I was wandering around 2 Divinity avenue, taking a break from studying in the Yenching Library. I noticed an old photograph on the wall with a small explanation beside it:

                "Charles M. Hall developed the process by which aluminum is extracted from bauxite; upon his discovery has been built an entire industry, and in particular the Aluminum Company of America.
        "It is said that the metal known as aluminium elsewhere is called aluminum in the United States because the second “i” was inadvertently omitted from the copy for the first advertising brochures, and Mr. Hall and his associates could not afford to have the brochures reprinted.
        "At his death he left a very large fortune. A considerable part of it he direted to be used to aid education in Japan, continental Asia, and eastern Europe. Some of these funds went directly to institutions in those areas. Another portion was allotted by the trustees of the Hall estate to the Harvard-Yenching Institute, which was incorporated in Massachusetts in 1928 for the dual purposes of aiding education in Asia and furthering Asian studies in the United States."

Ha! So that's where the "i" went!