Part 1 - The Institute Libraries - Institute for Advanced Study

Professor Veblen bore in the Founder's view na responsibility for the
recent events is shown by the fact that he vas elekted to that vacancy
the followfng yeax,
So far little cr nothing has been said about plans for bring-
ing students to the Institute, or for opening it for operation. During
the smer of 1932 Flexner had sought to estop the z~rhftlous planning
of Peblen 2nd Weyl for a large faculty by likening the Institute to the
Rockefeller Institute for Medical .Research, as he had done in Universities.
There, though neither man r ~ bzve y known it, there ves a small group of
I ,
pexxanent men -- a faculty -- and others called Members, with the status
of resezrch HSSOC~B~~S, ~ h were o chosen zfter they had won their doctoral
degrees and devxonstrated signal ebflity in their individual fields. No
degrees were swzrded; the scientific work was the object. As soon as
Veblen returned to the United States frm Europe in 1932, Flexner took
.him to visit the Institute. The amlogy was not wct. The Rockefelfer
Institute for Medical Research did not purpose te trzifn past-doetorals
in their researches, whereas this was a easdinzl point In t k of
the new Institute. This ~lexner explained to Veblen, making the point
that the Institute fox Advanced Study was not to be a graduate school,
but instead an institution for research and the training of the post-
.- - ___-
doctoral man and v a n who wznted to pursue advanced study and had shown
-___I -
-- -
a capacfty for independent research, After that he invited Professor
.. -
Veblen*~ counsel on such matters as thg method of selecting students or
workers, the sources from which they might be drawn, the method of aiding
those rho needed it by modest grants, the length and times of the academic