USA > Massachusetts > Franklin County > Deerfield > History of Deerfield, Massachusetts: the times when the people by whom it was settled, unsettled and resettled, vol 2 > Part 17
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1737. The "Farmers" were allowed "5d per week per scholar."
[1739] Voted that there shall be a school house built in the spring. That it be built at or near ye old place, the lower floor one foot be- low ye surface of ye ground, ye upper floor to be made with clay, the dimensions of the House to be 16 feet ye one way, 25 feet ye other, three windows on ye south side, one at each end, two small chim- neys on ye north side with iron mantle peaces
[1740] Voted not to build a school house at Green River nor to hire a school master, ye Selectmen to determine where and how long ye school shall be kept at Green River & so at Town
1741. Voted to petition the General Court for leave to sell lands given for school purposes by Mrs. Hannah Beaman. Leave was granted and Rev. Jona. Ashley became the pur- chaser.
1742. A schoolmaster was allowed at Green River, to be provided by the selectmen, who were also empowered to "get some one to preach " there this winter.
1744. Nov. 23d, voted to Greenfield £60 for 1743-4, for schooling and preaching, to be divided and expended at their will.
S41
TEACHERS' WAGES.
1748. The wages of the school dame at Green River to be 30s, O. T., per week.
1750. A master all the year round allowed Green River school.
1756. "Voted there shall be 23 d per scholar per week al- lowed for ye children that were schooled at Wapping, and the Bars, ye year passed."
1758. The wages of Ruth Hawks for the season were £2, 5 s, 2 d.
[1759] 212 pence a week allowed for scholars at Wapping & Mud- dy Brook
[1760, Oct. 20] Voted to build a new school house of ye Dimen- tions of 22 feet square 7 foot stud to be doubly boarded on the out- side, ye wall filled in & light ceiled & double floored below *
* * to be erected at or near ye front of ye lane between Ebenezer Wells & Jeremiah Nims.
This was the heater piece at the entrance of Memorial Lane.
Oct. 28th, the location was changed to be "on ye south side of ye present school house and as near it as may." This was on the northwest corner of the old "Smead lot" of 1671. The old schoolhouse was converted into a ferry house at the north end of Pine Hill.
1761. The pay for "reading scholars" was 23d, and for "writing scholars" 14d per week.
1763. Voted "that those people who live at the Farms, & have no benefit of ye schools in the Town Plat," shall have their proportion of money to school their own children.
1767. Six pounds allowed Bloody Brook towards building a schoolhouse.
1770. Bloody Brook allowed £2, 16s to hire a master to teach reading and writing.
1771. It was provided that each scholar should furnish one load of wood, and in default thereof to be turned out of school.
December, 23d was allowed Widow Sarah Shattuck and Lucy Wright for each child in their schools at Bloody Brook.
There is very little record of schoolmasters during the Rev- olution. Doubtless schools were kept up.
1779. Voted to hire a schoolmaster constantly in the town, and Wapping was granted £72 (Continental) towards build- ing a schoolhouse.
1782. March 4th, voted " to hire a Grammar Schoolmaster
S42
SCHOOLS-DEERFIELD ACADEMY.
in this town & two schoolmasters from the middle of October to the middle of April next."
1787. At the April meeting a new leaf was turned over. "Col. Joseph Stebbins, Col. T. W. Dickinson, Samuel Childs, Lieut. John Bardwell & Samuel Harding," were chosen a com- mittee to examine into the subject, and report whether or not it were best to adopt a new method of schooling the chil- dren. They reported an acceptable plan, under which the town was divided into six districts, "for the ensuing year." The districts are named below, with the amount of money assigned to each. This must be a pretty close guide to the population in the different parts of the town at this date :-
Town Street and Cheapside, £40 14, 10
Wapping and Bars,
9
Great River, 5
12,
Muddy Brook, IO
15,
Mill River,
8
4,
West Side of Deerfield River,
5
8.
