USA > Massachusetts > Middlesex County > Woburn > The history of Woburn, Middlesex County, Mass. from the grant of its territory to Charlestown, in 1640, to the year 1680 > Part 24
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From the time that a grammar school was established and constantly kept in Woburn, the town seems to have considered this school as fully answering the design of the law, and so to have neglected the maintenance of other schools for teaching children to read and write : for the Records make no mention, after 1700, of the appointment of any teachers, male or female, for this office, or of granting them any compensation. There can be no doubt, however, that women's schools, for this purpose, were still kept here by private subscription. For, at a general meeting, March 1, 1724-5, liberty was voted and given " to several of the inhabitants that should agree to set up a school house for children to learn to read in, upon the town's land in the street, where it may be most convenient ; and the Selectmen to set out the place." 39 And the liberty granted by this vote not being, apparently, for some reason, improved, another vote was passed at a general meeting, March 4, 1733-4, by which leave was given to several persons who had petitioned for that end, to erect a small school-house near the meeting-house, where the Selectmen shall appoint, for the accommodation of a school-mistress to instruct their children to read, and other things that are necessary to learn.40 And such a house, it is probable, was built, and employed for the use intended, though the Records are afterwards silent respecting it.
The grammar school in Woburn was originally kept, year
88 Town Records, Vol. VII., p. 521. 20 Town Records, Vol. VI., p. 213.
40 Town Records, Vol. VII., p. 171.
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after year, in one place only, viz, in the centre of the town. But at a general meeting, March 3, 1706-7, it was agreed as follows : “ Forasmuch as our Town of Woobourne (is) situated very scattering and remoat, so that the whole Town (cannot) be benefitted alike, by the Schoolmaster's keeping the Schoole in the Senter of the Town at all times, that therefore the Schoole Master for the time being (shall) keep the Schoole one quarter of the year in the Center of the Town, and the other three quar- ters of the year in three of the remoat Quarters of the Town, according to the direction and appointment of the Selectmen for the time being." 41 This vote laid the foundation of the moving school system, which was much, though not uniformly practised in this town during a large part of the last century. By this, the grammar school and its instructor were moved round into the different sections of the town, for lengths of time propor- tionate to the taxes they paid, by order of the Selectmen, or some other committee of the town's appointment. At first, only three of the remote quarters were named for the school to be moved to; and in each of these it was to be kept an equal time as in the centre. But as settlements in the town extended and multiplied, the school seems to have been wholly omitted some years in the centre; and the number of places in which it was kept in the outskirts was increased.
The ercetion of a school-house in the centre, by private individuals, in 1713, caused a temporary check to the moving system, as it was probably intended to; for we read nothing in the Records of keeping school in the quarters for six years afterwards. But at the annual meeting, March 2, 1718-9, it was voted that the grammar school-master for the time to come should " goe into the quarters of the Town" : from six weeks to two months into the end of the town where Deacon Walker lives [Goshen, or Wilmington]; as long as that, into the end where Deacon Johnson lives [Shawshin, or Burlington] ; and as long as that into the West, and then as long into the East end.42 At March meeting, 1728-9, it was voted " that the School Master
" Town Records, Vol. V., p. 42.
" Town Records, Vol. VI., pp. 48, 49.
20
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HISTORY OF WOBURN.
should move ; " and further, " that the School should be moved so far as Mr. Thomas Belknap's [on the road to South Woburn, or Winchester] their proportion; and to Sergeant Thomas Reed's house [West end] their proportion; and to Sergt. Ben- jamin Johnson's [Burlington] their proportion; and to the School house at Goshen [Wilmington] their proportion; and to the house of Samuel Eames [East Woburn] their proportion." 43 At a town meeting, February 2, 1737-8, after resolving that the school should be a movable one, the present and the ensuing year (that is, the remainder of 1737, as then calculated, and through 1738), it was voted that (1) the Precinct, (2) the Rich- ardsons and the Carters at the southerly part of the town, (3) the West, (4) the East, (5) New Bridge, should each have the school among them according to what they pay; that the school should move to the southerly part of Richardson's Row for them and the Carters; and that the Selectmen should state the place where the school should be kept.44 And at March meeting, 1741-2, the town having appointed the Selectmen a committee to provide a master for the grammar school that year, and voted that he should move into the different quarters, proceeded to choose Licut. Joseph Richardson, Lieut. James Proctor, Lieut. Samuel Carter, Ensign Samuel Wyman, Mr. Ebenezer Flagg, Mr. William Tay and Mr. Timothy Brooks, as a committee " to agree and determine on the severall places the Schoolmaster shall keep the Schoole at, in said Town, and the time at each place, the year ensuing "; and to report to the Selectmen, who were empowered to direct the master to go to the places, and to keep the terms of time agreed upon, agreeably to the committee's Report. 45 Accordingly, the Selectmen immediately engaged Mr. James Fowle to keep the grammar school in Woburn a year, for £70, Old Tenor; and shortly after, the committee for determin- ing the places where the school should be kept, and how long in each place, reported to the Selectmen as follows: That the school should remove :
" Town Records, Vol. VI., p. 369.
" Town Records, Vol. VII., p. 267. 45 Town Records, Vol. VII., pp. 304-306.
