USA > Indiana > A history of education in Indiana > Part 7
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From Joshua and David Lindley, in the earlier years, to J. A. and Edward Taylor, in 1875, when the school closed, a generation was so educated, as were generations elsewhere in Indiana, as not only to make the present system possible, but the old academies no longer necessary.
* Now Mrs. Martha A. Venable, of Eric, Kansas, to whom the author is indebted for many interesting facts of this and other schools.
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Fifty to seventy-five years ago private enterprise more often helped out the public system than now. Indeed, State contribution was reduced to a minimum, and the dominant influence for a generation was individual enterprise. Still the movement was generally co-operative-personal effort supplementing or re-enforcing the public provision. It was an interesting experience, though not always the most profitable.
Among all the schools that grew up by this united effort, one of the most successful and of substantial growth was the so-called New Albany School. The town of New Albany was laid out by the Scribner brothers in 1813, a stipulation of the sales being that "one-fourth part of each payment upon the lots should be paid into the hands of trustees, to be chosen by the purchasers, until such payments shall amount to $5,000, the interest upon which should be applied to the use of schools in the town for the use of its inhabitants for- ever." Under these provisions a school was incorporated January, 1821, and opened two years later, which in 1853 was merged into the city system established by the new law. For thirty years before high schools were known by name in the State this was a high school in every sense of the term. Teachers here were scholarly and fairly paid. There was an attempt at a graded course. Instruction was of a high grade of excellence.
Two schools of higher grade than the academies men- tioned, though fairly belonging in their general features to the " seminary period," were La Porte University, chartered in 1841, and St. Gabriel's College, located at Vincennes, two years before (1839). While they were meant to be degree- giving institutions, their best work was in the line of a liberal academic training.
The institution at La Porte was designed to be a school of high rank, and to include literary, medical, and law de- partments. The law school was immediately opened, under Judge William Andrew, and the medical department the year following. In 1843 the literary department was organ-
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ized, absorbing the Lancasterian Academy of La Porte, con- tinued until 1845, and closed for want of funds and patron- age. In 1851, other schools having opened at Ann Arbor, Chicago, Indianapolis, and Lafayette, the medical depart- ment also at La Porte closed. Instruction in law had been abandoned some years before. Nevertheless, the school was, in ways, eminently successful. Rev. W. K. Marshall was president and the life of the institution-a man of vigor, liberal culture, and educational insights. There was a large faculty-eight in the medical department alone (1846)-a building with accommodations for two hundred students, a liberal charter, and full university powers. The institution had perhaps the first dissecting-room in the State.
St. Gabriel's College, after years of opposition, was finally chartered as a college in 1841, and started out with great promise. It had been opened as a high-grade secondary school in 1839 by Brute, the Bishop of Vincennes. J. P. Bellier was the scholarly president, and an agent of the in- stitution was sent to Europe to engage professors for the leading branches. Among these were included, in the phraseology of the announcement, men "who have devoted their lives to the business of instruction, and have received their education in some of the most distinguished colleges of Europe." The building of the Vincennes University was purchased and fitted up for one hundred students. It was furnished with philosophical apparatus, and an extensive library begun. A botanical garden was projected "to con- tain the greatest possible variety of plants."
The course covered nine years, five of which were to be of collegiate rank, and include instruction in Latin, Greek, Hebrew, Spanish, Italian, French, German (the last two by professors to whom the tongues were vernacular), geology, botany, anatomy, physiology, music, painting, and drawing; and its completion was to be followed by the usual academic degrees. Four classes were graduated. The patronage of the institution was from Fort Wayne, Logansport, Terre Haute, and elsewhere in Indiana, and from St. Louis, Nat-
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chez, Vicksburg, and even New Orleans. Many were Prot- estants, and the school was regarded as among the best in all the Mississippi Valley. In the faculty, also, were John B. Chase, Francis Leray, August Martin, M. Murray, and Mr. Vabret-all scholarly men and eminent in their day .*
Two other institutions in northeastern Indiana of early note were the "Union Literary Institute," in Randolph County (1846), and the Liber College, in Jay County, a few years later-in both of which Rev. Ebenezer Tucker taught for many years, and in the latter Rev. I. N. Taylor. In Liber College, a few years later, and in La Grange Collegiate Institute were educated hundreds of young men and women, liberally for the time, at little expense practically, and with wholesome views of life. Such schools were truly the col- leges of the people. They made the best secondary learning available, if not to all, at least to many.
