The buildings erected during Mrs. Irvine's tenure of office were
few. Fiske Cottage was opened in September, 1894, for the use
of students who wished to work their way through college. The
"cottage" had been originally the village grammar school, but when
Mr. Hunnewell gave a new schoolhouse to the village, the college
was able, through the generosity of Mrs. Joseph M. Fiske,
Mr. William S. Houghton, Mr. Elisha S. Converse, and a few other
friends, to move the old schoolhouse to the campus and remodel it
as a dormitory. In February, 1894, a chemical laboratory was built
under Norumbega hill,--an ugly wooden building, a distress to
all who care for Wellesley's beauty, and an unmistakable witness
to her poverty.

On November 22, 1897, the corner stone of the Houghton Memorial
Chapel was laid, a building destined to be one of the most
satisfactory and beautiful on the campus. It was given by
Miss Elizabeth G. Houghton and Mr. Clement S. Houghton of Cambridge
as a memorial of their father, Mr. William S. Houghton, for many
years a trustee of the college.

In 1898 Mrs. John C. Whitin, a trustee, gave to the college an
astronomical observatory and telescope. The building was completed
in 1900. Another gift of 1898, fifty thousand dollars, came from
the estate of the late Charles T. Wilder, and was used to build
Wilder Hall, the fourth dormitory in the group on Norumbega hill.
In 1898, the first of the Society houses, the Shakespeare House,
was opened.

On November 4, 1897, Mrs. Irvine presented before the Board of
Trustees a review of the history of the college under the new