USA > Connecticut > New London County > Old Lyme > The educational history of Old Lyme, Connecticut, 1635-1935 > Part 5
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The Beginnings of Public Schooling. 43
River) provided that he agree to move at all speed from Brookhaven to Lyme, to inhabit the mill and to grind all corn into good meal. Neglect of duty carried with it the forfeiture of the property and payment of twenty dollars to the parties aggrieved.36 In the same manner Christopher Swane was granted land in 1690, "always provided that he doth keep a Smith Shope and do the town Smithers worke," and to Arter Shosele land "to continue in the towne and doe the tailers work." Both of these contracts were limited to four years. Other contracts were drawn to make provision for sawmills, gristmills and smith shops in the outlying sections of the town. In every instance the town secured its needed service through land grants modified by particular specifications.
With the turn of the century the work of the sawmills had become a part of a considerable exporting trade in lumber, as is demonstrated by permits granted in 1708 and 1709 when the town gave liberty to Captain John Clarke of Saybrook to transport thirteen thousand hogshead staves; to Captain Wil-
36. A contract interesting for its detail of arrangement was drawn up dur- ing the year 1684 between the town of Lyme and John Wade: "Wharof the inhabitants of the town of Lyme at a towne meeting one the 25th of this instant September by a general vote have given and granted and conferred to Mr. John Wade mill Rights, his hairs and survivors forever one halfe part of theys corne mille with the benefit of the streame and as by said voat recorded in the towne book more fully may answer know all men by these presents that the said John Wade for my selfe and-do hereby covenant and engage to and with Captain John Sill and Peter Pratt and all and each of the inhabitants of the Towne of Lyme Joyntly and generally that I will with all possible speed remove myself and family from Brookhaven to the Towne of Lyme and will use my interest, care and diligence to Repayer the said mille so that she may be fitt for service and further I engage from time to time and at all times when thar shall be watter sufficient and wether will permit to grind all the corne into good meal . . . and further I engage to inhabit as near said mill as I can and attend diligently upon her to keep her goeing and from time to time to repayer her . . . and to build a new mill and for the true performance of the par- ticular above sd I doe hereby bind myself, my heirs and my executors, admin- istrators and assigns and in Case of Neglect of any part tharof I forfitt the sd part of the mill to be returned again to the towne and also to paye twenty pounds sterling to the parties agrieved. . . . Signed, seled and delivered in presents of us. MOSES NOYS, RICHARD ELY, Sener, AMOSE TINKER." Lyme Records, Town Meeting Book, 1664-1724, September 25, 1684.
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liam Ely liberty to transport from Lyme thirty-three thou- sand hogshead and barrel staves; and to Joseph Peck liberty to transport from Lyme, out of Lyme Commons, twenty thousand barrel and hogshead staves. Provisions for the con- trol of this excessive exportation became necessary and on De- cember 24, 1708, Josiah Rainer, John Lee, Woolston Brock- way Sr., Daniel Stark and William Brockway were chosen in- spectors of all sorts of rift timber to prevent transportation out of the town contrary to the laws of the colony and the or- ders of the town.
Legislative and judicial affairs during this early period were entrusted to a few men prominent in the early history of the town, many of whom served for a number of years. On the list of representatives to the colonial assembly between 1670 and 1699 we find such distinguished freemen as Rei- nold Marvin, Mathew Griswold, William Waller, Joseph Peck, Thomas Lee, Richard Smith, Abram Brownson, Cap- tain Joseph Sill, William Ely, Isaac Brownson, Isaac Water- house, Wilt Eilie (?) and Thomas Bradford. Their names constantly recur in the early records of the town since they continually shared in the responsibility of formulating and administering public legislation. They symbolized and inter- preted the thinking of the ruling class.
The ecclesiastical affairs of the new plantation at Lyme be- tween 1667 and 1712 were typical of conditions in the Con- necticut colony generally. Connecticut was founded by church groups the members of which were Puritans. The church united the political, religious and educational responsibilities during these early years and through its educated clergy di- rected the type and quality of education.
