USA > Illinois > De Witt County > History of De Witt county, Illinois. With illustrations descriptive of the scenery, and biographical sketches of some of the prominent men and pioneers > Part 27
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Thus, in brief, the history of the press in De Witt County has been traced. It has wituessed as few failures as any other in- dustry and has been fairly representative, and kept pace with the growth and prosperity of the county. No industry can show more patient, industrious and energetic workers, nor number among its ranks, men who strive harder to build up and increase the material interests and prosperity of the section of country in which they live. The state of Illinois owes much of its unex- ampled prosperity to the introduction of railroads and a live, energetic press. The latter has, at all times and under all cir- cumstances, proclaimed to the world, the wonderful fertility of our soil, its great advantages as an agricultural region, its fine prairie lauds, interspersed with beautiful groves, its streams, mineral deposits and its hospitable and enterprisiug citizens. Through this medium the world has learned of its greatness. To the press, more than any other ageut, belongs the honor of building up the great West, and aiding in its prosperity. To this end, the press of De Witt County has contributed, and it shares the honor with its contemporaries.
CHAPTER XII. COMMON SCHOOLS.
BY MARY S. WELCH.
ORIGIN OF THE SCHOOL SYSTEM.
O give a brief and concise history of the schools and school-interests of De Witt county, is the object of this chapter. But such a his- tory would be incomplete without giving a synopsis, at least, of the rise and progress of the free school system in the State of Illinois. The State has encouraged and nurtured education since her admission into the union.
The present school-system dates from Jan- uary 15th, 1825, Illinois was admitted as a state in 1818, and the act of admissiou contains the following stipulations imposed by Congress : " Whereas the Cougress of the United States, in the act entitled ' An act to enable the people of the Illinois terri- tory to form a constitution and state government, aud for the admissiou of such state in the union on equal footing with the
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original states, passed the 13th of April, 1818,' have offered to this convention, for their free acceptance or rejection, the following propositions, which, if accepted by the conventiou, are to be obligatory upon the United States, viz : 1. The section uumber- ed sixteen in every township, aud when such se tiou has been sold, or otherwise disposed of, other land equivalent thereto, and as contiguous as may be, shall be granted to the state for the use of the inhabitants of such township for the use of schools. 2. That all salt springs within such state shall he grauted to the said state for the use of said state, the same to be used under such terms and couditions and regulations as the legislature of said state shall direct: Provided, the legislature shall never sell nor lease the same for a louger period than teu years at any one time. 3. That five per cent. of the net proceeds of the lands lying within such state, and which shall be sold by congress from and after the first day of Jauuary, 1819, after deducting all expeoses incident to the same, shall be reserved for the purposes following, viz: Two-fifths to be disbursed under the direction of cougress, in making roads leading to the state; the residue to be appropriated by the legislature of the state for the encourage- ment of learning, of which one-sixth part shall be exclusively bestowed on a college or university. 4. That thirty-six sections, or oue entire township, which will be desiguated by the president of the United States, together with the one heretofore reserved for that purpose, shall be reserved for the use of a seminary, and vested in the legislature of the said state, to be appropriated solely to the use of such seminary by the said legislature."