The Union Literary Institute was established by anti- slavery friends, in the heat of the abolition movement fifty years ago (1846), for the colored youth of both sexes, and was long known as the "Nigger College." The school holds a charter from the State, requiring that "no distinction shall be made on account of race, color, rank, or wealth." It was and is yet managed by a board representing different de- nominations and both the negro and white races. Ebenezer Tucker was the first principal, serving from 1846 to 1854, and again from 1873 to 1879, and was one of the original
* It should be noted that Bishop Brute had, about 1835, after a tour through France, during which considerable funds were collected, under- taken in a vigorous way the task of general education in that section of the State in and around Vincennes. Provision was first made for the educa- tion of the clergy ; then " free schools " for both boys and girls, " without re- gard to religious belief" ; night schools ; and, finally, as above, the college. This, let it be remembered, was so early that few men in Indiana of any class or belief could be found committed to the " free-school idea," much less undertake its realization. An interesting and valuable article in the Catholic Record, Indianapolis, for May 21, 1891, presents the case strongly for Bishop Brute as one of the first advocates, if not " the originator and founder of the free-school system of Indiana."
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trustees. The management at present includes J. F. Cousins, principal, employed by the directors, and an assistant hired by the local township trustee.
Similar in general character to these might be named also the Laurel Academy and Brookville College, in Frank- lin County; the Hopewell Academy, in Johnson County (later in charge of Prof. E. P. Cole) ; the Maple Grove Academy, in Knox County; the Peru Collegiate Institute (1837) ; the Orleans Institute (1840) ; the Bloomingdale (Friends') Academy (1846) ; the Fairview Academy, in Rush County (1840); the Carlisle School (1835) and Eugene Acad- emy (1829), in Sullivan County ; the Olive Branch School, in Tippecanoe County (1835), etc.
After the extremest criticism has been passed upon the deficiencies of the means of general public education during the period, it must be said that for no people or any genera- tion has there been provided more efficient teaching, more generously supported considering their resources, or more generally appreciated, than in these supplementary institu- tions that made the State honorably famous just prior to and following the middle of the century. On a frontier not yet freed from the swamp and thicket, where there was little wealth and less leisure, in more than a score of towns and country neighborhoods were well-known and prosperous centers of the severest classical and disciplinary culture. No compromise was made with the practical. Their train- ing was altogether "liberal" and general. They imitated the older East in the curriculum, and rivaled it in method and efficiency. The really classically educated, both among pupils and teachers, were relatively far more common then than now.
The entire period shows a wholesome faith in the saving influence of humanistic culture, and an independence of the merely useful and practical, that commands admiration from the most pronounced utilitarianism. But not all high-grade schools of the period were classical and humanistic. A large majority of them were finishing schools, and made no
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pretense of fitting for college ; indeed, the training to be had in certain of the seminaries was quite equal to the best which the contemporary colleges offered. From these and others, after a brief preparation, students went up to Craw- fordsville, Hanover, Greencastle, or Bloomington for more advanced work than local schools afforded. For the great majority of students, however, the seminary was the local college, and furnished their only formal culture and prepa- ration for life. In these schools, in some instances, was the only formal training of men who afterward became distin- guished as teachers, soldiers, statesmen, and professionals.
