USA > Indiana > A history of education in Indiana > Part 5
Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14 | Part 15 | Part 16 | Part 17 | Part 18 | Part 19 | Part 20 | Part 21 | Part 22 | Part 23 | Part 24 | Part 25 | Part 26 | Part 27 | Part 28 | Part 29 | Part 30 | Part 31 | Part 32 | Part 33 | Part 34 | Part 35 | Part 36 | Part 37
45
SEMINARIES AND ACADEMIES.
and from whose frequent meetings originated most move- ments looking to the general social, intellectual, and indus- trial advancement of the community. The building was held by legislative decree * to be "a common seminary of learning, and equally free and open to all the citizens of the county for purposes of education." But here were held also, as sometimes indeed at the present day, the religious meet- ings of the neighborhood, public speaking on social and political questions, lyceums and debates, Sabbath schools, chance conventions, etc., and in not a few of the newer counties sessions of the court regularly.
Upon the completion of a building, and in the movement to open a school, a board of trustees was generally provided to succeed the one trustee of the seminary funds, and to have general direction of the school. The numbers varied from five, in most counties, frequently seven, to as many as fifteen. The law originally provided that the choice of the trustees should be by election of the householders, but that, in case of failure to elect, the county commissioners should appoint. Usually, however, in the act of incorporation un- der the general law, members of the first board were named by the Legislature. They were frequently appointed by the Circuit Courts, and occasionally by the county officers. Boards once more were often self-perpetuating, though regu- larly vacancies were filled by the commissioners in most counties. The management, it will be seen, was very irregu- lar and various, the policy being wholly dictated by local preference and convenience.
The financial condition of the seminaries was never such as either to command confidence or to assure prosperity. There was perhaps no instance in the State where such school was self-supporting, or meant to be. All were de- pendent upon tuition fees. That the seminary should be "equally free and open to all the citizens of the county "
* Act of January 31, 1824, thereafter called the " General Law concern- ing County Seminaries."
X
46
UNDER THE FIRST CONSTITUTION.
only meant, at best, uniformity of charges, not immunity from them. Neither individuals nor classes should be spe- cially favored or discriminated against. Still, there were certain recognized sources of revenue, as enumerated in the Constitution, confirmed by the laws of 1818 and 1824, and supplemented in a trifling way by subsequent legislation ; but they were both few and unprofitable, not to say uncer- tain. The supplemental act was in 1838,* and provided for the recovery of money lost in gaming contracts. In case the party losing did not within six months' time prosecute for the amount, it "should be lawful for any other person or persons to sue for and recover the same, ... for the benefit of the family or the next of kin ; ... and in case there shall be no such family or kindred, then for the bene- fit of the county seminary." The several contingencies left little for the schools. The aggregate proceeds from all avail- able sources, it has already been suggested, were small, rarely sufficient even to erect a house, much less to meet the tuition and incidental expenses of the school.
The "conscience money," as the exemption payments came to be called, was but one dollar for each annual failure to perform militia duty, and was never large, though in certain sections of the State very common. The State treas- urer, Samuel Merrill, in his report to the Legislature in 1825, mentioned returns of fines assessed by eight regiments at $332.50, of which sum but $7 had been paid. At the same time judgment was reported against the former treasurer for $1,150 of such funds ; notwithstanding all of which, how- ever, the total amount actually paid into the State treasury by the several regimental paymasters from 1825 to 1841 was but $634.65. Insignificant as the proceeds were, a special act of February 2, 1833, provided that they might be paid to the school commissioner of the county, and applied to the com- mon schools, instead of into the seminary fund, if the indi- vidual making the payment so preferred. It is claimed that
* See Revised Statutes, 1843, chap. xxxiv, pp. 593, 594.
47
SEMINARIES AND ACADEMIES.
after 1840 most exemption moneys were so diverted from the seminaries (which were sometimes regarded as " aristocratic institutions ") to the township schools.
Fines assessed for breaches of the peace were sufficiently numerous then as now, and might have been made a fruitful source of revenue ; but having once been assessed by the local authorities, they were either not paid to or claimed by the seminaries, or they were remitted by the Governor ; and what might have been a source of wealth to the seminaries made, in fact, but insignificant contributions.