From the above, it will be seen with what care and jealousy the general government guarded the school interests of the new- formed states. These grants and conditions were accepted by the convention which assembled at Kaskaskia in July, 1818, for the purpose of framing a constitutiou for the new state. Hon. Shad- rach Bond, a man of marked ability, was elected first governor of Illinois. In his inaugural address to the general assembly, he called their special attention to the educational interests of the state in the following forcible language : "The subject of educa- tiou, the means for which have been so amply provided by the bounty of the general government, cannot fail to engross your serious attention. It would be well to provide for the appoiut- ment or election of trustees in each township sufficiently popu- lated, aud empower them to lease, for a limited period, the sec- tion of land reserved and granted for the use of schools within the same, requiring them to appropriate the rents arising there- from to such use and in the mauner to be prescribed by law. The townships of land which have been granted to the state for the use of a seminary of learning, cannot, it is to be believed, he so disposed of at present as to authorize the passage of a law to commence the undertaking; but at least a part of them may be leased, and the rents arising therefrom may be laid up or vested in some productive fund as a secure deposit to be hereafter appro- priated to the object to which the grants were made ; such a course will render those lauds productive, and when the period shall arrive at which it may be advisable to sell them, they will be extensively improved and of great value. These donations, together with the three per cent. upon the net proceeds arising from the sale of the public lands within the state, which have been appropriated for similar purposes, with proper arrange- ments, will create a fund sufficiently large to educate the children of the state to the remotest period of time. It is our imperious duty, for the faithful performance of which we are answerable to God and our country, to watch over this interesting subject. No employment can be more engaging than that of husbanding those
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HISTORY OF DE WITT COUNTY, ILLINOIS.
resources which will spread through all classes of our fellow- eitizens the means of wisdom and of knowledge, which in the freedom of our institutions will make the child of the poorest parent a useful member of society and an ornament to his coun- try."
The first General Assembly was too much engrossed with other matters of state to give this portion of the governor's message the attention it deserved ; but at its second session, it took cognizance of the recommendations contained in his first message, and a bill was passed by both houses, and approved by the governor, Mareh 2d, 1819. It provided for the appointment by the county com- missioners in each and every county, of three trustees iu each township, who were within six months after appointment author- ized to employ a surveyor, who should lay out seetion sixteen in each township in lots, not containing less than forty, nor more than one hundred and sixty acres, and to lease the same for a term of ten years, for the purpose of creating a revenue for school-purposes. As this law was general in its tenor, it was sufficient to protect and throw around these school-lands a proper safeguard; and had the recommendations of the governor and the provisions of the law been adhered to until the lands became valuable, the public fund in nearly every township in the state would be to-day sufficient to maintain our public schools without special taxation. Unwise counsel prevailed somewhere, and the most of this munificent gift of the general government has been largely sacrificed.
From 1819 to 1825 but few changes were made in the school- law. Although the changes were few and unimportant, there was a deeided, growing sentiment favorable to the free-school system ; and in 1825 the General Asembly passed an act provid- ing for the establishment and maintenance of public schools. In The duties of the secretary of state confined him almost entirely to his office as the state developed, and the demands for a special officer to discharge the duties of this department became a neces- sity. Hence, in 1854, this legislature passed a law making the office of state superintendent of publie iustruetion a separate one. the preamble to this act, the following patriotic sentiment was expressed : "To enjoy our rights and liberties we must under- stand them ; their security and protection ought to be the first ob- ject of free people ; aud it is a well-established fact that no nation has ever continued long in the enjoyment of civil and political . The duties to be performed were similar to those under the aet of 1845. It was provided to fill the office by appointment of the governor until after the election in 1855, with a salary of $1,500 per annum.
freedom which was not both virtuous and enlightened ; and be- lieving the advancement of literature always has been, and ever will be, the means of developing more fully the rights of man, that the mind of every citizen in a republic is the common prop- erty of society, and constitutes the basis of its strength and hap- piness. It is therefore considered the peculiar duty of a free government like ours to eucourage and extend the improvement and cultivation of the intellectual energies of the whole."
This act is unquestionably the foundation-stone of the present free-school system in the State of Illinois. The aet was manda- tory, as will be seen f om the language of the statute in the fol- lowing passage: "There shall be established a common school or schools in each of the counties of this state, which shall be open to every class of white citizens between the ages of five and twenty-one years." It also provided for the election in each dis- triet of the following officers : Three trustees, one treasurer, one elerk, one assessor and one collector. The trustees were empow- ered to perform many of the functions now performed by the county superintendents, such as examining of teachers, visiting schools, reporting to the county commissioners, etc. Some of the provisions of the law of 1825 were repealed hy the act of 1827, creating a general law of the state relating to the common schools; but no material changes were made until 1841, when the legisla- ture made a complete revision of the school law, and approved February 26, 1841.
