A history of California and an extended history of its southern coast counties, also containing biographies of well-known citizens of the past and present, Volume I, Part 39

Author: Guinn, James Miller, 1834-1918
Publication date: 1907
Publisher: Los Angeles, Cal., Historic record company
Number of Pages: 1184

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It was not long before Kearney and his fel- lows were back on the sand lots hurling out threats of lynching, burning and blowing up. On January 5 the grand jury presented indict- ments against Kearney, Wellock. Knight, ()'Donnell and Pickett. They were all released on the rulings of the judge of the criminal court on the grounds that no actual riot had taken place.

The first victory of the so-called Working- men's party was the election of a state senator in Alameda county to fill a vacancy caused by the death of Senator Porter. An individual by the name of John W. Bones was elected. On ac- count of his being long and lean he was known as Barebones and sometimes Praise God Bare- bones. His only services in the senate were the perpetration of some doggerel verses and a

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speech or two on Kearney's theme, "The Chi- nese Must Go." At the election held June 19, 1878, to choose delegates to a constitutional convention of the one hundred and fifty-two delegates the Workingmen elected fifty-seven, thirty-one of whom were from San Francisco. The convention met at Sacramento, September 28, 1878, and continued to sit in all one hundred and fifty-seven days. It was a mixed assem- blage. There were some of the ablest men in the state in it, and there were some of the most narrow minded and intolerant bigots there. The Workingmen flocked by themselves, while the non-partisans, the Republicans and Democrats, for the most part, acted in unison. Opposition to the Chinese, which was a fundamental prin- ciple of the Workingmen's creed, was not con- fined to them alone; some of the non-partisans were as bitter in their hatred of the Mongolians as the Kearneyites. Some of the crudities pro- posed for insertion in the new constitution were laughable for their absurdity. One sand lotter proposed to amend the bill of rights, that all men are by nature free and independent, to read, "All men who are capable of becoming citizens of the United States are by nature free and inde- pendent." One non-partisan wanted to incor- porate into the fundamental law of the state Kearney's slogan, "The Chinese Must Go."

After months of discussion the convention evolved a constitution that the ablest men in that body repudiated, some of them going so far as to take the stump against it. But at the elec- tion it carried by a large majority. Kearney continued his sand lot harangues. In the sum- mer of 1879 he made a trip through the south- ern counties of the state, delivering his diatribes against the railroad magnates, the land mo- nopolists and the Chinese. At the town of Santa Ana, now the county seat of Orange county, in his harangue he made a vituperative attack upon the McFadden Brothers, who a year or two before had built a steamer and run it in op- position to the regular coast line steamers until forced to sell it on account of losses incurred by the competition. Kearney made a number of false and libelous statements in regard to the transaction. While he was waiting for the stage to San Diego in front of the hotel he was con-

fronted by Rule, an employee of the McFad- den's, with an imperious demand for the name of Kearney's informant. Kearney turned white with fear and blubbered out something about not giving away his friends. Rule struck him a blow that sent him reeling against the build- ing. Gathering himself together he made a rush into the hotel, drawing a pistol as he ran. Rule pursued him through the dining room and out across a vacant lot and into a drug store, where he downed him and, holding him down with his knee on his breast, demanded the name of his informer. One of the slandered men pulled Rule off the "martyr" and Kearney, with a face resembling a beefsteak, took his departure to San Diego. From that day on he ceased his vituperative attacks on individuals. He had met the only argument that could convince him of the error of his ways. He lost caste with his fellows. This braggadocio, who had boasted of leading armies to conquer the enemies of the Workingmen, with a pistol in his hand had ignominiously fled from an unarmed man and had taken a humiliating punishment without a show of resistance. His following began to de- sert him and Kearney went if the Chinese did not. The Workingmen's party put up a state ticket in 1879, but it was beaten at the polls and went to pieces. In 1880 James Angell of Mich- igan, John F. Swift of California, and William H. Trescott of South Carolina were appointed commissioners to proceed to China for the pur- pose of forming new treaties. An agreement was reached with the Chinese authorities by which laborers could be debarred for a certain period from entering the United States. Those in the country were all allowed the rights that aliens of other countries had. The senate ratified the treaty May 5th, 1881.