Of the third class of funds, it is enough to say it was a provision chiefly on paper. Either suit was not pressed for lack of interested parties, or the money recovered went to the claimants as "next of kin." The county seminary's claim rested upon so many contingencies that nothing came of the provision. At no time does there appear official rec- ord of any funds derived from this source.
The annual exhibit of the State treasurer (1845), acting as Superintendent of Common Schools, showed the aggregate seminary funds in fifty-nine counties to be $40,687.87, and the value of buildings and grounds, $50,617.47 ; or an aver- age seminary fund of $690 to each county, and an average investment of about $850 in buildings ; or, assuming the same ratio to hold throughout the other twenty-nine coun- ties in the State, a total seminary property of something less than $150,000. As early as 1825 the seminary fund in Dearborn County amounted to $700 ; in 1835 Monroe County reported $2,000, and Morgan County a like amount, the latter showing an annual income (1849) of $410.93. But these were exceptional instances. Of the twenty-two coun- ties reporting to the Legislature in 1825, eight accounted for less than $50 each, and but seven for more than $200.
Seeing all of which, it is not difficult to understand that the fees of students must have been the principal source of revenue. No schools were endowed, and none were free. The Legislature of 1829 had enacted that, "after erecting sufficient buildings, and furnishing the same, the trustees
48
UNDER THE FIRST CONSTITUTION.
should, if thought necessary, appropriate such funds (as provided for by the Constitution) to the payment of teachers and for necessary assistance, so as to reduce the price of tuition, and, if practicable, make the same a free school." Some such vision of a State or public supported school may have been had by the legislators or by an occasional board of seminary trustees, but the ideal was illusive. Nowhere were schools free, even in the older East. It could scarcely be expected of the pioneer West, even in elementary educa- tion, much less among secondary schools, such as the county seminary was meant to be.
Speaking in general terms : A house having been pro- vided, a teacher was sought for who would take charge of the school, receive and account for the public funds, collect tuition from students, assist or co-operate with the trustees in advertising the school, employ all needed assistance, and be satisfied with making what he could. The enterprise was not always a paying one ; indeed, the profits were usually small-out of all proportion to the efficient and, for the time, scholarly service and exemplary lives of many of the teachers, both principals and assistants, who managed the schools in the years just prior to and following 1850. Some- times the principal was hired for the total tuition-the trust ees, or their agent, making the collection. Occasionally a contract specified a fixed salary. In any case the pay was inconsiderable, although it is known that the Rev. Lucius Allen, principal of the Aurora Seminary, received $300 a year at a time when the principal of Indiana Seminary was thought to be sufficiently remunerated with $250.
The organization of the old seminary was a good example of the undifferentiated academy. It was emphatically a mixed school, of all grades, from the infant classes (fre- quently including children five, and even four years old) through the higher elementary and secondary forms, fitting for professional schools or classical studies in the State Uni- versity. Pupils ranged from four to thirty years of age. In those sections of the State where the township schools
4.9
SEMINARIES AND ACADEMIES.
flourished the seminary was a high-grade classical and fitting school, and the younger pupils were excluded. For most counties, however, the seminary provided both elementary and secondary instruction.
The school year was thirty-six to forty weeks, variously divided, now into two terms-May to September, and No- vember to March-and again into three or four terms, the latter perhaps being most common, each term consisting of ten weeks. The patronage of each school was, of course, chiefly in the immediate locality. It was a county institu- tion ; its constituents were specified, and their rights guar- anteed. The privileges of the seminary being by law equally open to all within the county, they were also, by act of the trustees, made available, and usually on the same terms, to residents of other counties. Indeed, a few seminaries-as those at Salem, Logansport, Winchester, Muncie, Centre- ville, and New Castle -- drew from territories comprising sev- eral counties, and even from adjoining States. In one year, under Mr. Ferris's principalship, six counties were repre- sented in the Randolph County Seminary, and the States of Ohio, North Carolina, and Mississippi besides.
The seminaries of Washington, Clark, Dearborn, Knox, and others along the Southern border drew students from Kentucky and other Southern States. It is claimed that during Morrison's administration Salem Seminary was more or less patronized by one third of the organized counties of the State.