In the town street two schools were kept, but a need was felt for better accommodations and a higher grade of instruc- tion. To meet this lack, fifteen citizens of the village, vis .. Maj. Salah Barnard, Maj. Seth Catlin, Dea. Jona. Arms, Ens. Joseph Barnard, Simeon Harvey, Samuel Field, Esq., Col. Jo- seph Stebbins, Eliphalet Dickinson, Col. Thomas W. Dickin- son, Aaron Arms, Dr. Elihu Ashley, Capt. John Locke, John Williams, Esq., and Zur Hawks, met Oct. 8th, 1787, and formed themselves into a sort of a corporation, under the title of " Proprietors of the New School." The corporation was offi- cered by John Williams, clerk; Salah Barnard, treasurer ; Salah Barnard, Jona. Arms and John Williams, assessors.
Westwood C. Wright was employed, and before the first of January, 1788, he built a schoolhouse on the spot where Philo Munn's shop now stands. Each share represented two schol- arships, and the school could not exceed thirty pupils. The shares were transferable to such parties only as the corpora- tion approved. At a meeting, Jan. 21st, 1788, it was agreed to pay 6s a week for the schoolmaster's board; to keep the school from 8.30 to 12 A. M., and 1.30 to 5 P. M. A commit- tee was raised to appraise firewood, making the standard, oak, at 6s per cord ; and another committee to prepare a code of rules and orders. The cost of the building and expenses for
843
HOW FUNDS WERE PROVIDED.
the first quarter was £150. Freegrace Reynolds was the first teacher. Mr. Reynolds was born in Somers, Ct., 1767, was graduated at Yale in 1787, and licensed to preach in 1790; of this license he availed himself so far as to preach to one par- ish in Connecticut, nine in Vermont and seven in Massachu- setts, his last settlement being at Leverett, Dec. 5th, 1832. He left there in 1837 to spend his last days in Wilmington, Mass., it is to be hoped, in peace. The school proved a suc- cess, and I notice it as the germ from which the Deerfield Academy sprung ten years later.
Deerfield Academy. The act establishing this institution was approved by Samuel Adams, governor, March 21st, 1797. The men of the old corporation named in this act were John Williams, Seth Catlin, Joseph Stebbins and Joseph Barnard. The papers of the Academy corporation were destroyed when the house of the secretary, Dexter Childs, was burned, and no connected account can be found of the preliminaries for organizing this new enterprise. It appears that an applica- tion was made to the town for aid, but by a vote July 4th, 1796, it was refused, and that the money for putting up a school building was raised by a general contribution among the men of Deerfield in sums of from twenty to one hundred dollars, amounting to about thirteen hundred dollars, and notes for payment were given March 30th, 1797. At the same date about fourteen hundred dollars was raised by subscrip- tion as a permanent fund. This was in sums ranging from twenty to one hundred and fifty dollars secured by bonds at six per cent. interest. Sample bonds are still extant ; at least six of these were running so late as 1830. This was the nu- cleus of the fund lately transferred to the trustees of the Dickinson Academy.
The first meeting of the trustees was held April 18th, 1797, at the tavern of Erastus Barnard, the present "Frary House." Rev. Roger Newton of Greenfield, was chosen president; Rev. John Taylor, vice-president ; Deacon Jona. Arms, treas- tirer ; and Dr. Wm. S. Williams, secretary ; a committee was chosen to buy an acre of land of Seth Nims, on the south part of his home lot. This is the land on which Memorial Hall now stands ; it cost $333-34. A committee was also chos- en to report a plan of a building. June ISth, this committee reported in favor of a brick structure 60 x 26 feet, two stories,
844
SCHOOLS-DEERFIELD ACADEMY.
with a piazza at one end, and a cupola on the roof; this re- port was accepted, and Esq. John Williams, Joseph Barnard and Maj. David Dickinson chosen a building committee. At a later meeting the piazza was cut off, and the width made 28 feet. In this form it was built the same year; the bricks were made on the Nims lot, a few rods to the east, where a brick yard was continued some thirty or forty years. In 1797 the fund of the Academy was increased by a grant from the Massachusetts Legislature of one-half of a township of land in Maine. No account of the disposition of this land has been found.
