USA > Connecticut > New London County > Old Lyme > The educational history of Old Lyme, Connecticut, 1635-1935 > Part 13
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Thus it is seen that "the practice of the early settlers con- tinued for nearly a century and a half (1650-1800). All classes received their education together and the teacher of the common school held a recognized place in the community. Then, by degrees, the supervision of the common school was transferred from the town, where the public interests were
32. Ibid., p. 43.
136 Educational History of Old Lyme.
looked after, to an independent corporation thinly attended." This transferring led eventually to the "desertion of the school meeting." The support of the schools was, at the same time, thrown mainly on the income from public funds and this in turn was followed by a declining interest in the affairs of the several school districts in Lyme.
By 1826 the general conditions of schools in the state had become so grave that a committee was appointed by the legis- lature "to inquire whether any, and if any, what alterations in the laws relating to common schools are necessary to raise their character and increase their influence." This committee found a great need for the improvement of books and the qualifications of teachers, and for the inspection of all state schools. They believed that the project of a seminary for the training of teachers was still impracticable in Connecticut but advised the appointment of a superintendent of schools who would prepare a report for the legislature compiled from the individual reports of the school societies.
What effect this new program of school administration had upon the schools of Lyme is unknown. Some fragmentary data of a local nature are to be found in the early state re- ports and some material is available from the school society in the third society but absolutely no records remain of the school society which functioned in the area of the first society of Lyme between 1798 and 1856. No single reference to schools appears in the ecclesiastical records for this period and the only statement in the town meeting records of 1801-1855 is the report of a special meeting held on January 16, 1837, at Grassy Hill to consider the acceptance of the town deposit fund. At that meeting Henry M. Waite was appointed mod- erator and Lodowick Bill was chosen clerk pro tem.
This town deposit fund was a portion of the $764,670.60 paid to Connecticut by the Federal Government in 1836 as her share of the Surplus Revenue Grant. This amount was in turn divided among the several towns of the state in proportion to their respective populations. By a vote at a special session in December of that year, the legislature ordered that this money
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be deposited with the towns.33 The meeting at Grassy Hill, on January 16 following, was therefore the town's reply to this order.
Since that time much of the money so deposited through- out the state has been lost to school purposes and the town deposit fund has been the occasion of numerous state inquiries. For that reason this original report on the town deposit fund of Lyme is presented here in full. This report includes the amounts of money received and the regulations adopted for its care and use.
Resolved that this Town will receive its proportion of the money which is or may be deposited with this State by the United States in pursuance of the act of Congress entitled an act to regulate the de- posits of the public money . .. and that the Town will in all re- spects comply with the stipulation contained in said act.
Resolved that John L. Smith be and he is hereby appointed the agent of this town to receive from the Treasurer of this State the proportion of the money belonging to the town.
Resolved that the Town Deposite fund belonging to this town shall be managed by three agents who shall receive no compensation for their services.
Resolved that the Treasurer of said fund shall give a bond to the Town with one or more sureties . , and shall receive seventy dollars as a compensation for his services.
Resolved that no loan shall be made to any one individual of any sum or sums greater than five hundred dollars nor less than one hun- dred dollars . . . nor upon any real estate previously encumbered.
Resolved that when the Real Estate mortgaged by any debtor to said fund shall not exclusive of the buildings thereon be equal in value to twice the amount of his debt he shall cause the buildings or so much of them as may be necessary to be kept insured at his expense and the policy of insurance to be executed or assigned to the Town as col- lateral security for his debt.
Resolved that every debtor to said fund shall pay annually not less than twenty per cent of the principal sum loaned to him . . . or in case he shall neglect to pay the interest whenever the same shall be- come due it shall be the duty of the Treasurer to cause the whole debt due from such debtor to be forthwith collected.
33. Bourne, The History of the Surplus Revenue of 1837, PP. 50-52.
138 Educational History of Old Lyme.
Resolved that the agents and Treasurer appointed at this meeting shall continue in office until the Annual Town Meeting for the choice of officers A. D. 1838.