By a considerable number these seminaries, however, were looked upon with distrust-patronized by the aspiring mediocre and attended by the few; well enough used by the would-be teacher or professional, but furnishing an educa- tion undesirable for the pioneer laborer ; an expensive, un- practical institution, aristocratic, and to be feared. The seminary had opposition even among the educated. An impression prevailed in parts of the East, and before the middle of the century was fast gaining place in the West and South as well, that education should be chiefly indus- trial, practical, of a calculable business value. Manual in- dustry was needed, so its advocates claimed, both as a means of, and a stimulant to, vigorous mental exercise, and a means of support during the school period, as well as a preparation for the industrial life of the frontiersman, which most stu- dents must afterward follow.
The idea of the Hofwyl institution in Switzerland had but recently been imported into this country, and already Fellenberg schools were planted in a number of States- notably one each in Connecticut and South Carolina-that were the precursors, if not progenitors, of our later agricult- ural colleges.
In New York State had been founded, with more or less success, the Yates School, the Oneida Institute of Industry and Science, the Aurora Manual Labor Seminary, and the Genesee Manual Labor School, all prior to 1835, and all
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seeking to combine physical (manual) labor with the acqui- sition of mental culture. The Franklin Manual Labor Col- lege, the Chatham Manual Labor School, the Burnt Prairie Manual Labor Seminary, the Knox Manual Labor College, Illinois College, and Fayette Manual Labor Seminary-all in Illinois, and all before 1840-were of the same character, as appears from their corporation names. Of course, there will be remembered in this connection the more conspicuous example of Oberlin Collegiate Institute, founded in 1833, changed soon after to Oberlin College. This organization included a system of daily manual labor by all students- boys and girls alike-as a means of meeting, at least in part, the expenses of college tuition and living.
So of Indiana. The movement toward a union of manual employment and literary training reached the State, and spread like an epidemic. There were several so-called farm- ers' academies, not greatly unlike many another high-grade school, except that the classics were less emphasized perhaps, supported as finishing schools, and managed by individuals in the interest of local and generally rural neighborhoods. Conspicuous among these, and somewhat more prosperous for a time, were one each in Clinton and Rush Counties, in the latter of which Dr. A. R. Benton * was at one time an acceptable principal. The Indiana Teachers' Seminary, at Madison (incorporated, but never opened), and the Wabash Manual Labor College,t of Crawfordsville, both chartered in the same year (1834), and both fathered by Williamson Dunn, were avowedly industrial, and meant to be partially, if not wholly, self-supporting.
One of the most illustrious examples (illustrious because of its distinguished promoters and patrons) of this class of school was the attempt-equally fruitless, however-made in 1824 by William Maclure, the early Indiana (Scotch) geologist, Thomas Say, Lesueur, and others at New Har-
* Late President of Butler University.
t Subsequently Wabash College.
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mony. Fostered by wealth and patronized by genius, its failure was paradoxical ; but upon its ruins rose the Pesta- lozzian School of Neef, that more than compensated Indiana for the loss, in the presence of the resulting greater honor and really large and substantial services to education.
So, also, the Indiana Baptist Manual Labor Institute * (1836), located at Franklin; the Western Scientific and Agri- cultural College (1837) ; the Union Literary Institute (1846), in Randolph County; the Manual Labor Collegiate Insti- tute (1837), of St. Joseph County; the Jeffersonville Indus- trial and Literary Institute; and the West Point Literary and Agricultural College-were so many attempts to make either palatable or available an education, avoided in the one case by, or in the other out of reach of, classes most needing its advantages.
In 1845, one Henry Thomas, from the East, was instru- mental in starting a school at Bloomingdale (then Bloom- field), in Park County, within the limits and under the direc- tion of the " Western Quarterly Meeting " of Friends. Thirty acres of land were purchased, a school-house erected, and finally a shop. Onions and other vegetables were cultivated, bench work was attempted, and both combined with book studies. The labor did not prove to be profitable either for commercial or educative purposes, but the land remained and the name was soon changed to " Western Agricultural School," and in 1859 to "Bloomingdale Academy," as now known. From 1851 it was a high-grade academic school, and for sixteen years had Barnabas C. Hobbs as principal.