At a meeting of the trustees, Dec. 31st, 1798, - thus reads the record,-
A number of gentlemen and donors to the Academy, considering the present occasion, and wishing to be instrumental in promoting the convenience and gratifying the curiosity of a respectable con- course of spectators, pray that leave may be granted them to illumi- nate the Academy building to-morrow evening; and from the best information, we presume a great number of strangers will attend which cannot be provided for in the manner in which our inclination suggests ; we therefore beg permission for once, the occupancy of the hall for the evening.
What the "inclinations" of the petitioners might "suggest" did not appear to the guardians of the property, and the re- quest was promptly refused. After a personal interview, however, and grave deliberation, a guarded assent was given.
January ist, 1799, was a gala day in Old Deerfield, and an important era in her history. On this day the Academy was formally opened, and dedicated by a sermon in the meeting- house by Rev. Joseph Lyman of Hatfield, one of the trustees. The meeting being adjourned to the Academy, Roger New- ton, president of the board, formally inducted Enos Bron- son into the office of Preceptor of the Deerfield Academy, and delivered him the keys of the building. Of the illumi- nation and occupancy of the hall in the evening no report has been received.
The first quarter closed March 25th, 1799, with forty-nine pupils. The average for the year was sixty-seven to the term, a total of two hundred and sixty-nine ; of these, sixty- eight only were from Deerfield. Northampton sent nineteen; Greenfield, eighteen; Conway, seventeen; Northfield, thir- teen ; Hadley, eleven; Brattleboro and Suffield, each ten;
S45
BIOGRAPHICAL NOTICE OF PRECEPTORS.
Shelburne, eight; Amherst, Hatfield, Springfield, Vt., and Wilmington, Vt., each six; Ashfield, five ; Colrain, four; Al- bany, Dalton, Ashby, Guilford, Greenwich, Hawley, three; Hardwick, Longmeadow, Royalston, Springfield and Whate- ly, two; and one each from Brookfield, Buckland, Easthamp- ton, Great Barrington, Heath, Lebanon, N. Y., Montague, New Salem, Putney, Vt., Southampton, Stockbridge, War- wick, Westhampton, Westfield and Worthington. The quar- ter bills paid by the pupils for the year, amounted to $690.88.
Generous donations were made to furnish the philosophi- cal apparatus and endow the library, notably by David Wells of Greenfield; Abigail Norton, Jona. Arms and Col. Asa Stebbins of Deerfield. In 1806, Col. Stebbins presented a " Planetarium " and " Lunarium," and his name was ordered to be engraved thereon. Many similar votes to benefactors were recorded by the secretary.
In 1803, the trustees had leave of the town to build pews in the back parts of the north and south galleries in the meet- inghouse.
For ten years the school had been prosperous, and proved by its usefulness, the wisdom of its founders, its right to be. and its good management. Larger accommodations were now required, and, in 1809, the trustees voted to enlarge the building by the addition of another story, and a wing thirty feet square on the northwest side. Hitherto the preceptors had short terms of service. Mr. Bronson, the first, but one term ; he was a graduate of Yale, 1798, and died in 1823 ; John Williams, Jr., was usher. His successor, Claudius Herrick, was of Yale, in the same class with Mr. Bronson ; he entered the ministry in 1801, and died in r831. Mr. Herrick delivered an oration at Deerfield, at the obsequies of Washington, be- fore noted, and another July 4th, 1800, which was printed. His son, Edward Claudius Herrick, born in New Haven, 1811, was the learned librarian of Yale College, from 1842 to 1858, and contributed to the American Journal of Science valuable papers on etymology, meteorology and astronomy. Elijah Alvord of Greenfield was usher. Samuel Fisher, who had also been usher under Mr. Herrick, was promoted to the head of the Academy, to be followed in one year by Henry Lord of Killingworth, Ct., a graduate of Yale in 1801. He became a minister and died in 1834. John Hubbard, who
846
SCHOOLS-DEERFIELD ACADEMY.