Resolved that Henry M. Waite, Peter Comstock and Reuben Lord Esquires be the agents and John L. Smith Esq. the Treasurer of said fund.
LODOWICK BILL, Clerk Protem JOSHUA R. WARREN, Town Clerk. 34
Of the $764,670.60 received by Connecticut, the following amounts were assigned to the town of Lyme according to the census of 1830:
By first installment, February 15, A. D. 1837 $3,502.76
By second
April 17, A. D. 1837 3,504.12
By third
July 12, A. D. 1837 3,502.76
TOTAL $10,509.64
In the years immediately following, the town voted on several occasions "to appropriate one half of the interest aris- ing from the Town Deposite Fund for the support of educa- tion in the common schools in said Town of Lyme." What disposition was made of the remaining half is not recorded. After 1855 the entire income went to education.
When East Lyme withdrew in 1839 and Old Lyme with- drew in 1855 they were assigned their portions of the fund on the same basis as that determined by the original assign- ment to Lyme. Annual reports of the deposit fund continued for a long period of years but finally, in the town of Old Lyme, following the Civil War, the principal was borrowed by the town and soon lost its identity in the annual financial reports.
The only other record for this period was a deed found in Volume 24 of the Lyme Records, 1808-1811. This deed is believed to have covered the transfer of land purchased on Lyme Street for the building of a schoolhouse at the corner
34. Lyme Records, Town Meeting Book, 1801-1855, January 16, 1837.
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of Library Lane, probably the schoolhouse bought later by Mr. Thomas Ball and remodelled as a dwelling.35
The number of school buildings in the first society for this period is indicated in the list of exemptions in the tax asses- sor's books. In 1825 there were six schoolhouses valued at $ 1,000 and in 1835 eight schoolhouses valued at $ 1, 100. The total tax exemption in each case was $30. These same eight schoolhouses were maintained in the eight districts of the first society until 1894 when the first local school consolidation was instituted. The tax list of the first society for 1840 also included in its summaries 182 dwellings, 837 cattle, III horses, 1,395 sheep and a grand list of $ 13,257.08, while that of 1850, somewhat more elaborate in detail, gave summaries showing 171 dwelling houses, 10,220 acres of land, 9 stores and wharves, 2 shops, 2 factories, 2 corn mills, I sawmill, 1,019 cattle, 1,428 sheep, 304 swine, 92 wagons and carriages and a grand list of $15,371.97.36 The nature of the com- munity life is thus indicated.
The latter part of this transition era, from 1838 to 1856, was marked by phenomenal changes in the public-school system of the state. These changes led to drastic reforms com- prising every unit of the educational structure. They were determined by a combination of vital and far-reaching influ- ences. The rapid growth of industrialism reduced provincial- ism, increased wealth, concentrated the people and tended to identify Connecticut with national movements. One of these movements was the international educational awakening which resulted from the teachings and experiments of Rousseau,
35. Ibid., March 27, 1810:
First School District deed from Joseph Noyes
Know all men by these presents that I, Joseph Noyes, of Lyme in the County of New London for the consideration of thirty dollars rec'd to my full satisfaction of Syl- vester Mather and Richard McCurdy and the rest of the inhabitants of the first School Society in said Lyme have and do by these presents lease and let the sd Mather the rest of the inhabitants of sd district for the purpose of erecting and repairing a school house thereon.
March 27, 1810.
JOSEPH NOYES.
36. Lyme Records, Assessment of the Property of the First Society Lists, 1840. Ibid., 1850.
140 Educational History of Old Lyme.
Pestalozzi and Lancaster. A third influence of immeasurable significance was the timely presence of a great educational leader who could use these circumstances to fire the public mind.
It was during the year 1837, slightly more than a century ago, that Henry Barnard took his seat in the state legislature of Connecticut and started his great drive for the improve- ment of public education. He first revealed the needs and then projected his program. At the age of twenty-six he brought to the legislature the combined advantages of youth, education, travel and private wealth. He had lived through an era of educational depression and then and there dedicated his life and fortune to its elimination.
