These are the cardinal principles which guided Michigan's first President throughout his career in the University, and, as ideals, have been a powerful factor in its growth since his time. More apparent to his contemporaries were the immediate benefits of his strong administration. He saw at once the urgent need of more funds for the library and obtained a subscription from Ann Arbor citizens of some $1,515, to which the Regents added $300, resulting in an increase of 1,200 volumes. From that time dates the steady and consistent growth of the University Library. Even more pressing appeared to him the need for an astronomical observatory. From the very day of his inauguration, he made the raising of sufficient funds for this purpose one of his first tasks and so effective were his efforts that the Observatory was opened in 1855; the result of a gift of $15,000 by citizens of Detroit, to which the University had added an appropriation of $7,000. This gave Michigan one of the three well-equipped observatories in the country at that time. The telescope, a thirteen-inch objective, was purchased in this country, but other items of equipment were obtained in Berlin under the advice of Professor Encke, the Director of the Royal Observatory, whose assistant, Dr. Brünnow, came to America as Michigan's first Professor of Astronomy.
It was during Dr. Tappan's administration also that the professional departments, as they were long called, came into their own. The Medical School had been organized since 1849, when the first building was completed at a cost of about $9,000; but the work was only fairly under way when he came. The new department was opened in October, 1850, with ninety matriculates and grew with extraordinary rapidity, so that for the first years the enrolment exceeded that of the Literary Department. When Dr. Tappan left the University in 1863 there were 252 students in the Medical Department and by 1866-67 their number increased to 525, the largest enrolment in the history of the School. The creation of a Law Department was considered at the same time the Medical Department was organized, but lack of resources as well as any enthusiastic support from the legal profession in the State postponed its opening for ten years. The growing number of petitions for its establishment, however, finally led to the opening of the School in 1859 with a Faculty of three, and ninety-two students. Hardly less important was the establishment in 1855 of a course in civil engineering. It was organized in connection with the Department of Physics, however, and did not attain to the dignity of a separate department with its own head for many years. Even so modest a beginning as this for technical courses in the University found precedent in those days only at Harvard. Lack of funds and co-operation from the Legislature seems to have been the only reason which led to the abandonment of plans for the creation of departments of Agriculture and Military Science which were seriously considered at that time.