The Puritan movement and the rise of the Congregational church were synonymous. Puritanism implied an attempt to purify and emphasized a form of church organization in which authority was derived from the congregation. Moreover, the early ministers were often statesmen as well as divines. The Rev. Thomas Hooker of Hartford, Rev. John Davenport of New Haven, Rev. James Fitch, founder of Norwich, Rev. Gurdon Saltonstall of New London, seventeen years governor
The Beginnings of Public Schooling. 45
of Connecticut, and others of like reputation testify to this fact. They fostered legislation that maintained the dominance of the church. They and many others made ability to support a ministry the basic requirement for the incorporation of towns.37 They favored a program of education that required weekly catechism in the principles of religion. Under their in- fluence religious education remained until the turn of the nineteenth century as a major subject in the curriculum of public schools. As Puritans they accepted the Cambridge Plat- form of 1648, which with the ecclesiastical laws formed the religious constitution until the adoption of the Saybrook Plat- form in 1708. Both platforms declared it necessary to main- tain the ministry. Magistrates were appointed to see that the law was fulfilled. The ecclesiastical laws further required full attendance at public worship on the Lord's Day and special fast days but the enforcing of these religious ordinances be- came the task of the civil authority.
These Puritans were persuaded that the scriptures were a perfect rule, not only of faith and manners, but of worship and discipline also. They considered that in every completely organized church there should be a pastor, a teacher, a ruling elder and deacons.38 Attendance at any church other than those directed by settled and approved ministers was forbid- den by law.39
The Rev. Moses Noyes, who came to "East Saybrook" in 1666 with a group of families to settle a church, was, as were many of the early clergy of Connecticut, a man of means, cul-
37. Osborn, History of Connecticut, III, 274-289.
38. Trumbull, History of Connecticut, p. 292.
39. "This Court orders that there shall be no ministry or church administra- tion entertained or attended by the inhabitants of any plantation in this collony distinct and separate from and in opposition to that wch is openly and pub- lickly observed and dispensed by the settled and approved minister of the place except it be by approbation of the General Court and neighbor chs provided always that this order shall not hinder any private meetings of godly persons to attend any duties that christianity or religion call for, as fasts or confer- ences, nor take place upon such as are hindered by any just impediments on the Sabbath day, from the publicke assemblies, by weather or water or the like." Public Records of the Colony of Connecticut, I, 311.
0
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Educational History of Old Lyme.
ture and education. He was, like his brother, the Rev. James Noyes of Groton, a graduate of Harvard and shared with him the heritage of three generations of scholarly divines.40 His wife, the granddaughter of William Brewster, also claimed a distinguished lineage and during his long pastorate of sixty- three years her influence was keenly felt.
A meetinghouse is believed to have been built soon after Mr. Noyes started preaching. Tradition describes it as a small log house erected by the settlers on the brow of Meeting House Hill on the old Indian trail which crossed the hill at this place. Credence is given to this belief by a reference in the Lyme records of March 2, 1673, to the "repairing of the road to the Meeting House." This was evidently one of the twenty Congregational churches in the Connecticut colony in 1670 and one of the forty-one listed in 1708.41 At the latter date only two churches of other denominations, a Baptist church at Groton and an Anglican church in Stratford, inter- rupted the complete Congregational dominance of the reli- gious affairs of the colony.42 Under such conditions it is easy to understand the complete Congregational dominance of educational affairs also.
Little is known of the intimate religious activities of the people of Lyme during this period. There are no ecclesiastical records of the town prior to 1717 and the town-meeting rec- ords make no mention of church affairs except to report that town meetings were all convened in the meetinghouse. The latter was in fact the seat both of government and of religion. Frequently during the winter months, however, town meet- ings were convened in the meetinghouse and immediately ad- journed "to meet as soon as may be at the house of Balthazar DeWolfe." The proximity of this neighbor's home to the meetinghouse and the added hospitality of his warm and spa- cious kitchen suggests the reason for this change. It offered, no doubt, a more inviting situation than the frigid meeting- house and favored more deliberate consideration of town af- fairs.