The following is a list of the governors of Cal- ifornia, Spanish, Mexican and American, with date of appointment or election: Spanish : Gaspar de Portolá, 1767; Felipe Barri, 1771; Felipe de Neve, 1774: Pedro Fages, 1790; José Antonio Romeu, 1790; José Joaquin de Ar- rillaga, 1792; Diego de Borica, 1794: José Joa- quin de Arrillaga, 1800; José Arguello, 1814: Pablo Vicente de Sola, 1815. Mexican gov- ernors : Pablo Vicente de Sola, 1822: Luis

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HISTORICAL AND BIOGRAPHICAL RECORD.

Arguello, 1823: José Maria Echeandia, 1825; Manuel Victoria, 1831; Pio Pico, 1832; José Maria Echeandia, Agustin Zamorano, 1832; José Figueroa, 1833; José Castro, 1835; Nicolas Gutierrez, 1836; Mariano Chico, 1836; Nicolas Gutierrez, 1836; Juan B. Alvarado, 1836; Man- uel Micheltorena, 1842; Pio Pico, 1845. Amer- ican military governors: Commodore Robert F. Stockton, 1846; Col. John C. Fremont, Jan- uary, 1847; Gen. Stephen W. Kearny, March 1, 1847; Col. Richard B. Mason, May 31, 1847 : Gen. Bennet Riley, April 13, 1849. American governors elected: Peter H. Burnett, 1849. John McDougal, Lieutenant-governor, became governor on resignation of P. H. Burnett in January, 1851; John Bigler, 1851; John Bigler,

1853; J. Neely Johnson, 1855; John B. Weller, 1857; M. S. Latham, 1859; John G. Downey. lieutenant-governor, became governor in 1859 by election of Latham to United States senate; Leland Stanford, 1861; Frederick F. Low, 1863; Henry H. Haight, 1867: Newton Booth, 1871; Romualdo Pacheco, lieutenant governor, be- came governor February, 1875, on election of Booth to the United States senate; William Ir- win, 1875: George C. Perkins, 1879; George Stoneman, 1882; Washington Bartlett, 1836; Robert W. Waterman, lieutenant-governor, be- came governor September 12, 1887, upon the death of Governor Bartlett: H. H. Markham, 1800; James H. Budd, 1894; Henry T. Gage, 1898: George C. Pardee, 1902: James H. Gillett, 1906.

CHAPTER XXXV. EDUCATION AND EDUCATIONAL INSTITUTIONS.

T HE Franciscans, unlike the Jesuits, were not the patrons of education. They bent all their energies towards pros- elyting: Their object was to fit their converts for the next world. An ignorant soul might be as happy in paradise as the most learned. Why educate the neophyte? He was converted, and then instructed in the work assigned him at the mission. There were no public schools at the missions. A few of the brightest of the neophytes, who were trained to sing in the church choirs, were taught to read, but the great mass of them, even those of the third gen- eration, born and reared at the missions, were as ignorant of book learning as were their great- grandfathers, who ran naked among the oak trees of the mesas and fed on acorns.

Nor was there much attention paid to edu- cation among the gente de razon of the pre- sidios and pueblos. But few of the common people could read and write. Their ancestors had made their way in the world without book learning. Why should the child know more than the parent? And trained to have great filial regard for his parent, it was not often that the progeny aspired to rise higher in the scale

of intelligence than his progenitor. Of the eleven heads of families who founded Los An- geles, not one could sign his name to the title deed of his house lot. Nor were these an ex- ceptionally ignorant collection of hombres. Out of fifty men comprising the Monterey company in 1785, but fourteen could write. In the com- pany stationed at San Francisco in 1794 not a soldier among them could read or write; and forty years later of one hundred men at Sonoma not one could write his name.

The first community want the American pio- neers supplied was the school house. Wher- ever the immigrants from the New England and the middle states planted a settlement, there, at the same time, they planted a school house. The first community want that the Spanish pabladores (colonists) supplied was a church. The school house was not wanted or if wanted it was a long felt want that was rarely or never satisfied. At the time of the acquisition of Cal- ifornia by the Americans, seventy-seven years from the date of its first settlement, there was not a public school house owned by any pre- sidio, pueblo or city in all its territory.

The first public school in California was

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HISTORICAL AND BIOGRAPHICAL RECORD.

opened in San José in December, 1794, seven- teen years after the founding of that pueblo. The pioneer teacher of California was Manuel de Vargas, a retired sergeant of infantry. The school was opened in the public granary. Vargas, in 1795, was offered $250 to open a school in San Diego. As this was higher wages than he was receiving he accepted the offer. José Manuel Toca, a gamute or ship boy, ar- rived on a Spanish transport in 1795 and the same year was employed at Santa Barbara as schoolmaster at a yearly salary of $125. Thuis the army and the navy pioneered education in California.