Through his efforts, a law was passed creating a board of commissioners of common schools consisting of the governor, the commissioner of the school fund and eight members, one from each county in the state. The chairman of this board was the state superintendent of public schools and Henry Barnard was elected to fill the position at a salary not to exceed three dollars per day. His survey of schools in the state followed immediately and the report published in the Connecticut Common School Journal had far-reaching effects. The ques- tionnaire which he used as the basis of his study was in the nature of a circular letter and was followed by visits, conven- tions and associations throughout the state.
Some of the findings and conclusions are here briefly sum- marized:
I. Great variety of text-books
2. Parents exhibit generally no interest
3. School committees in no instance paid
4. School visitors paid in but twelve towns
5. Average wages exclusive of board in public school per month male $14.50. In public school per month female $5.75 In private schools per month male $30.00 In private schools per month female $10.00
6. Average tuition in public schools per year $ 11.00
7. 6000 between 4-16 years of age in no school.
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He also stressed the great need of more competent teachers provided through a teacher-training school; higher wages; some classification of students; a longer school term; more standard texts; and a revision of the school law.
In discussing the details of public education he considered fifteen items and these fifteen items became in turn the major objectives of his administrative plan. Each at some time has held the front stage in the state's program of educational re- form.
I. School societies he considered a manifest disadvantage. Town and schools were artificially separated.
2. School districts were too small to maintain a good school. Generally insignificant.
3. Enumeration.
4. Attendance.
5. Non-attendance. Very high rate of illiteracy.
6. Length of winter schools. Average in 1838 was seventeen weeks. Summer school brought total to eight months.
7. Teachers in 1292 districts were male 996, female 296. Few teachers served two years in same position.
8. Branches taught: winter schools-all had spelling, arithmetic, reading and writing. Some schools had geography, history and grammar. A few larger districts taught philosophy, science, mathematics and Latin.
9. School books presented nine serious evils.
10. School registers were in very general use and were indispensa- ble in distributing the school fund according to attendance.
II. Rules and regulations for school societies.
12. School houses.
13. School libraries.
14. Common schools of higher order.
15. Private schools registered 10,000 children from the richer class. 37
The Connecticut Common School Journal, published first in 1841, became the organ of the commissioners of common schools and presented both local and foreign educational in- formation. Barnard's revised school law was also accepted that year but was abolished with the board, in 1842, as a result of
37. Connecticut Common School Journal, May 7, 1839.
142 Educational History of Old Lyme.
political change. A new superintendent was appointed in 1844 and made his first report in 1846.
Between the years 1842 and 1849 Henry Barnard was ac- tive in organizing the educational affairs of Rhode Island. He was recalled in 1849 to direct the newly established normal school at New Britain. He was also ex officio state superin- tendent of schools. Through these two offices he again led a concentrated drive in the interest of improved educational facilities in Connecticut. Few changes had been made thus far in the conditions as he had found them in 1839. The school societies, through the school committees, school visitors and district committeemen, still had full control of schools. There was no law specifying the character of education and none to enforce the keeping of the schools for any prescribed period. The average length of the winter term was eighteen weeks. Of the entire number of teachers employed in winter schools approximately three-fourths were men. In the summer schools approximately the reverse was true. There was no prescribed course of study but reports to the questionnaire showed spell- ing, reading, arithmetic and writing to have been generally taught, with geography, history and grammar included in scattered situations. In teaching these subjects, over two hun- dred different textbooks were found to be in use. Only six schools in the state had school libraries.
The figures compiled in 1840 on districts and numbers of children were still approximately unchanged. These showed the following rather startling circumstances:
Districts and Number of Children in 1840
3 districts with over 500 persons enumerated
81
100
262
70
598
50
1034
less than
50
777
"
40
454
30
177
"
20
60
IO
8
5
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These facts were further supported by the summaries of replies received from a circular letter sent in 1846 to the school visitors of each of the 215 school societies in the state. There were 175 replies to use in compiling these summaries. Through them it was found that:
Less than one-half of the total children from 4-16 years of age were in school winter or spring.
The average school term was four and one-half months in winter and four and two-thirds months in summer.