succeeded Mr. Lord, was born in Townsend in 1769, a gradu- ate of Dartmouth in 1785. He was a man of considerable note; Judge of Probate for Cheshire County, N. H., from 1798 to 1802, when he came to Deerfield. He left his office here to become Professor of Mathematics and Natural Philosophy at Dartmouth, was author of Rudiments of Geography, Ameri- can Reader, and other publications, and died at Hanover in 1810. His successor, Allen Greeley, a graduate of Dartmouth in 1804, was here but three terms, he became a minister, and was tutor at Middlebury College and lived till 1866. His classmate, Avery Williams of Leverett, a graduate of Deer- field Academy, who followed him for two terms, was also a minister, and died in 1816. The next preceptor was John Chester of Wethersfield, Ct., a graduate of Yale in 1804, a classmate of John C. Calhoun; he began to preach at Hart- ford in 1807, became a D. D., and died in 1829. He was suc- ceeded in 1806 by Hosea Hildreth, a graduate of Harvard in 1805 ; he became a minister and died in 1835. His son, Rich- ard Hildreth, the celebrated journalist and historian, was born here, in the Dr. Willard house, June 28th, 1807. Mr. Hildreth's assistant was Israel Wells of Shelburne. A new departure was made this year, under the pressure of the times. A military professorship was added to the curriculum, under Maj. Epaphras Hoyt, who taught the "Theoretical and practical art of war," with instructions in the field, in geome- try, the elements of fortification and the construction of small works.
The first preceptress was Miss Eunice Woodbridge, en- gaged for the summer term of 1802; her career in this field came to an untimely end by marriage to John Williams, one of the trustees. At the annual meeting of the corporation Mr. Williams had been chosen on a committee "to manage the interests of the trustees." As far as the interest of one trustee was concerned he appears to have been eminently successful in his management. He had been a generous ben- efactor to the Academy, and might have looked upon the whole transaction in the light of an Indian gift. It was, how- ever, as we shall see, a dangerous precedent. Undismayed by the fate of her predecessor, Sally Williams, a graduate of Deerfield Academy, which she entered at the age of twenty- one, next accepted the office ; she was a relative of Esq. John
847
BY-LAWS.
and probably furnished by him as a substitute for the late Miss Woodbridge; she remained two years, when she received another call similar to that of her predecessor. She died March 28th, 1845. Miss Jerusha Williams, a descendant of our first minister, was preceptress from 1806 to 1811.
At the period we are considering, this institution stood in the front rank of the Academies in the land. With an estab- lished reputation, and enlarged facilities for usefulness, the trustees hoped by pursuing the same policy to place it, at the end of a second decennial, on a still higher plane.
In 1810, the enlargement of the building was completed, mnuch as we see it to-day in Memorial Hall. Twelve rooms were fitted up for boarders, a bell bought to call them to time, and Asahel Wright engaged for a steward. At the opening of the Academy under the new establishment "the preceptors and ushers, besides teaching the arts and sciences, were directed to instill into the minds of the pupils moral and Christian principles, and form in them habits of virtue and the love of piety." The standard of admission was raised, the study of natural history, natural philosophy and logic en- couraged, and " no person was suffered to attend to painting, embroidery, or any other of the ornamental branches to the neglect of the essential and fundamental parts of education." It was under this rule, perhaps, that for many years there was no chattering of foreign tongues, and no jargon of the dead languages heard within these walls. Addisonian and Johnsonian mother-tongue were good enough for Yankees in those days. For the regulation of affairs at the school, a brief code of by-laws, of only thirty-six articles, was provided. A few extracts will be made for the benefit of the boys and girls who may think the regulations of to-day rather "strict." Pupils of different sexes were not allowed to meet upon the grounds or within the walls of the Academy except at meals and prayers, nor walk or ride or visit together, under a pen- alty of one dollar. None were allowed to be absent from meeting, Sunday, Fast or Thanksgiving day, under a penalty of one dollar, and a fine of one dollar was sure if they didn't behave well when there. For walking in the streets and fields, or visiting, Saturday night or Sunday, there was a fine of one dollar. No playing cards, backgammon or checkers in the building, without a loss of the inevitable dollar, if detect-
848
SCHOOLS-DEERFIELD ACADEMY.