Governor Borica, the founder of public schools in California, resigned in 1800 and was succeeded by Arrillaga. Governor Arrillaga, if not opposed to, was at least indifferent to the education of the common people. He took life easy and the schools took long vacations; in- deed, it was nearly all vacation during his term. Governor Sola, the successor of Arrillaga, made an effort to establish public schools, but the in- difference of the people discouraged him. In the lower pueblo. Los Angeles, the first school was opened in 1817, thirty-six years after the founding of the town. The first teacher there was Maximo Piña, an invalid soldier. He re- ceived $140 a year for his services as school- master. If the records are correct, his was the only school taught in Los Angeles during the Spanish régime. One year of schooling to forty years of vacation, there was no educational cramming in those days. The schoolmasters of the Spanish era were invalid soldiers, possessed of that dangerous thing, a "little learning :" and it was very little indeed. About all they could teach was reading, writing and the doctrina Christiana. They were brutal tyrants and their school government a military despotism. They did not spare the rod or the child, either. The rod was too mild an instrument of punishment. Their implement of torture was a cat-o'-nine- tails, made of hempen cords with iron points. To fail in learning the doctrina Christiana was an unpardonable sin. For this, for laughing aloud, playing truant or other offenses no more heinous, the guilty boy "was stretched face downward upon a bench with a handkerchief

thrust into his mouth as a gag and lashed with a dozen or more blows until the blood ran down his little lacerated back." If he could not im- bibe the Christian doctrine in any other way, it was injected into him with the points of the lash.

Mexico did better for education in California than Spain. The school terms were lengthened and the vacation shortened proportionally. Gov- crnor Echeandia, a man hated by the friars, was an enthusiastic friend of education. "He be- lieved in the gratuitous and compulsory educa- tion of rich and poor, Indians and gente de rason alike." He held that learning was the corner-stone of a people's wealth and it was the duty of the government to foster education. When the friars heard of his views "they called upon God to pardon the unfortunate ruler un- able to comprehend how vastly superior a re- ligious education was to one merely secular .* Echeandia made a brave attempt to establish a public school system in the territory. He de- manded of the friars that they establish a school at each mission for the neophytes; they prom- ised, but, with the intention of evading, a show was made of opening schools. Soon it was re- ported that the funds were exhausted and the schools had to close for want of means to sup- port them. Nor was Echeandia more successful with the people. He issued an order to the commanding officers at the presidios to compel parents to send their children to school. The school at Monterey was opened, the alcalde act- ing as schoolmaster. The school furniture con- sisted of one table and the school books were one arithmetic and four primers. The school funds were as meager as the school furniture. Echeandia, unable to contend against the enmity of the friars, the indifference of the parents and the lack of funds, reluctantly abandoned his futile fight against ignorance.

One of the most active and earnest friends of the public schools during the Mexican era was the much abused Governor Micheltorena. He made an earnest effort to establish a public school system in California. Through his efforts schools were established in all the principal

*Bancroft's California Pastoral.

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HISTORICAL AND BIOGRAPHICAL RECORD.

towns and a guarantee of $500 from the ter- ritorial funds promised to each school. Michel- torena promulgated what might be called the first school law of California. It was a decree issued May 1, 1844, and consisted of ten articles, which prescribed what should be taught in the schools, school hours, school age of the pupils and other regulations. Article 10 named the most holy virgin of Guadalupe as patroness of the schools. Her image was to be placed in each school. But, like all his predecessors, Micheltorena failed: the funds were soon ex- hausted and the schools closed.

Even had the people been able to read there would have been nothing for them to read but religious books. The friars kept vigilant watch that no interdicted books were brought into the country. If any were found they were seized and publicly burned. Castro, Alvarado and Val- lejo were at one time excommunicated for read- ing Rousseau's works, Telemachus and other books on the prohibited list. Alvarado having declined to pay Father Duran some money he owed him because it was a sin to have anything to do with an excommunicated person, and therefore it would be a sin for the father to take money from him, the padre annulled the sen- tence, received the money and gave Alvarado permission to read anything he wished.