School legislation during the period was chiefly tentative, and most attempts at schools were but gropings. The man- ual labor experiments were only more obvious examples of an unwise policy. Whatever may be its final pedagogical significance, the movement described in four States, and which may be studied in as many more, was a "craze," and soon ran its course. The schools, one and all, failed, or
* Now (since 1844) Franklin College.
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were, after a few years, transformed into the traditional liter- ary institutions.
Almost the sole exception to this statement, if it may be an exception, was the Union Literary Institute, in Ran- dolph County, founded in 1846 by Rev. Ebenezer Tucker, and to which reference has been made elsewhere. It was an institution exclusively for colored people, and one of the most successful of its kind. Student labor was an essential factor in its administration, and was made apparently a wholesome educative agency, as it was nowhere else in the State.
CHAPTER VII.
THE SEMINARIES (Continued).
ANOTHER characteristic which belonged to most of the better seminaries of the time was the semi-professional bias they exhibited-looking to the training of teachers for the common schools. How great was the need for this service the present generation is not in condition to understand.
In Early School-days, Dr. B. C. Hobbs notes that "the pioneer teachers were generally adventurers from England, Scotland, or Ireland, or from the East in this country, who sought temporary employment during winter while waiting for an opening for business." Teaching was made to pay the expenses of a tour of observation. "Another class," the same writer elsewhere mentions, " were men unsuccess- ful in trade, or who were otherwise disabled. Successful men rarely continued in the business." In 1834, another puts it, "teachers were poorly qualified, and there was no suitable means for their improvement." Prof. Mills in- veighed against "placing their (the children's) intellects and hearts under the instruction of those whose incom- petency is as notorious as the paltry and contemptible sum they demand for their services," and sought from the Legis-
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lature a provision that public funds should "not be ex- pended in the payment of services by other than men of well-trained minds and unblemished morals .*
Apprehensive of the seriousness of the situation, Governor Noble, also, in his message to the Legislature in December, 1833, recommended that seminaries be fitted to instruct and prepare teachers, and suggested that the "Saline Fund + be applied to one or more institutions for the preparation of young men as teachers for the township schools on the man- ual labor system." A similar suggestion had been made to the New York Legislature by the Board of Regents of that State in 1821, again in 1828, and by the Superintendent of Common Schools to the same body in 1831; in this last year two academies reported " principles of teaching " among the studies pursued. The responsibility thus voluntarily assumed by the New York academies was incorporated into a law of the State Legislature May 2, 1834. The problem there was the problem in Indiana. The need was a common one and widely felt. Governor Noble perhaps borrowed the notion, but was voicing a popular sentiment.
In the autumn of 1832 Judge Williamson Dunn and other interested and public-spirited men took steps looking toward a school in Crawfordsville. It was to be denomina- tional in control, collegiate in rank, and was the fourth such school in the State. Land was donated, money subscribed, a house erected, and on January 15, 1834, the institution was chartered under the corporate name of "Wabash Manual Labor College and Teachers' Seminary," with E. O. Hovey, Williamson Dunn, J. A. Carnahan, Samuel G. Lowry, James Thompson, John S. Thompson, Martin M. Post, and John Gilliland as trustees. Pupils were to be instructed in agriculture and mechanical labor. The trustees were directed by the Legislature, however, " to make it one of their first and
* Extract from Second Address, December 6, 1847.
+ Derived from lands granted to the State by Congress (1816) and authorized to be sold (1832) for the support of schools.
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for a time their most prominent objects in their efforts to promote literature, to provide the means for conducting an English scientific department in the institution, with special reference to the qualification of teachers of the common schools." This special though literary training was the original purpose of the founders, it would seem, but the Legislature declined to grant a charter unless under some such practical name as the above, there being "a prejudice," as it has been expressed, "against colleges, pianos, and Yankees."
