After some years spent in teaching he eventually
entered the Yale Graduate School, where he received his doctorate in
1907.

Two years later he was elected President of Smith College, but spent a
year in travel abroad before taking up his duties at Northampton. He
remained at Smith until 1917, when he succeeded Dr. George E. Vincent as
President of the University of Minnesota, the position he resigned to
accept the Presidency of Michigan. He comes to his new task as did his
predecessors, Dr. Tappan and Dr. Angell, with a vision for the future of
the University. He believes, as they did, that in the State University
lies the future of education in this country, and Michigan, with her
strategic position between the East and the West, the prestige of her
years, the wide distribution of her students, and the proved loyalty of
her great body of alumni, offered him a field which he could not well
refuse. He has before him the prospect of many years of service, for he
is only three years older than was Dr. Angell when he first came to
Michigan.

Dr. Burton was officially inaugurated President of the University on
October 14, 1920. His formal acceptance of his office was made the
occasion of a significant and stimulating educational conference, which
lasted for three days. Some two hundred representatives of the leading
American Universities and educational bodies listened to the discussion
of vital academic and administrative problems of the modern state
university during the five sessions, which covered the general topics;
"Educational Readjustments," "Administrative Problems," and
"Constructive Measures." The inauguration banquet was held at the
Michigan Union on the evening of October 15, 1920. President A. Lawrence
Lowell of Harvard, President E.A. Birge of the University of Wisconsin,
President Harry A. Garfield of Williams College, and the Hon. Thomas E.
Johnson, Superintendent of Public Instruction, were the speakers on that
occasion.

[Illustration: MARION LEROY BURTON, LL.D.
President of the University of Michigan, 1920-]

CHAPTER VI

LITERATURE, S