During the war for the conquest of California and for some time afterwards the schools were all closed. The wild rush to the gold mines in 1848 carried away the male population. No one would stay at home and teach school for the paltry pay given a schoolmaster. The ayunta- miento of Los Angeles in the winter of 1849-50 appointed a committee to establish a school. After a three months' hunt the committee re- ported "that an individual had just presented himself who, although he did not speak English, yet could he teach the children many useful things; and besides the same person had man- aged to get the refusal of Mrs. Pollerena's house for school purpose." At the next meeting of the ayuntamiento the committee reported that the individual who had offered to teach had left for the mines and neither a school house nor a schoolmaster could be found.

In June, 1850, the ayuntamiento entered into

a contract with Francisco Bustamente, an ex- soldier, "to teach to the children first, second and third lessons and likewise to read script, to write and count and so much as I may be com- petent to teach them orthography and good morals." Bustamente was to receive $60 per month and $20 for house rent. This was the first school opened in Los Angeles after the conquest.

"The first American school in San Francisco and, we believe, in California, was a merely pri- vate enterprise. It was opened by a Mr. Mars- ton from one of the Atlantic states in April, 1847, in a small shanty which stood on the block between Broadway and Pacific streets, west of Dupont street. There he collected some twenty or thirty pupils, whom he continued to teach for almost a whole year, his patrons paying for tui- tion."*

In the fall of 1847 a school house was built on the southwest corner of Portsmouth square, fronting on Clay street. The money to build it was raised by subscription. It was a very mod- est structure-box shaped with a door and two windows in the front and two windows in each end. It served a variety of purposes besides that of a school house. It was a public hall for all kinds of meetings. Churches held service in it. The first public amusements were given in it. At one time it was used for a court room. The first meeting to form a state government was held in it. It was finally degraded to a police office and a station house. For some time after it was built no school was kept in it for want of funds.

On the 21st of February, 1848, a town meet- ing was called for the election of a board of school trustees and Dr. F. Fourguard, Dr. J. Townsend, C. L. Ross, J. Serrini and William H. Davis were chosen. On the 3d of April fol- lowing these trustees opened a school in the school house under the charge of Thomas Douglas, A. M., a graduate of Yale College and an experienced teacher of high reputation. The board pledged him a salary of $1,000 per an- num and fixed a tariff of tuition to aid towards its payment; and the town council, afterwards,

*Annals of San Francisco.

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HISTORICAL AND BIOGRAPHICAL RECORD.

to make up any deficiency, appropriated to the payment of the teacher of the public school in this place $200 at the expiration of twelve months from the commencement of the school. "Soon after this Mr. Marston discontinued his private school and Mr. Douglas collected some forty pupils."*

The school flourished for eight or ten weeks. Gold had been discovered and rumors were coming thick and fast of fortunes made in a day. A thousand dollars a year looked large to Mr. Douglas when the contract was made, but in the light of recent events it looked rather small. A man in the diggings might dig out $1,000 in a week. So the schoolmaster laid down the pedagogical birch. shouldered his pick and hied himself away to the diggings. In the rush for gold, education was forgotten. December 12, 1848, Charles W. II. Christian reopened the school, charging tuition at the rate of $10. Evi- dently he did not teach longer than it took him to earn money to reach the mines. April 23, 1849, the Rev. Albert Williams, pastor of the First Presbyterian church, obtained the use of the school house and opened a private school, charging tuition. He gave up school teaching to attend to his ministerial duties. In the fall of '49 John C. Pelton, a Massachusetts school- master, arrived in San Francisco and December 26 opened a school with three pupils in the Bap- tist church on Washington street. He fitted up the church with writing tables and benches at his own expense, depending on voluntary con- tributions for his support. In the spring of 1850 he applied to the city council for relief and for his services and that of his wife he received $500 a month till the summer of 1851, when he closed his school.

Col. T. J. Nevins, in June, 1850, obtained rent free the use of a building near the present inter- section of Mission and Second streets for school purposes. He employed a Mr. Samuel New- ton as teacher. The school was opened July 13. The school passed under the supervision of several teachers. The attendance was small at first and the school was supported by con- tributions, but later the council voted an ap-

propriation. The school was closed in 1851. Colonel Nevins, in January, 1851, secured a fifty-vara lot at Spring Valley on the Presidio road and built principally by subscription a large school building, employed a teacher and opened a free school, supported by contributions. The building was afterwards leased to the city to be used for a free school, the term of the lease running ninety-nine years. This was the first school building in which the city had an ownership. Colonel Nevins prepared an ordi- nance for the establishment, regulation and support of free common schools in the city. The ordinance was adopted by the city council September 25, 1851, and was the first ordinance establishing free schools and providing for their maintenance in San Francisco.