The total number of teachers in 1351 districts in winter was 1413. Male 1075, female 338.
The total number of teachers in 1351 districts in summer was 1300. Male 123, female 1177.
The average monthly wage in winter exclusive of board was, male $15.42; female $6.86.
Of the 1085 teachers, 911 "boarded round" and 174 boarded them- selves, 38
In 15 1 school societies 215 different texts were used. These conditions were evidently very typical of conditions in the town of Lyme at that time.
Interesting also is a model daily schedule for an ungraded school lifted from the Report of the Superintendent of Com- mon Schools in Connecticut in 18 48. It indicates the objectives set up for the curriculum and time schedule in an approved ungraded school at that time.
9-9:20 Whole school reading Testament and singing prayer.
9:20-9:50
Reading for first class-every day.
9:50-10:30 Reading for other classes.
10:30-10:40
Recess.
10:40-11:00 Lessons or exercises for smaller scholars.
11:00-11:30 Noon
Outline maps and geography.
1:00-1:30 Reading and spelling of small classes.
1: 30-2:00 Mental arithmetic.
2:00-2:30 Second class in written arithmetic.
2:30-2:40 Recess.
2:40-3:00 First class in arithmetic.
38. Report of the Superintendent of Schools of Connecticut, 1846.
I44 Educational History of Old Lyme.
3:00-3:20 History.
3:20-3:40 Philosophy.
3:40-4:00 General spelling exercise.
Singing.
Dr. Barnard's report of 1851 was written in support of another of his major objectives. It was devoted to a study of normal schools in the United States and Europe. The report of 1852 then followed with a discussion of teachers' insti- tutes, educational lectures, teachers' meetings, parents' meet- ings and the need of some classification of pupils. In 1851, twelve thousand children in the state were shown to be at- tending no school. The Connecticut Common School Journal, which had been discontinued in 1842, was resumed and was used as a means of converting the public mind to a new edu- cational responsibility. Violent attacks were projected against nonattendance, the district system and school support through a tax on parents.
Following this Dr. Barnard took the opportunity in 1853, when giving his annual report to the general assembly, to restate the educational standards of the founders of the com- monwealth. He said in part:
The outline and most of the features of our present system of com- mon or public schools will be found in the practice of the first settlers of the several towns which composed the original colonies of Con- necticut and New Haven before any express provision was made by general law for the regulation and support of schools, or for the bringing up of children. . . . They (the founders) did not come as isolated individuals drawn together from widely separated homes, en- tertaining broad differences of opinion on all matters of civil and re- ligious concernment and kept together by the necessity of self-defense in the eager prosecution of some temporary but profitable adventure. They came after God had set them up in families and they brought with them the best pledges of good behavior. . .. They came with the foregone conclusion of permanence and with all the elements of the social state, combined in vigorous activity every man expecting to find or make occupation in the way in which he had been trained. They came with earnest religious convictions. The fundamental
39. Report of the Superintendent of Schools of Connecticut, 1851 and 1852.
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articles of their religious creed . . . made schools necessary to bring all persons to a knowledge of the scriptures. . . . The constitution of civil government . . . made universal education identical with self preservation. But aside from these considerations the natural and ac- knowledged leaders in this enterprise . . . were educated men-as highly and thoroughly educated as the best endowed grammar schools in England could educate them at that period and not a few had been to the great universities.
This address, eulogizing the higher educational standards of the past, no doubt stood out in bold relief against the con- ditions with which these legislators were forced to deal. It was probably cold comfort for their pride. The results were phenomenal.
The following year, 1854, the legislature passed an act aimed to spread the burden of education more generally over the population. It imposed upon each town a tax of one cent on every dollar of the grand list for the support of schools. This was a part of a general budget for education in which every child was to be allowed fifty cents from the town, one dollar and twenty-five cents from the school fund and twenty- five cents from the deposit fund.
In 1856 the greatest achievement was realized when the school societies, so thoroughly unsatisfactory during the long period since 1795, were abolished by legislative act. The schools were returned to the towns under the supervision of a paid board of school visitors, which had all the functions of both the visitors and the committees of the former school societies. Their chief authority was the distribution of the state appropriation. Unfortunately the school districts were retained and the district committees still exercised direct con- trol over their respective schools. The school term was fixed at a minimum of six months.