40. Roberts, Historic Towns of the Connecticut River Valley, pp. 57-58.
41. Ibid., p. 34. 42. Ibid.
The Beginnings of Public Schooling. 47
By 1668 a need was felt for some general plan of church government that would unite and strengthen the scattered churches in the colony. With this in mind the general court authorized the Revs. James Fitch of Norwich, Gershom Bulke- ley of Wethersfield, Jared Eliot of Guilford and Samuel Wakeman of Fairfield, each of them representing one of the four counties of the colony, to meet in Saybrook. As a result of their deliberations the court approved the Congregational order and allowed dissenters to remain in the colony unmo- lested.43 This latter provision was apparently only tempo- rarily satisfactory, however, for on December 17, 1675, the general court made arrangements for ministers to meet in New Haven and Hartford "to make diligent search for those evils amongst us"44 and three years later, as a part of the gen- eral plan of organization, the Christian people of Lyme were allowed to gather into a church society.'
The natural increase in the number of families in the town from thirty in 1665 to sixty in 1678 also created a need for a more permanent and more commodious meetinghouse. So after a period of consideration it was finally voted, on Janu- ary 22, 1683, at a special meeting held for that purpose, that a meetinghouse "40 foot long and 20 foot wide and 141/2 foot between joynts" be erected.46 Then Mathew Griswold Sr., Captain Sill, Lieutenant Brownson, William Ely, Thomas Lee and William Watrous, all freemen of the town, were chosen a committee to agree about the dimensions of the tim- ber and the ordering of it. That the location of the meeting- house was not so easily decided is evident from the town act of February 8, 1685, when it was voted that the placing of the meetinghouse be left to be determined by the general
43. "May 16, 1669, the Court appointed a committee to consider and pre- pare something for the consideration of the Court respecting ecclesiastical af- fairs." Public Records of the Colony of Connecticut, II, 107.
44. Ibid., p. 109.
45. "Upon motion of the deputies of Lyme (William Measure and Richard Smith) in behalfe of Mr. Noyce and other Christian people that this court would grant them their liberty and countenance them to gather into a church society." Ibid., III, 18.
46. Lyme Records, Town Meeting Book, January 22, 1683.
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Educational History of Old Lyme.
court in May next "when either side shall have a deputy to prefer and allidge the same to the court."47 In this connection an interesting deposition, which is to be found in the Con- necticut Archives on Ecclesiastical Affairs, given on May 10, 1686,48 to Commissioner Griswold by Woolston Brockway Sr. reveals some of the local feeling between families and ex- plains partly the source of the controversy over the location of the meetinghouse. From this it appears that before the meet- inghouse was built the inhabitants agreed upon and staked out a place on the hill just above Richard Smith's dwelling house and that some time soon after William Waller, the uncle of Woolston Brockway, came to him and urged Brockway to op- pose the setting of the meetinghouse in that place. Brockway accordingly protested and his "Uncle Waller" carted the tim- ber to the land "where the meetinghouse now stands."
Soon after, when the location of the new church was fixed by legislative committee, Mr. Noyes was voted a salary in- crease of five pounds, bringing his total annual salary to sixty pounds. Then the building of the meetinghouse went forward and on July II, 1687, Isaac Waterhouse and John Lay Jr. were chosen "to get bords and timber for the setting and seal- ing of the meeting house with what sped may be"; but not until November 29, 1690, were Lieutenant Brownson and Watters engaged to seal the meetinghouse "up to the first Gurte," put in the floor and seats and raise the pulpit. Then twelve years later a town rate was collected to build the gal-
47. The deposition given by Woolston Brockway Sr. to Commissioner Mathew Griswold on May 10, 1686: "This Deponant Testifyeth that before Lyme Meeting House was built the place that the inhabitants agreed upon and accordingly staked out for to sett our meeting house upon was on a Hill Just above Richard Smith's his now dwelling house and orchard; butt not long after The first place was staked out his uncle Wm. Waler came to him and told him that the stakes for the meeting house were setch a small matter within the said Brockway his land and advised the said Brockway to Opose the setting of the Meeting house there: he told his said Uncle Waler that if he desired it he would and accordingly The said Brockway protested against the Standing of the Meeting House on the for sd place: whereupon his Uncle Waler carted the timber unto the place where the meeting house now standeth." Connecticut Archives, Ecclesiastical Affairs, I, 82.