Among the changes of this act are the following provisions :
Each township could have as many schools as the inhabitants of such township desired ; the people of every organized district were required to meet and elect from their number three trustees, and to agree upon the plan and manner of conducting the school. These trustees or directors were vested with power to execute the plan adopted, and were required to visit and superintend the schools. This law was the first that required schedules to be kept by the teachers and returned to the township treasurers. It also required a teacher to pass an examination for a certificate to teach The board of trustees was required to perform this duty, or appoint a board of examiners for the purpose. The law did not mention the branches to be taught, nor did it specify the branches in which the teaeher should be examined, but re- quired that the certificate, when issued, should enumerate the branches in which he was qualified to teach.
In 1845 another revision of the school-law was made, and many new and important features were incorporated in it. The secretary of state was by virtue of his office created state super- intendent of schools. Among the various duties the statute pro- vided that he should counsel with experienced teachers, relating to the latest and most improved methods of conducting the com- mon-schools; be was required to advise the school commissioners as to the best manner of managing the schools; of constructing school-houses, and procuring competent teachers ; to recommend the best text books, charts, maps, ete., and to bring about a uni- formity of the same. Under this law, whose duties were those of secretary of state, the first state superintendent was the Hon. Thomas Campbell, who made a very efficient and useful officer. Many of the suggestions given by him in his report to the gover- nor could be used with profit in our school system to-day.
The Hon. Ninian W. Edwards was appointed the first state superintendent under this law, and the first to have the honor of framing a bill for the unification of the school system of the state. Again, in 1872, there was another general revision of the school law, since which time there have been but few important changes made. Of the last revision, I should do this history great injus- tiee without the mention of the name of Hon. Newton Bateman, who has no superior in this country as an educator or friend to the free-school system. Our legislators, in the above revision, which caused our school system to rank with the best in the land, gave the greatest heed to his judgment and counsel.
From the foregoing it will be seeu that there have been five marked epochs in the school history of Illinois-1825, 1840, 1845, 1854 and 1872. In the main we have a most excellent free- school system in our state; but there are changes in the law that should be made, and which would prove wholesome to all con- cerned. I have special reference to the want of clearness in the language of the statute. The school law, above all others, should be the plainest in all its details, and so well arranged as to be intelligible to all who are able to read.
The permanent school fund of the state comprises : 1st, the school fund proper, being three per cent. upon the net proceeds of the sales of the publie lands in the state, one-sixth part ex-
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HISTORY OF DE WITT COUNTY, ILLINOIS.
cepted ; 2d, the college fund, consisting of the above one-sixth part ; 3d, the surplus revenue derived from the distribution in 1836, of the surplus revenue of the United States; 4th, the semi- nary fund, derived from sales of lauds granted to the state by the general government ; 5th, county funds created by the legis- tature in 1535; 6th, township funds arising from the sale of public lands granted by congress for common-school purposes.
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EARLY SCHOOLS IN THE COUNTY.
In these days of prosperity, surrounded as we are with the ad- vantages of social and business life, we can form no adequate idea of the trials, hardships and privations endured by the pioneers of this county. To them and those who have aided us iu secur- ing the information necessary from which to write this article, we dedicate this imperfect history of her common schools. That it is very incomplete we know ; having no records of the early schools, we were obliged to glean from the failing memories of the surviving few, the data from which to write.
The early settlers were a hard-working, intelligent, warm- hearted people, who came from the older states to the wilderness of Illinois. Having had opportunity to note the value of learn- ing in the work of life, they determined that their children should not grow to years of maturity in ignorance, so that we find them early turning their attention to the establishment of schools, into which in accordance with the spirit of those times, they introduced the severe discipline of which we shall speak further on. Many now complain of the backwardness of onr schools. But comparing them with the schools of fifty years ago, and remembering with what crude material we have had to work, and that like the Yankee, we not only had to make the thing itself, but the things to make it with, we will conclude that all things considered, we have not been slow to improve our oppor- tunities, although with better management of the school affairs, we might have had better results.