The enrollment varied greatly, as might be expected, in different counties, and in the same county at various times and under different principals ; the more prosperous, includ- ing those named and a few others, registering each term from one to two hundred. In Randolph County an inter- esting regulation is preserved to us in the by-laws adopted by the trustees (1842) to the effect that, in the event of over- crowding in the school, " each congressional township in the county should be entitled to scholars in proportion to the number of qualified voters in the township," the overplus
50
UNDER THE FIRST CONSTITUTION.
being always taken from the younger members of the school. It need scarcely be said that such excess of pupils was rare.
The curriculum, along with many minor differences, was yet fairly uniform throughout the State, just as, and for the like reason in the same period, there were few and unimpor- tant disagreements among college or university courses. Education generally was prescriptive and dogmatic. The machine was far more common than now. It has been mentioned that the seminary was only imperfectly graded. Neither old catalogues, nor the fragmentary courses that remain, show any organized effort to classify students accord- ing to their attainments except in the rudest way. Subjects were rarely co-ordinated into " courses." Each studied what he chose. Nevertheless, in most schools there may be rec- ognized a few fairly well-established classes or grades, the germ of the later systematic schooling.
One manual, prepared by Prof. E. P. Cole, for some years principal of the Randolph County Seminary, exhibits a somewhat more careful plan, that, while different in form, was typical in spirit of most others. It included (1) the "seminary class," in which were taught orthography, read- ing, writing, and the first lessons in arithmetic ; (2) the "junior class," comprising, besides advanced work in the above, rhetoric, speaking, writing "in various hands," arith- metic "in a manner to insure practical utility," modern geography, history, and English grammar and composition ; and (3) the " senior class " with ancient and modern geog- raphy, history, natural philosophy, chemistry, astronomy, geometry, algebra, mental and moral philosophy, Latin, and sometimes Greek * and French.
The secondary work proper covered from three to four years, Latin and mathematics being continued throughout the course, and Greek and French for a shorter period. The
* For a number of years prior to 1850 the Delaware County Seminary, under Mr. Ferris, maintained three classes of Greek along with four of Latin.
51
SEMINARIES AND ACADEMIES.
amounts of history, literature, and science were really very small. Music appeared in almost every course, both vocal and instrumental, extra charges being made for it, however. Even drawing, painting, and short-hand appeared in many of them. The texts used were standard, and, to present judg- ment, seem to have been well chosen. They include Olney's Geographies, and sometimes Mitchell's ; Walker's and Web- ster's Dictionaries, Davies's Algebra, Haile's History of the United States, Bronson's Elocution, Ray's Arithmetic or Day and Thompson's, Parker's Aids to English Composition, and Smith's or Wells's English Grammar. References for the subjects enumerated were few. With an occasional library, there were no laboratories. The study of Nature at first hand had as yet, and particularly in Indiana, received but little tangible encouragement ; schooling was centered in the mastery of books. The languages (especially the clas- sics) and mathematics "formed " the course. Other branches were incidental. Rhetoric, composition, debates, declama- tion, the dictionary, were much exalted, but were, after all, regarded rather as the common and efficient means at hand toward a practical preparation for civic and general public duties. . The man of influence, then as now, was the master of argument and rhetoric ; then more than now through direct and personal contact. The seminary lyceum of fifty years ago was a training ground of the citizen, and a school of state-craft. The schools of to-day may be better organ- ized and more uniform, and more generally accessible, but from no school or system of schools has been taught a truer patriotism, more generous living, or safer habits than in these same old seminaries.
This was the practical aspect of the course. In every other respect the training of the seminary was "liberal" both as to subject-matter and method. Its aim was clearly disciplinary and humanistic; closely allied in scope and spirit with the old English and early New England acade- mies, after which it was broadly patterned, and the first American colleges. When complete in its organization
52
UNDER THE FIRST CONSTITUTION.
and efficiently administered, it was a veritable college in the clearing. Too often it was only a pretense. Alongside of principals and teachers whose service would do honor to the people of any age as masters of learning and examples to youth, were ignoramuses, pedants, and mountebanks. The like has been true elsewhere and again. Even Harvard had her Nathaniel Eaton. It behooves teachers to know, how- ever, and it is wholesome frequently to remember, the large and epoch-making services of a few of these so-called public but really private seminaries in a dozen counties. Public, because State-regulated, and the beneficiaries of continuous State aid. Private, because fee-supported, and dependent upon personal and private enterprise and interest. Among the principals of these schools were men of liberal culture and large influence.
