THINKER'S ALMANAC - July 2

 

Subject:  Education - Maurice Hilleman

Event:  The Morrill Act is signed into law by Abraham Lincoln, 1862

Let us in education dream of an aristocracy of achievement rising out of a democracy of opportunity. -Thomas Jefferson

On this day in 1862, amid the Civil War, President Abraham Lincoln signed the Land-Grant College Act into law.  Also known as the Morrill Act, the law expanded and democratized American higher education, providing opportunities for the children of farm and factory workers.  

The chief sponsor of the legislation was Justin Morrill, a long-serving lawmaker from Vermont.  The son of a blacksmith, Morrill had little formal education himself.  Nevertheless, he had the foresight to expand educational opportunities beyond just the privileged elite (1).

     Image by David Yu from Pixabay

One example of the long-term benefits of the Morrill Act is the story of Maurice Hilleman.  After growing up on a farm and graduating from high school in 1937, Hilleman was about to take a job as an assistant manager of a J.C. Penney store in Miles City, Montana.  Instead of taking the job, however, Hilleman took the advice of his older brother and applied for a scholarship at Montana State University -- one of the land-grant colleges established by the Morrill Act.  Hilleman got the scholarship, graduated first in his class, and then earned a graduate degree in microbiology at the University of Chicago.  You may have never heard of Maurice Hilleman, but his work in fighting diseases such as measles, mumps, and pneumonia might just have saved your life.  He developed eight of the 14 standard recommended vaccines.  In developing these vaccines, Hillman applied his experiences growing up on a farm by incubating viruses in chicken eggs.  

Another beneficiary of a land-grant college is the American author Sarah Vowell.  Writing in The New York Times in 2018, Vowell celebrated her college experience:

Like Hilleman, I might not have attended college but for M.S.U. It was what I could afford. And I’ve come to appreciate the E pluribus unum implications of having been thrown together with 10,000 Mormons, Crow, Future Farmers of America and flower children’s children whose only shared experience was that we all graduated from high school within a 400-mile radius of Great Falls. No surprise, Oprah Winfrey and Johnny Carson attended land-grant colleges in Tennessee and Nebraska — you do learn how to talk to anyone. (2)

The Morrill Act signed by President Lincoln gave each state public land that could be sold to raise endowment funds for public colleges.  For each Senator and Representative a state had, it received 30,000 acres.

Millions of Americans, like Hilleman and Vowell, have seen their lives improved by the education provided by a land-grant college. 

Recall, Retrieve, Recite, Ruminate, Reflect, Reason:  How did the Morrill Act democratize education in America?

Challenge - Don’t Take the Land-Grant Colleges for Granted

Research one specific land-grant college in the United States.  When was it established?  And what makes this college or university unique?  

Sources:

1-Clinger, James C. July 2, 1862: President Abraham Lincoln Signs the Morrill Act Establishing Land Grant Colleges. Constitutingamerica.org. 

2-Vowell, Sarah.  “A University of, by and for the People.”  The New York Times 2 February 2018.