disease not open to any other city in the temperate zone. The intensive investigation of tropical diseases and the allied fields of protozoology and comparative pathology is sure to yield results of the greatest value to scientific medicine, and will at the same time allow this University to assist the state in even greater extent than in the past, in the solution of problems concerning the health and welfare of its citizens. In this field alone the Hooper Foundation will undoubtedly take a prominent part, active and advisory in the affairs of the community.

Another field which this Institute may enter with great promise of success is that of the chronic diseases. These have been for the most part neglected. This is to some extent due to the difficulties which surround these problems, but in large part is the result of the influence of bacteriology, which, on account of its amazing development in the past thirty years, has focused the attention of investigators upon the acute infectious diseases. This influence, while of the greatest importance to medicine, and responsible for much of the endowment of research in this country, has had a tendency to retard the study of diseases not due to bacteria or protozoa. The pendulum now, however, is swinging the other way, and the diseases of advanced life-the chronic or degenerative diseases of the heart, the kidneys, the blood vessels are beginning to receive an attention commensurate with their incidence and importance. This field demands methods and training and facilities other than those of the bacteriologist. Here the methods of the physiologist and chemist come into demand. The diseases in question cannot be readily reproduced in animals, but must be studied in large part in man; thus the University hospital is of the greatest value in research of this type, for clinician and investigator must co-operate frequently for long periods of time in the study of disturbances due to faulty metabolism, altered internal secretions or other abnormal physiology. It is in this department of investigation that the University Hospital and the Hooper Foundation

will each find the other indispensable, and though the problems are difficult, time-consuming, and full of disappointments, it is the field most in need of worthy effort at the present time. The result of the investigation of the acute infectious diseases has been to increase the expectancy of life by diminishing the mortality of infancy, childhood and early manhood. Life insurance statistics of recent years show an increase apparent or real, it is not clear which in the chronic degenerative disease of middle and advanced life. It is, of course, the obvious thing to say that if one is saved from the acute infections of early life the chances are greater that one may succumb to a degenerative disease during middle life. This, however, is not necessarily so. We may do as much for the degenerative diseases if we learn their predisposing causes and the hygiene necessary for their prevention, as has been done in the matter of the acute infections. And even though we may not prevent them entirely, for one must die sometime, we may at least give to the period of middle or advancing life a greater stability and thus prolong years of useful activity. I sincerely hope that the study of the chronic disease will occupy the larger share of the efforts of the Hooper Foundation.

Of other fields of labor, two I consider to be of the greatest importance in the solution of the difficulties which oppose human progress. One is cancer investigation and the other the study of diseases of unknown etiology, as scarlet fever, measles, etc. I realize fully that we have already in this country four research foundations devoted to the study of cancer, but the problem is one of such magnitude that I believe it is the duty of every institute that can afford it, to give of its resources to this work.

As to diseases of unknown etiology we have before us the wonderful example of the good accomplished by the Rockefeller Institute in the study of infantile paralysis. Equally brilliant results may await the Hooper Foundation in connection with other disease, the etiology of which is at present unknown and the prevention and control therefore uncertain.

These last suggestions are, perhaps, matters to be considered as the Institute develops. With a foundation for work, based on an equipment for the study of tropical diseases and that for the study of the chronic disease, it would be comparatively easy to turn to new problems as opportunity presents. An unusual epidemic, the appearance of diseases new to the community, the development through industrial changes of a new occupational disease, any of these could become immediately the object of study by an institute planned on the lines I have suggested. Opportunism of this kind-that is, the power of being prepared to appreciate the problem and to grasp the opportunity -is of as great value in research as in other things. And this applies to men as well as to subjects of research, for research is always a matter of men and not alone of buildings, or equipment or problems.

Thus far I have spoken only of the opportunities for research opened up by the Hooper Foundation and of the benefit to be derived from these by the people of the immediate community and of the state at large. There is another side, and that the influence upon the teaching and practice of medicine. The introduction of new departments of research have always tended to break down the hard and fast lines which bind together the laboratory subjects formerly known as the institutes of medicine. I have no doubt that it will not be long before this effect is seen in your own medical school; physiological chemistry will beit certainly should be split off from physiology and a new department of pharmacology and experimental therapeutics will be established. Bacteriology, with the closely allied field of immunology, will undoubtedly separate from pathology. These and other expansions mean greater freedom in teaching and greater opportunity for investigation and are the inevitable result of the proximity of a research foundation. With the University Hospital added as a teaching and research center, all these factors combined will exert upon the practice of medicine an influence which will

enhance beyond computation the welfare of the community, and place the University in the position of "the scientific adviser of the state" and "the peoples' organized instrument of research." The public looks first, and naturally so, to the state and municipal laboratories for assistance, but it looks also to the laboratories and hospitals of the universities for that wise guidance and direction which, untrammeled by political expediency, is the result of impersonal scientific observation and experiment. To occupy this position is the opportunity offered the University of California by the Hooper Foundation.

GEORGE WILLIAMS HOOPER

CURTIS H. LINDLEY

It is fitting on the threshold of these ceremonies, marking the first important administrative step in the establishment of the George Williams Hooper Foundation for Medical Research, that we pause for a few passing moments to pay a slight tribute to those whose generosity and love of humanity have made the Foundation possible, and to recount in brief outline its history from the birth of the thought in the mind of its creator to the coming together in this presence of the distinguished men who are charged with the high responsibility of shaping its destinies.

Every purposeful human achievement has its origin in a thought—a hope-an aspiration. Before the dawn of realization is the twilight filled with shadowy forms-assuming at times shapes more or less definite-then dissolving into vague outlinings-then reappearing and by degrees developing into the real and substantial. What it is now our privilege to call the George Williams Hooper Foundation passed through all these nascent stages, originating in the thoughtful mind of him whose name the foundation bears, cherished by him throughout the remainder of his

noble life, and nourished with affectionate and sympathetic devotion by his life's companion, who remained to perfect the plan.

George Williams Hooper was born in the State of Maine in 1847. The family moved to Boston when George was quite young, at which place he received his education at the South Boston High School, graduating at the age of sixteen. He immediately set out for California, his father having preceded him by several years. Most of his life thereafter was spent in San Francisco, where starting out in humble employment he was by degrees advanced and ultimately acquired a share in the business which his father and brothers had previously established. It was in the conduct of this business that Mr. Hooper, by patient industry and business integrity, laid the foundation of the fortune, the larger portion of which he has dedicated to humanity.

To those who knew him, no tribute to his character is necessary. To those who had not that privilege, a few words may be said. He was one of nature's noblemen. Though forceful, he was gentle and sweet-spirited, full of loving kindness, just, in the highest sense of the term, and full of sympathy for all mankind. His aid and comfort to those in need or distress was unostentatious. He represented the highest type of citizenship. He loved San Francisco, and in its struggle for municipal betterment he could always be relied on to aid in the cause of civic righteousness.

The nature and character of the Hooper Foundation for Medical Research is a reflex of the nature and character of its founder. More might be said, but that is all sufficing. Some time after the calamity of April, 1906, he gradually withdrew from business, availing himself of the opportunity for leisure to travel in foreign lands.

It was on the eve of one of these journeys around the world that Mr. Hooper first seriously considered the ultimate disposition of his accumulated wealth. In a conversation with one whom he esteemed as a friend, he broached the subject of devoting a goodly portion of his fortune to some