A bill to provide for a public school system was introduced in the legislature of 1850, but the committee on education reported that it would be two or three years before any means would become available from the liberal pro- visions of the constitution; in the meantime the persons who had children to educate could do it out of their own pockets. So all action was postponed and the people who had children paid for their tuition or let them run without schooling.

The first school law was passed in 1851. It was drafted mainly by G. B. Lingley, John C. Pelton and the superintendent of public instruc- tion, J. G. Marvin. It was revised and amended by the legislatures of 1852 and 1853. The state school fund then was derived from the sale and rental of five hundred thousand acres of state land; the estates of deceased persons escheated to the state; state poll tax and a state tax of five cents on each $100 of assessed property. Congress in 1853 granted to California the 16th and 36th sections of the public lands for school purposes. The total amount of this grant was six million seven hundred and sixty-five thou- sand five hundred and four acres, of which forty-six thousand and eighty aeres were to be deducted for the founding of a state university or college and six thousand four hundred acres for public buildings.

The first apportionment of state funds was made in 1854. The amount of state funds for

* Annals of San Francisco.

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HISTORICAL AND BIOGRAPHICAL RECORD.

that year was $52,961. The county and mu- nicipal school taxes amounted to $157,702. These amounts were supplemented by rate bills to the amount of $42,557. In 1856 the state fund had increased to $69,961, while rate bills had decreased to $28,619. That year there were thirty thousand and thirty-nine children of school age in the state, of these only about fifteen thousand were enrolled in the schools.

In the earlier years, following the American conquest, the schools were confined almost en- tirely to the cities. The population in the coun- try districts was too sparse to maintain a school. The first school house in Sacramento was built in 1849. It was located on I street. C. H. T. Palmer opened school in it in August. It was supported by rate bills and donations. He gath- cred together about a dozen pupils. The school was soon discontinued. Several other parties in succession tried school keeping in Sacra- mento, but did not make a success of it. It was not until 1851 that a permanent school was es- tablished. A public school was taught in Mon- terey in 1849 by Rev. Willey. The school was kept in Colton Hall. The first public school house in Los Angeles was built in 1854. Hugh Overns taught the first free school there in 1850.

The amount paid for teachers' salaries in 1854 was $85,860; in 1906 it reached $5,666,045. The total expenditures in 1854 for school purposes amounted to $275,606; in 1906 to $8.727,008. The first high school in the state was established. in San Francisco in 1856. In 1906 there were one hundred and ninety high schools, with an attendance of eighteen thousand eight hundred and seventy-nine students. Four millions of dol- lars were invested in high school buildings, fur- niture and grounds, and one thousand teachers were employed in these schools.

THE UNIVERSITY OF THE PACIFIC.

This institution was chartered in August, 1851, as the California Wesleyan College, which name was afterwards changed by act of the leg- islature to that it now bears. The charter was obtained under the general law of the state as it then was, and on the basis of a subscription of $27,500 and a donation of some ten acres of land adjacent to the village of Santa Clara. A

school building was erected in which the pre- paratory department was opened in May, 1852, under the charge of Rev. E. Banister as prin- cipal, aided by two assistant teachers, and be- fore the end of the first session had over sixty pupils. Near the close of the following year another edifice was so far completed that the male pupils were transferred to it, and the Fe- male Collegiate Institute, with its special course of study, was organized and continued in the original building. In 1854 the classes of the college proper were formed and the requisite arrangement with respect to president, faculty, and course of study made. In 1858 two young men, constituting the first class, received the de- gree of A. B., they being the first to receive that honor from any college in California. In 1865 the board of trustees purchased the Stock- ton rancho, a large body of land adjoining the town of Santa Clara. This was subdivided into lots and small tracts and sold at a profit. By this means an endowment was secured and an excellent site for new college building obtained.

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A history of California and an extended history of its southern coast counties, also containing biographies of well-known citizens of the past and present, Volume I, Part 39

Author: Guinn, James Miller, 1834-1918 Publication date: 1907 Publisher: Los Angeles, Cal., Historic record company Number of Pages: 1184

Author: Guinn, James Miller, 1834-1918
Publication date: 1907
Publisher: Los Angeles, Cal., Historic record company
Number of Pages: 1184