48. Ibid., May 10, 1686.
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leries and defray other town debts. It is believed that the meetinghouse was then completed, since no further references were made to it.
A citation in the records of April 18, 1692, however, arrests our attention. Here we find a town vote requiring all bache- lors and boys eight years old and upwards to be catechized by Mr. Noyes in the meetinghouse every fourth week on the Lord's Day and girls and women every fourth week on the weekdays. In this manner the minister checked the teaching of parents and held his flock to the rather rigid standards fixed by the church. From this requirement only married men were excused.
We are impressed also with the seriousness of religious life in colonial days when Sabbath attendance was required by law. We can readily picture our forefathers making their way with their families, in all sorts of weather over rough roads and country trails, to the barren unheated meetinghouse on the high, rocky, wind-swept ledge that is now reverently known as "Meeting House Hill." Savages often lurked about, dev- astating the empty homes, molesting the traveller or other- wise disturbing the service. For over one hundred years the people were called to service by drums while guards with guns kept watch. Within the church, in spite of its great sim- plicity and the great interdependence of these rural people, the strict social stratification of the time was adhered to. Seat- ing was arranged according to age and social rank. Men and women sat on opposite sides, with children and slaves seated ยท at the rear. The services were long, consuming the greater part of the day. The noon recess, the length of which was regulated by the town meeting and was varied with the sea- sons, provided time for lunch. In some places church houses with a chimney fire were built for use during the noon recess. In other places the village ordinary, the forerunner of the inn, was quite regularly located near the meetinghouse. This may have been the situation in Lyme in 1680 when William Measure was chosen ordinary keeper for the town. Tithing- men, appointed at town meeting to keep the peace, stood at the rear of the church, armed with brass-tipped staves with
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Educational History of Old Lyme.
which they wakened the slumberers and silenced the noisy. They also supervised the ordinary and reported late comers. Hymn singing which came with the reform of 1700 offered the only levity in this otherwise sober ordeal.
In this manner the early churches in Connecticut domi- nated and nurtured the people, inspired and enforced their legislation, required and supervised their education and in every way shaped the pattern of life that pertained for nearly a century. In support of this program a synod of forty-one Connecticut churches, called by the general assembly, met at Saybrook in the summer of 1708, immediately following the seventh commencement of the Collegiate School. At the close of their deliberations the synod recommended an explicit cove- nant between churches, to be endorsed by the minister and one delegate from each church in the colony. This body was to constitute a court of resort for all disputes. The covenant, generally known as the "Saybrook Platform," was ratified soon after by the general court and the Congregational church became thereby the official church of the colony. Moses Noyes of Lyme was one of the covenant's most ardent supporters. Opposed by some and welcomed by others, it served to unite the churches until 1794 when other forces supplanted it.49 During the same years, 1667 to 1712, through which we have traced the more important incidents in the political, economic and ecclesiastical affairs of Lyme, inherent educational influ- ences of far-reaching importance were affecting the people. Not until 1680, however, did they find it necessary to make specific provisions for schooling.
From the earliest settlement in Connecticut, as has been previously recorded, schools were considered next to religion in importance in the prosperity of the people. With this atti- tude education was never left to the voluntary acts of towns. So it developed that the early educational laws of 164450 and
49. Osborn, History of Connecticut, III, 257-262.
50. The law of 1644 was essentially the same as the Massachusetts law of 1642. "It being one chief project of that old deluder Satan to keep men from the knowledge of the Scriptures, as in former times keeping them in an un- known tongue, so in these latter times by persuading them from the use of
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1648, after being absorbed in the Code of 1650, became in 1665, with the union of the New Haven and Connecticut colonies, the general educational law of all. This code set up five educational requirements which comprised the program of public education:
every town of fifty [householders] must appoint a teacher to in- struct the children to read and write.
every town of one hundred householders must establish a grammar school and engage a master competent to prepare youths for college.
selectmen must see that all children and apprentices within the households be taught enough to read and write the English language.
