Diary of to Amos A. Lawrence: Wednesday, January 26, 1859

Company to dinner at four. Agassiz, George Ticknor, Professor Felton, Rev. Dr. Huntington, Charles Hale (Speaker of House of Representatives), Lord Radstock, ex - Governor Washburn, and some gentlemen from the legislature whom I wished to become acquainted with Mr. Agassiz. They all seemed to have an agreeable visit, and I hope it will help along the project of establishing the Museum of Zoëlogy at Cambridge. Lord Radstock is a young man, travelling with his wife.

SOURCE: William Lawrence, Life of Amos A. Lawrence: With Extracts from His Diary and Correspondence, p. 160

Diary of to Amos A. Lawrence: Wednesday, February 15, 1859

Subscribed $1,000 to Agassiz's museum in Cambridge. The committee now have $40,000 subscribed, and expect more.

SOURCE: William Lawrence, Life of Amos A. Lawrence: With Extracts from His Diary and Correspondence, p. 160

Diary of to Amos A. Lawrence: April 9 , 1859

President Walker came to see about the Sanders donation. Before he left Mr. Agassiz came to get some money in advance and at the same time Governor Gardner came about something else.

SOURCE: William Lawrence, Life of Amos A. Lawrence: With Extracts from His Diary and Correspondence, p. 160-61

Diary of to Amos A. Lawrence: May 5 , 1859

Meeting at my Court Street office of the committee appointed to be the faculty of the Agassiz Museum: President Walker, Dr. Jacob Bigelow, Dr. O. W. Holmes, and Mr. Agassiz. The latter is so progressive that it requires all the tact of Dr. Walker and Dr. Bigelow to keep him in check.

SOURCE: William Lawrence, Life of Amos A. Lawrence: With Extracts from His Diary and Correspondence, p. 161

Diary of to Amos A. Lawrence: June 12, 1858

Professor Agassiz came to see me about his additional salary. He says he wishes to create the most complete collection of natural history in the world; so that it shall command students not only from all parts of this country, but from Europe. I said to him, “We shall draw students if we have the right man,” pointing to him. “Yes,” he added, “the man may draw students, but he cannot teach forever. He must go; and then if you have not some other inducement, the students will go. It is such a collection of objects as I will make which will perpetuate the school.” He is a frank, hearty-looking man.

SOURCE: William Lawrence, Life of Amos A. Lawrence: With Extracts from His Diary and Correspondence, p. 158

Diary of to Amos A. Lawrence: November 17, 1858

President Walker, Chief Justice Shaw, Judge G. T. Bigelow, Rev. Dr. Putnam, Professors Agassiz and Longfellow, Messrs. David Sears, W. Appleton, E. Rockwood Hoar, Jared Sparks, and J. A. Lowell dined here at four o'clock. They had an agreeable meeting. Chief Justice Shaw took Mrs. Lawrence in to dinner, though I asked Dr. Walker to do so; the former (who is seventy-eight) being more active than Dr. Walker, who is lame. The dinner was cooked by our own cook, Marion, and they all were cheerful and even gay; nor did they leave the dining-room until they went away. Mr. Agassiz sat next to me and talked all the time. I asked him whether some anecdotes about him in the newspapers to-day were true, but he had not seen them. Then I repeated one about his replying to a person who offered him a large sum for some lectures, “that he was too busy to waste his time in making money;” and this he pronounced to be true.

SOURCE: William Lawrence, Life of Amos A. Lawrence: With Extracts from His Diary and Correspondence, p. 158-9