By the founders the school was meant to be, and for many years was only, a school of general culture, which, it was hoped, "might grow into a college." The manual labor element was neither prominent nor permanent, and what was then understood by the " preparation of teachers," may be inferred from the claims of its originators. Prof. Mills, writing in 1883, planned "an institution where teachers, both male and female, should be trained," but revealed his notion of this professional training in saying that "it is a matter of higher importance to secure the right teacher for the English department than for the classical, because he will fit teachers for the common schools." It is not clear that the school did more of this preparatory work than did other contemporary institutions. What it did was of the best. But that best was still academic.
Within three weeks * of the opening of Wabash Seminary "The Indiana Teachers' Seminary" was incorporated at Madison, with Williamson Dunn, again, and others as trust- ees. This also was. in the words of the statute, to comprise " a system of manual labor blended with instruction in lit- erature, in such a manner as to be most conducive to health, mental improvement, and the support of the students." No record is preserved that the seminary was ever opened. It was simply a part of an undefined, so uncertain, but spirited movement toward the bettering of the schools-one more
* February 1, 1884.
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only of many unrealized efforts on behalf of public intelli- gence and the general welfare.
But not all attempts were failures. Incidentally, the established seminaries of the time, both public and private, had already contributed to the qualification of teachers, and occasional better teaching was the result. The instruction was not always nor often professional; the academic train- ing was generally meager. But in the decade from 1840 to 1850 hundreds of young men and women passed directly from the seminaries to the township schools as principals, assistants, tutors, etc. The first normal school in the United States had just been established,* and few educators, whether East or West, and fewer yet of legislators and politicians, saw anything in professional training but larger and more accurate scholarship. So that academies were fairly regarded as teachers' schools in proportion as their students became teachers. In this sense a few such institutions were emi- nently professional.
The New Harmony Community School and the Wash- ington County Seminary were opened about the same time (1826), and, in the way named above, both educated teachers for all southern Indiana.
In the "Community School," as teachers, were Francis Joseph Nicholas Neef, Pestalozzian educator, author, and teacher; his daughter, Mrs. Evans; Robert Dale Owen and Prof. Richard Owen; William Phiquepal and M. D'Aras- mont; Mrs. Fauntleroy, a sister of the Owen brothers; and J. Blackwood. What pioneer people were ever so blessed with genius and learning ! It was a new Yverdun or Burg- dorf on a Western frontier.
Neef, the founder. had been a student of Pestalozzi, his representative in Paris, and expounder of the system. Brought to this country by William Maclure, in 1806, he established and for nearly twenty years was principal of a Pestalozzian school in Philadelphia, and in 1826 came by
* At Lexington, Massachusetts, in 1839.
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invitation to New Harmony. Here, in what was modestly known as "the school," were prepared the first teachers in a formal way perhaps in all the West. Mr. Neef's Plan and Method of Education, published in 1808, and his Methods of Teaching, five years later, were among the first pedagogi- cal treatises in America, and almost a generation before Prof. S. R. Hall's Lectures on School Keeping (1829) and Page's Theory and Practice of Teaching (1847). This Pesta- lozzian theory found admirable exposition in the Community School for both young men and young women, to whom it was more than a model school in their later teaching ; it was at once an inspiration and a liberal training .*
The administration of John I. Morrison, comprising nine years in the County Seminary and a longer period in the Salem Female Seminary, was scarcely less fruitful of good to the common schools ; indeed, it was a sort of training school for seminary principals and teachers as well. The work was almost wholly academic, providing only occa- sional talks or lectures on didactics. But it is no small privi- lege to have learned the simplest lesson only, from a real teacher. The ways of the Salem school were significant of the " best method." So that many young teachers, and older ones too, went away from a term or a year with John I. Morrison having clearer aims and purer motives, not less than studious and accurate habits of mind. They were bet- ter teachers, primarily because they were better men and women, but equally because of the enthusiasm for truth and the unselfish interests incident to training in a real school. A large percentage of the students from Salem taught, and the school in this way came to be regarded, and became, a train- ing class for the township schools-indeed, not infrequent.
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