Masters of familyes at least once a week doe catechise theire chil- dren and servants in the grounds and principles of religion.
Education of children was considered to be of singular behoofe and benefitt to any commonwealth.
Religious education was set up as fundamental to good citi- zenship. The school became a central support in the civil fab- ric and the early schoolmasters, well skilled in the rudiments of knowledge, held positions of esteem in the community.51
Such were the educational laws of the Connecticut colony when Lyme, in 1667, with the minimum requirement of thirty families, became an incorporated town. She was then, and for some years thereafter, well outside the technicalities of these laws. Not until 1680 do we find the record of the first vote on school affairs in the town. This came quite evidently as the natural result of a series of circumstances.
Tongues so that at least the true sense and meaning of the original might be clouded with false glosses of saint-meaning deceivers and that learning may be buried in the graves of our forefathers in church and commonwealth, the Lord assisting our endeavors. It is therefore ordered by this court and the authority thereof, that every township within this jurisdiction, after the Lord increase them to fifty householders, shall then forthwith appoint one within their town to teach all children as shall resort to him to write and read, be paid either by the parents or masters of such children or by the inhabitants in general by way of supply. ... Also that the select men of each town shall keep vigilant eyes over their brethren and neighbors and see to it that parents and masters did not neglect the education of the children under their charge." Public Records of the Colony of Connecticut, I, 554-555.
51. Trumbull, History of Connecticut, pp. 240-243.
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In the interim between 1667 and 1680 the assembly had restated the Code of 1650 in the new school law of 1672. Fundamental changes in the law then followed in rapid suc- cession. Penalties and fines were added for the benefit of neg- ligent towns. Grammar schools were required in the four county towns and the court made a grant of six hundred acres to each of these towns as a direct financial aid. The following year all towns were empowered to levy a special tax for the support of schools. The laws affecting Lyme, however, were not passed until 1677 and 1678. The former fixed the school term at nine months. The latter reduced the number of fami- lies, in a town required to have a school, from fifty to thirty. A fine of twenty-five pounds was also added for any town having school for less than three months each year.52 This collection of laws, coming when the plantation at Lyme was well established and when its list of proprietors was known to include sixty names, gave impetus, no doubt, in 1680 to the town acts making provision for the first school in Lyme.
It should be appreciated, however, that the years from 1667 to 1680 were not as barren of educational opportunity as the records might suggest nor as rich in schooling after 1680 as the sudden presence of an organized school might presup- pose. From the point of view of literary attainments the colony was temporarily well fortified. The Rev. Moses Noyes was especially well educated and with such a small flock was in a position to influence intimately the "at-home schooling" of his younger generation. Mathew Griswold and his wife, Annah Wolcott Griswold, were also well equipped with the educational advantages of their time, while Mrs. Thomas Lee Sr., a sister of the well known Chad Brown of the Provi- dence Plantations, was well prepared to train her children adequately in the standard subjects of the day. Similarly others of these early settlers had the complement of schooling which was proper to their financial and social standing.
Coupled with this was the advantage of intimate participa-
52. Steiner, The History of Education in Connecticut, p. 29; Public Records of the Colony of Connecticut, III, 9.
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tion in town building which was both necessary and possible in a group so small, so well acquainted, and so interdepend- ent. Opportunities for actual training in concrete living situa- tions came very early. The generations came noticeably closer together than now and adult responsibilities were experienced at a much earlier age.
The great dependence of the people upon the resources of their own location for food, clothing and shelter also tended to develop an intensive program of household and manual arts in which children of almost every age could be assigned an active part. Similarly in the numerous group projects which dealt with shipbuilding, lumbering, handling of crops, road building and common defense, there was a challenging op- portunity for adolescent youth. In such a situation there were very real "try-outs" and for every young man there were nu- merous choices. In this way, these early generations developed skills and techniques in many things, such as agriculture, en- gineering, politics and trade. The first school was therefore, temporarily at least, a limited adjunct in a broad educational experience.
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