811.42793/1567a: Telegram
The Acting Secretary of State to the Ambassador in China (Gauss)
224. 1. Professor Brown whose services were made available to the Ministry of Education as aeronautical engineering specialist reports that when he was in Chungking he arrived at a tentative agreement with Ku, Vice Minister of Education, General C. J. Chow the Director and John T. Tseng, a Division Chief of the Commission on Aeronautical Affairs, and with J. A. Lo of the National Central University Aeronautical Engineering Department that he should obtain opportunities in American universities for 12 to 15 professors of engineering and about 50 graduate engineers with from 1 to 3 years’ experience in the field to obtain paid positions in American engineering colleges. The first group were to be employed as instructors or teaching assistants and the second group as research assistants.
2. The Department desires that the Embassy inform Vice Minister Ku that Professor Brown has obtained offers of over 30 positions as research assistants as follows: Purdue, civil 12, electrical 6; Iowa, aeronautical 2, civil 2, engineering mechanics 2; Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, aeronautical 2, civil 1, chemical 1, electrical 1, metallurgical 2; Minnesota, aeronautical 1, mechanical 1, metallurgical 1; Massachusetts Institute of Technology, unclassified 5. Openings for three professors in aeronautical and mechanical engineering and engineering mechanics are offered at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute. Stipends ranging between $60 and $100 monthly are offered to research assistants and $2500 per annum for professors. All other costs must be met by the Chinese Government or the Chinese organizations or individuals concerned.
3. Apparently this information has been telegraphed by General Mow, representative here of the Commission on Aeronautical Affairs, to General Chow, Director of the Commission. Copies of the letters from the different institutions offering these positions are being mailed to the Embassy8 and while it would be advisable for the Chinese authorities to decide their action in principle the selection of individuals should await arrival of the exact specifications contained in the letters.
4. The Chinese Government will of course be put to considerable expense for transportation and the equipment and supervision of appointees in the United States but the Department suggests that the advantages they will receive as staff members of prominent institutions could not otherwise be duplicated irrespective of expense.
- In instruction No. 517, February 14, infra.↩