ed. It is to be hoped that the pupils were well supplied with pocket money, otherwise there must have been a great com- motion amongst the "dollars of the fathers" about which so much is said now-a-days. Perhaps it was at the suggestion of these said fathers that a close board fence was built from the south side of the Academy across the yard to the road, to keep the boys and girls apart. Of course, separate entrances to the building and separate schoolrooms were provided.
Playing ball or similar games near the Academy was pro- hibited under a penalty of six cents, and a fine of six cents for any found out of their rooms during study hours. The morning prayers were at five o'clock, or as soon as it was light enough to read, with a fine of four cents for absence and two cents for being tardy ; study hours commenced an hour later. Fines were imposed for damage to library books or books belonging to each other, at the rate of six cents for a blot, six cents for each drop of tallow; for every leaf torn six cents an inch, for every letter written on it, inside or out, two cents, for every mark or scratch two cents. After numerous other offenses were provided with suitable penalties, the pre- ceptor seems to have had a general commission to impose a fine of fifty cents whenever he had the toothache, or the wind happened to be in the east.
The first preceptor I have found under the new establish- ment was Rev. Edward Tucker from Heath. He occupied the building and boarded scholars at $1.50 a week, and charged for rooms from 75 ets. to $1.50 per week.
Aaron Arms, a Deerfield boy, a graduate of the Academy in 1809, and of Yale in 1813, came fresh from the latter insti- tution to preside over the former. This he did with credit and success for two years, when he left to read law. He was admitted to the Franklin County Bar in 1817. He died in 1849.
Edward Hitchcock, another Deerfield boy, born in 1793, whose entire school education was obtained at six winter terms of this institution, while working as a farm laborer the rest of the year, was the next preceptor, and although for many years the moving spirit and president of Amherst Col- lege, and the recipient of high honors from Harvard and Yale, he was never a graduate of any other institution than this.
While a pupil three months, and farm laborer nine months
S49
THE SELF-MADE MAN.
in the year, he had developed an ardent love for studying the science of nature that marked the coming man. His favor- ite study was astronomy, and this he pursued with an ardor which nothing but physical disability could subdue. When the astronomical apparatus in the Academy failed to meet his wants, his ingenuity was equal to devising and manufactur- ing instruments to supply his requirements.
In 1817, Mr. Hitchcock asks the co-operation of the public in collecting specimens of the minerals and compound rocks of the county, to be deposited in the Academy. Thus was made an important addition to the museum.
It was while Mr. Hitchcock was at the head of this Acad- emy that he boldly entered the lists in a contest with the as- tronomers of Europe, and came off victor, after a sharp and prolonged contest, astonishing the magnates there by his skill and power. It is risking but little to say, that, but for a partial failure in his eyesight, Dr. Hitchcock would have made a place for himself by the side of the leading men of the world, in this, his first chosen field.