Rev. Hiram A. Hunter, a Virginian by birth, having re- moved to Indiana, taught for years in the Gibson and Cass County seminaries ; Rev. James S. Ferris, himself educated in the seminaries, pupil of William Haughton and first super- intendent of the Winchester city schools, and Rev. R. B. Abbott (a graduate of Indiana University in 1847), were associated in the management of the Delaware, Randolph, and Henry County seminaries in succession; Prof. George W. Hoss, graduate of Asbury (now De Pauw) University, long a professor in the State University, and for one term Superintendent of Public Instruction, in Delaware and Wayne Counties ; Rev. Thomas Conley and W. H. H. Ter- rell (subsequently Adjutant-General of the State) in Morgan County; Prof. E. P. Cole, graduate of Miami University, Ohio, and first principal and organizer of the Indianapolis High School, in the counties of Randolph and Monroe; James G. May, first superintendent of the New Albany schools and principal of the Decatur County Seminary, and Col. R. W. Thompson in Lawrence County-all, with many others, through a long experience, justified their reputation as scholarly men and superior teachers. It was the day of the classics and mathematics. A liberal training
53
SEMINARIES AND ACADEMIES.
meant these or nothing. And of all the subjects of the time, they were the best taught. Besides, the growing West attracted energetic, capable men from the older communi- ties, many of whom became at once teachers and mission- aries. To such men in no small degree does the present owe the regeneration of the State, the promotion of its material interests as well, and its marvelous development.
Typical of this larger and more wholesome influence, and so deserving of individual consideration, were such men as S. K. Hoshour, of Wayne County; Cornelius Perring,* of Monroe; and Hon. John I. Morrison, of Washington County.
Prof. Hoshour was a rare man, conscientious of both public and private duties, scholarly beyond his contempo- raries, a linguist of more than local reputation, a teacher of so generous experience, and withal so inspiring to the young and so rich in the assurances of culture to man and woman as to dignify the profession-a genius, but, what is more rare, always and easily in touch with the common mind-the universal need. While at Centreville, in the Wayne County Seminary, he was the teacher, and for many years after- ward the counselor and friend, of both Oliver P. Mor- ton, later Indiana's war Governor, and Lew Wallace, since military leader, diplomat, and author. Besides these, there were in the same school others who came to only less fame; men and women of learning and enterprise, rich in the dignities of refinement and virtue, stanch friends of right and truth, in the home or the State. It was a school of statesman and prophet. It was a center of learning and ambition for much of eastern Indiana. The seeds there sown brought a rich harvest for the State.
The seminary of Washington County, for nine years under the principalship of John I. Morrison, was perhaps one of the best and best known of these county schools. It was opened at Salem in 1826 by Mr. Morrison, then a young man of twenty years, recently arrived from Franklin County,
* See p. 84.
5
54
UNDER THE FIRST CONSTITUTION.
Pennsylvania ; a large-hearted man of scholarly habits, possessed of mental balance and sound intentions; demo- cratic enough to reach the majority, but withal so familiar with the peculiar and exclusive privileges that belong to a deep and persistent spiritual culture as to attract the few most ambitious youth, nobly aspiring to a broader field of labor and privilege, the means of co-operation with the world's rich life. Students came to Salem, not alone from Washington and adjoining counties, but from distant parts of the State and from neighboring States. The principal became known, and while the school was not the largest in the State, its reputation for thoroughness, for a far-seeing, practical preparation for business, and the intelligent fitting for higher studies, drew a superior class of mature, thought- ful, earnest students.
