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committee submitted to the Association a carefully prepared report of
progress being made in the department to which it had been
assigned. Some of the reports displayed more animus than
discrimination.
The need for assisting the Institute financially was constantly in the
minds of the alumni. Their first venture in fund raising was to
procure money for an oil portrait of John Boynton, which was presented
at Commencement in 1884. Two years later they planned the raising of
the Thompson Memorial Fund, to be secured by annual gifts for a
five-year period, and presented to the Institute. The fund raising
began in 1887, and by heroic efforts there was accumulated the sum of
$3,734, which was donated to the trustees in 1894 as an endowment, the
income to be used for the purchase of books for the library. The
success of this effort led to plans for a general alumni fund as a
continuing policy.
Alumni activities were not confined to the annual meeting. Groups of
graduates in various cities found it pleasant to come together in
social groups. The first of these groups to organize a branch
association was the one at Washington, D. C., in June, 1890. Two years
later a similar organization was formed in Cleveland, and the Western
Association was organized at Chicago in the fall of 1892.
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