While holding the office of preceptor he found time to make the necessary astronomical observations for the alma- nacs which he published in 1813, 14, 15, 16 and 17. That he did not meanwhile neglect his duties as a teacher, is proved by the fact that one of his pupils, Rebecca Jackson of New- ton, in addition to the required "essential and fundamental parts of education," found time to learn the paths of the planets, and to calculate eclipses of the sun and moon. I question whether another person in town, not a pupil of Mr. Hitchcock, save Gen. Epaphras Hoyt, can, or ever could, trace the trackless spheres through space and mark the mo- ment and manner of their meeting.
During all the years he labored here as preceptor, Mr. Hitchcock had an able assistant in Miss Orra White. She, too, could calculate eclipses, and she calculated to, and did, eclipse from her unsophisticated superior all the shining lights of his native town. When leaving this institution in 1819,-having before him the example of the trustee who en- ticed away the first preceptress,-Mr. Hitchcock made no scruple of engaging Miss Orra to go with him as his assistant for life.
The income from tuition bills for 1812 was $555, in 1813
850
SCHOOLS-DEERFIELD ACADEMY.
it was $385, with no essential change until the last year of Mr. Hitchcock, when it fell off to $289. The last two terms of 1819 were exclusively a girl's school, the income from which was only $89, which proves conclusively-something,- but I don't know what. And so the second decade of the life of Deerfield Academy closed.
Leaving a rich field for future research, I give only a bare and imperfect list of the preceptresses and preceptors after 1819 to its union with the High School in 1876 :-
Mary Bancroft [sister of the historian],
Mrs. C. M. Crittenden,
Ellen Gage,
Joseph Anderson, Charles G. Corse,
Sarah B. Goodhue,
Mary Cruttenden,
Winthrop Bailey,
Jane Pidgeon,
Sarah B. Willard,
Luther B. Lincoln,
Martha Harding,
Susan M. Lane,
Samuel Willard, Jr.,
Emily Draper,
C. Alice Baker,
Cotton M. Crittenden,
Charlotte Catlin,
Mary E. Young,
John M. Thompson,
Hannah Ripley,
Emily Poor,
Henry K. Warriner,
Harriet R. Stone,
Mrs. V. M. Howard,
J. C. Brown,
Mary Willard,
Jona. A. Saxton,
R. D. Smith,
Mrs. Susan B. Lincoln,
Henry P. Kendell,
Benj. S. Lyman,
Lucretia Wilson,
Joseph Field,
Horatio Alger,
Eliza A. Starr,
Frederick H. Allen,
George W. Bartlett,
Martha Carter,
Zenas Clapp,
Virgil M. Howard.
In 1819 there was a strong movement for relocating Wil- liams College, and Deerfield put in a claim to have it brought here. May 15th, 1819, while the matter was under consider- ation in the legislature, a committee of that body gave a hear- ing on the question to the Deerfield people. Northampton people argued for that place as more central, and promised $50,000 for the benefit of the college, and the legislative com- inittee favored that town. Williamstown opposed any change and in 1820 the committee reported in favor of leaving the college undisturbed.
Dickinson Academy and Deerfield High School is a free institution founded, in 1876, under the will of Esther Harding Dickinson. Soon after, the funds of the Deerfield Acad- emny were transferred to the trustees of the Dickinson school; a new building was erected on the home lot of Mrs. Dickinson for the use of the school, and also for a free library and read- ing room. Here boys and girls are fitted for college. At Bloody Brook there is a high school in a building put up by the town, and a good library has been established there.
Pocumtuck Valley Memorial Association. The first public utterance, which was to test the feelings of the people con- cerning associated action in perpetuating the memory of our
851
ANTIQUARIES ORGANIZE.
ancestors, was an appeal through the county newspaper in September, 1869. The response to this was such that the Pocumtuck Valley Memorial Association was formed; this was chartered by the Massachusetts legislature, May, 1870. The avowed purpose of the association was :-
Collecting and preserving such memorials, books, records, papers and curiosities, as may tend to illustrate and perpetuate the history of the early settlers of this region, and of the race which vanished before them, and the erection of a Memorial Hall in which such col- lections can be securely deposited.
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