So it happened that in seven years of concentrated work Henry Barnard achieved a number of the major objectives in his drive toward a free public-school system with adequately trained teachers. A dark period in the development of public education in Connecticut was ended and the groundwork was firmly laid for future building.
146 Educational History of Old Lyme.
The part which Lyme played in this drama is all but hid- den from us. We are forced to rest content with an under- standing of the general conditions within the state and the few casual reports of the school visitors of Lyme which ap- pear in the reports of the state superintendent of schools, to- gether with data taken from early school registers, privately collected.
The Report of the Board of Commissioners of Common Schools of 1846 includes the only statistical summary which is available for the schools in the first society of Lyme be- tween 1839 and 1855. These facts are pertinent.
Number of school districts
8
Division from School Fund
$534.80
Children 4-16 years in winter 273
Children 4-16 years in summer 204
Children 4-16 years in private school 60
Average length of school, winter 41/2 months
Average length of school, summer 41/2 months
Number of teachers employed 8
Number employed, male in winter
Number employed, female in winter
Number employed, male in summer
Number employed, female in summer 7
Average wages per month, male
$15.50
Average wages per month, female $ 5.00
They indicate that the eight schools which were established in 1766 were in operation, with one exception, for nine months during 1846 and that each school had its own full-time teacher. All the summer teachers were women and probably all the winter teachers were men, but this item is not recorded. The difference in the salary rates for men and women teachers is quite startling, but this difference tended to disappear as a training course for teachers was established. The number of children in private schools is also considerable.
The report of the school visitor of Lyme further states that the visitor prescribed the books that were to be used in the schools. This he did quite evidently in response to one of the
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requests of Dr. Barnard. He reported the presence in the schools of convenient blackboards but no globes. The school society had appointed a single individual as examiner of the teachers and visitors of schools, but parents were reported as never visiting schools and district committees seldom.4ยบ The books used were "Webster's Speller, Smith's Grammar, Smith's Geography, Daboll's Arithmetic, Parley's History, and for reading, the Village Reader, Hall's Primary Reader and the Testament."
The districts in Lyme during this period held their meet- ings once each year between late October and early Decem- ber. The early part of November was most common. At this meeting they elected a moderator, a school committeeman and a secretary-treasurer to serve for one year. In 1830 they voted a school session of three months. Similarly on May 2, 1845, at a meeting of the second district of the first society in Lyme, N. E. Conkling was elected moderator and I. Pilgrim clerk pro tempore. The committee was instructed to hire a teacher for four months and pay her out of the public money, as far as it would go, and then to collect the rest on the head of each child that attended the school.41
The only other available data on the first society of Lyme for this period are brief items from school registers of the second district for the years 1854 and 1856. In 1854 Annie M. Beckwith was the teacher and twenty-five children were registered as being in attendance, while in 1856 the school term ran from November 1, 1856, to February 27, 1857, and of the thirty-one children enrolled only twenty were in gen- eral attendance. The summer school, which was really a tui- tion school for sixteen "scholars," was kept for two months between May 12 and July 12.
The only other available pertinent material on schools in Lyme is to be found in the registers of the second school society. There, in the first district during 1851 and 1852, a four months' school was conducted. Thirty-six boys and twenty-eight girls were enrolled and the average daily at-
40. Report of the Superintendent of Schools of Connecticut, 1846.
41. Private Records, Mrs. William Coult, Old Lyme, Connecticut.
148 Educational History of Old Lyme.
tendance was twenty-seven. N. S. Parker was the visitor for the society committee, while E. E. Brockway and J. W. Bill were the district committee. Both committees visited the school jointly twice during the year. The abstract of that school register also showed that the average number of days attended by each pupil was fifty-nine. There were two pupils under four years of age and two over sixteen. The summer term in the same district for 1852 began on May 3 and ended on Sep- tember 12, with an enrollment of twenty boys and twenty- eight girls.
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