The youth of that day never dreamed of the comforts and even luxuries enjoyed by the school children of the present. They were compelled to make long journeys over bramble and bush, through mud, snow, cold and heat, to reach the little log-hut, in which the school was kept, as they termed it. The first schools
ODD LOG SCHOOL-HOUSE.
were taught in cabins, sometimes previously occupied as dwell- ings, and were of the poorest sort, with greased paper for windows, uo floor, and often no chimney; a hole in the roof allowed the smoke to escape, which was prevented from returning by the use of what they called a wind-board, which had to be changed every time the wind changed. A fire-place in one or both ends of the room kept the children from freezing, and seats were made by splitting logs and putting in wooden legs to support them, the flat side of the puncheon up; another slab supported by pins
put in the walls, formed the only desk for writing purposes. The older pupils, many of them men and women for size and age, sitting with their backs to the school ; their elbows resting on the desk in front of them, performed their allotted tasks, girls on one side of the room, and the boys on the other. The smaller children occupied lower seats, but so high from the floor that their feet dangled in the air, with no support whatever for their backs. Thus they were compelled to sit erect, holding their book,
PUNCHEON BENCH.
or more often, a little thin board with letters printed on it, up before them in an attitude of study, from six to eight hours each day, and if they dared to grow noisy nr restless, they felt the keen tingle of the master's switch. In those days " licken and laroeu " went together, and no teacher was considered capable who did uot make a vigorous use of the pursuasive rod. Hence we find that every teacher of that day, who had an ambition to be abreast of the times, sought to be an expert wielder of the " birch," or the ever memorable ferule.
The teachers, though severe in their discipline, were faithful in the discharge of duty, teaching to the extent of their ability. But few of them were well qualified to teach beyond the rudi- ments of an education, yet. possessed of that hard common sense characteristic of the early settlers, they were enabled to accom- plish much-they taught but little, and taught it well. In 1837 teachers were first required to hold certificates, for which they were seldom examined beyond the three R's, " Rithmetic, Read- ing and Riting " Arithmetic was considered the all-important branch, especially for boys to study, and it still holds a very sig- nificant place iu many of the rural districts to-day. It was thought that a girl needed little book preparation for her work in life, but usually in a later day, when grammar was more often taught in the schools, it was pursued by the girls, the boys think- ing it was useless to waste time on such foolishness. The only common ground on which they could meet was the spelling. Here the boys were often compelled to acknowledge the girls their equals. Spelling schools, so common, and so enjoyable in those days, were an outgrowth from which they derived much social and intellectual pleasure. These also were the days of " barring out " and " ducking " for treats, and the older citizens who enjoyed these sports, would think the history incomplete without mention of them.
Sometimes it would happen that a man of good attainments was found at work in these cabins, and, when such was the case, the young men from the settlements around would attend the school, and so earnestly apply themselves that often they were better prepared for the practical duties of life thau many of their more favored brothers of the present day, who have the privilege of a college course. The individual plan of recitation was in vogue in all the earliest schools The master went round from one to another, helping them "do their sums" and pronouncing hard words in the spelling lesson, which confronted him at every turn he made. Between these exercises, he would make and mend peus, for which they used goose quills. They made their own ink ont of nut galls, and other things known to them. Then there were the copies to "set" for those that wrote, and the
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HISTORY OF DE WITT COUNTY, ILLINOIS.
little ones to hear from four to six times a day. From this daily programme we know that the teacher who did his work faithfully and well, had little time to idle. They paid him a small salary, and expected him to earn his money. It was thought at that time, and many still cling to that old idea, that any one might without injury or loss to the community, teach the schools, espe- cially the smaller scholars, even though they knew very little themselves of the snhjects they proposed to teach.