The extent of the wholesome influence of Morrison at Salem has never been told; perhaps can not be. Among his pupils here during the decade about 1830 were John S. Campbell, Barnabas C. Hobbs, James G. May, Z. B. Sturges, W. C. De Pauw, Elijah Newland, Thomas J. Rodman, and Nathan Kimball. These are only names from the better known. Many of his pupils became teachers-indeed, not a few entered with that purpose. The seminary was a sort of teachers' academy, after the plan of the State-aided ones (after 1821) in New York, and contemporaneous with the "Teachers' School" of S. R. Hall at Concord, Vermont (1823-'30). For that day and for Indiana under pioneer conditions, large numbers also were led to continue their studies in college .*
Every influence of the institution and the man was vital-
* Indiana had at this time (prior to 1840) but four colleges : the State Uni- versity (so named in 1838) at Bloomington, Hanover and Wabash Colleges, and Asbury (now De Pauw) University. (Vincennes University, closed in 1823, was but reopened in 1840.) Kentucky had two; Illinois, four; Ohio, nine; Michigan, one. Five only of these twenty so-called colleges were non-sectarian, the fifteen representing various denominations, and greatly dividing the patronage in each State.
55
SEMINARIES AND ACADEMIES.
izing and elevating. Mr. Morrison was personally an initial factor or a leading spirit in a series of social movements that made Salem for many years a kind of intellectual Mecca-a center of learning and civic discussion, and public enterprise and social improvement of the State, sharing with New Harmony the credit of making southern Indiana known.
His more capable students became at times his assistants, and later, principals or assistants in other county or private seminaries and academies, or filled chairs in colleges. Camp- bell entered Wabash in 1844 fresh from the Washington County Seminary, graduated in 1848, becoming successively tutor, principal, and professor in the institution. Hobbs left Salem for Cincinnati College in 1837, and studied under McGuffey, Mitchel, and Mansfield, becoming later professor in the Earlham School, and first president of the College and Superintendent of Public Instruction. Sturges entered Han- over, and, upon graduating in 1842, opened a classical school in Charlestown, Clark County, which for a score of years represented the best standards of current humanistic culture.
Such are a few only of the many instances that might be cited of the far-reaching touch of the Salem school. In seminary and college, in public office and social life, in science and culture, wherever generous sentiment and phil- anthropic interest were needed, for fifty years might be found men who gratefully acknowledged their indebtedness for both learning and inspiration to the Salem teacher-the Hoosier Arnold-John I. Morrison.
It was required of seminary trustees that an annual re- port be made "showing the number, age, and studies of pupils, and the expense of instruction," one copy of which should be filed with the county auditor, and a second for- warded to the superintendent of common schools (1843). This was the sole form of State inspection to which the county seminaries were subject, and, with the annual ex- hibit of their funds to the Legislature, was the only mark
56
UNDER THE FIRST CONSTITUTION.
they bore of being public, not private schools. These an- nual statements were made up from records kept by the principals, sets of which registers may yet occasionally be found in the possession of former teachers, historical socie- ties, local libraries, or schools, and are of great value .* Indeed, they afford the one glimpse we have to-day into almost the sole means for elementary education in Indiana prior to 1850.
The accompanying table is inserted, showing, along with a list of the counties and the dates of their organization, also the establishment and location of their seminaries. It will be seen that almost half of the counties established no such schools. In some they were organized late and made no record for themselves, being sold and conducted as private seminaries or closed ; yet others, for want of funds or wise management, or local interest, failed and were abandoned. In those counties in which there were such schools an aver- age period of fourteen years elapsed between the organiza- tion of the county and the founding of the seminary. Of the several counties without seminaries, but three were or- ganized after 1840 ; it could not have been, therefore, from the lateness of their organization that no schools were estab- lished.
The conditions perhaps that militated against the com- mon schools were felt here also. Education was not gener- ally held to be a public concern. Funds accumulated slowly. Population was sparse. In the best frontier life few would feel the need of such education as the seminaries offered.
* One such register is held by Hon. T. B. Redding, Newcastle, Indi- ana, and includes records of the Randolph County Seminary from January 1, 1842, to March 1, 1847; the Delaware County Seminary from March 8, 1847, to September 1, 1850 ; the Henry County Seminary from September, 1850, until the seminaries were closed under the new Constitution ; and the Newcastle Academy, which grew out of the last, until its absorption into the graded-school system of the town. For most of this period Rev. James S. Ferris was continuously principal, and in the three places successively.
Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.