After a few years, the manner of recitation was somewhat changed from the individual plan. The older pupils were ar- raoged in a straight line on the floor, and required to " toe the mark," then "make their manners," after which they proceeded to recite, toeing the mark through the whole recitation. If it was reading, the one that read londest and called the words most readily, was counted the best reader. This expressionless style of reciting was called the " school-tone." At the close of the ex- ercise, more " manners " were required, and the class passed to their places, and swinging their feet over the long slab bench, were ready to study the next lesson, or write, perhaps.
Then the smaller pupils came to the master's knee, one at a time, with their little board or book, if they were so fortunate as to have one, which the teacher takes, and resting it upon his knee, points out the letters in regular order with his knife, the child repeating them after the teacher, till he knows them.
Often the little urchia fails to recognize a letter, perhaps T. After many fearful contortions of the face and nervous move- ments of the limbs, he gives it up, and fixes a blank stare on the face of the teacher, who by way of reminder, asks, " What did you drink for supper last night?" Quick as thought, the little fellow has it, and answers in a loud voice, " buttermilk," and the teacher, an adept at turning things to account, repressing a smile, uses the blunder to fix the letter iu the mind of the child.
But the old log school-house, with all its discomforts, has passed entirely out of use, and the teacher, ruling with the iron- heel, has become a creature of the past. The state has provided a better class of accommodation, and prepared the way for teachers to fit themselves for their work; and we are now be- ginning to enjoy in a fuller measure the rich results of all the long line of laborers, from the first parents who built the first cabin for school purposes and the first teacher who wielded the birch and taught the "yonng idea how to shoot," to the grand army of educational workers of to-day.
The first school of which we can get any account was kept on Jacob Coppenbarger's farm, which is now on section eight of Tunbridge township, in 1829. A young man by the name of Edom Shugart, who is said to have been possessed of a good education for the time, taught this school. The second school we find was taught in 1831, on the site of the town of Waynesville, by William S. Dunham. This was the first school taught in what is now Waynesville township, and the second in the county. Again, in the winter of 1832, we find Edom Shugart teaching in the first house built in the county for school pur- poses, as we found him in 1829 in Tunbridge township, teaching the first school in the county.
This school-house was located in what is now Wapella town- ship, abont a mile and a half north of the town of Wapella. It was a little, rough log cabin, and was used but one year, when a larger and better honse was erected nearer the centre of the present district and on the same hill where Liberty school-house now stands. This was the first school-house to have a floor and a glass window. For several years subsequent to this, however, the school-rooms were lighted by removing a log the full length
of the house, and sometimes greased paper was pasted over to keep out the wind and storms; this with the light admitted through the open doors and chimneys, was thought sufficient. In this new house John B. Swearingen taught the first school, in the winter of 1833. This year we find two other schools tanght, one in Tunbridge township, by Edom Shugart, just north of Kenney, and one in what is now Waynesville township, by J. J. McGraw. The next winter (1834) we find several schools, taught by the following teachers: Edom Shugart, William Lowry, Daniel Newcomh, Wm. S. Dunham, J. J. McGraw, J. B. Swear- ingen and Walter Roben, all teaching schools located in the townships now organized as Tunbridge, Barnett, Waynesville and Wapella. In this year, 1834, the Howard school-honse was built, which was the first frame school-house erected. The same winter, what was known for years as the Hall school-house was built on the farm of Mahlon Ilall, the first built west of the present city of Clinton, the third in the county, and for many years the only school-house in the present limits of Barnett township, which now has eight schools, all furnished with good, comfortable houses,-that at Midland City being a graded school of two de- partments. Some of the teachers who have done excellent service may here be mentioned : Reuben Howard, Alfred Hyde and J. I. Barnett. The last named has taught at Hallsville for several years ; he is a graduate of Eureka College, and in his own school does excellent work, as his long stay in the same place will attest. Some of the first teachers in this township were: Lowry, Newcomb, McIntosh, Pollock and Derby.
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