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HISTORY OF WOBURN.
1. To Lieut. Samuel Kendall's (Kendall's Mill) on the 22d day of March inst. and there keep till May 9th.
2. Thence to the School house (in the Centre) till July 11th.
3. Thence to New Bridge, " house of Martha Tidds', or elsewhere," till August 8th.
4. Thence to the house of Lieut. Joseph Richardson Jr. till Sept' 19th.
5. Thence to the Precinet, at some place that they shall agree upon, till Dec' 31st.
6. Thence to the Carter's Quarter (South Village) house of Mr. Ebene- zer Convers, till (Ist) Monday in March next.
Signed by the Committee, March 18, 1741-2.45
In this brief view of the operation of the moving school system in Woburn, from its commencement in 1707 till 1742, we may observe, that while the school-house, in the centre of the Old Parish, is mentioned only once among the places, in which, in the different years enumerated above, the grammar school was ordered to be kept, the places in the outskirts for keeping it in had increased from three to five. While some conveniences resulted from this plan of conducting the school, its incon- veniences to all parties concerned were many and serious. So much trouble was it wont to occasion the teacher, that Master Fowle petitioned the town one year, 1760 (but without success), to make him some additional allowance besides his salary, “ in consideration of the fatigues he hath had by reason of there being so many removals of (his) school." 46 The frequency of these removals in the course of a year, and the shortness of the time the school was kept in some of the quarters, (viz : from a month to six weeks only) were both of them unfavorable circum- stances to the comfort and improvement of the scholars. The appointments, too, of time and place for the school by the com- mittee (judging of them as well as we can at this distance of time) appear to have been, in some instances, injudicious, and in others to lie open to the suspicion of partiality. For example, by the last quoted arrangement for January and February, 1742-3, a season of the year, when the severity of the weather, the badness of the travelling, and the superior opportunities which children in the country then usually enjoy for attending
" Town Records, Vol. VIII., pp. 285, 288.
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HISTORY OF WOBURN.
school, would naturally have led the committee, one would sup- pose, to fix upon the school-house in the centre, as the most eligible place for keeping the school, and calculated to accommo- date the largest number of pupils, it was ordered to the south- ernmost extremity of the town, and where, in going to it, a very large proportion of the children and youth, probably a majority of the whole, must have been obliged to travel from two to five miles, or relinquish the privilege of attending school altogether. At times, too, the several committees for fixing the location of the school year after year, gave cause to the inhabitants of some of the quarters to conceive themselves to be slighted. There is on file an original petition to the Selectmen without date, but written probably about 1742, and subscribed by twenty-eight inhabitants of Button End, complaining that they had not had the school among them for nearly thirty years; and carnestly requesting that it might be kept that year in their neighborhood, at the house of Capt. Joseph Richardson, Jr., where accommo- dations were provided for it.
All these circumstances caused a growing dissatisfaction with the system, and eventually a powerful opposition to it, although many years a majority was found in town meeting who voted in favor of it. At March meeting, 1744, the town voted that the Precinet should have their proportion of the school the year ensuing ; and their proportional part of the time being deducted, the school should be kept the remainder of the year in the Old Parish, in one place as near the meeting-house as a spot to set a school-house on could be procured. 47 And at March meet- ing, 1748, it was voted, (1) that the Precinet should have the school that should be kept the present year, their proportionate part of the time; and. (2) that the school should not be removed about in the First Parish the ensuing year, " but be kept in the School House near the Old Meeting House in said town the rest of the year," after deducting the Second Parish's proportionable part.48 Votes to the same purpose with this last were passed in the years 1749, 1750, 1751, 1752, 1753, 1754 and 1755.
47 Town Records, Vol. VII., p. 410.
" Town Records, Vol. VII., p. 539.
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HISTORY OF WOBURN.
In 1756, the town reverted, in part, to the moving plan. After voting, March 1, that the school should be kept in the Precinct, and in the school-house near the new meeting-house (of the Old Parish), their proportional part, voted, that it should also be moved to the East and West sides, as the Selectmen should pro- portion the time ; but, if either side neglected to provide a house for the school, it was to be kept in the Centre School-house. 49 And, although the three next years the school was ordered again into the quarters, yet, the year following, 1760, this plan was again abandoned, and the grammar school confined to the Pre- cinet, and the centre of the Old Parish. And between that year and 1775, the system of moving the Grammar School into the several different quarters of the town was laid aside, excepting the years 1762, 1767 and 1768, and the school was kept only in the Precinct, and at the school-house in the centre of the First Parish.
In 1760 commenced the institution of schools different from the grammar school, and inferior to it, in the remote parts of the town. That year, after voting, at March meeting, that the Precinct should have its proportional part of "the School," (meaning, the grammar school) the year ensuing, and that the rest of the time the school was keeping, it should be kept in the school-house in the First Parish, and not be removed, and after choosing a committee to provide a person suitable to take the charge of such school, it was voted in May, that "they would allow to each of the extream parts," (meaning the East, South and West parts) "of the first parish in said town the sum of thirty-three pounds six shillings and eight pence, Old Tenor, or equivalent in Lawfull Money, to be draughted out of their Treasury by each part, provided they appropriate said money in hireing some suita- ble person to keep a school for the instruction of their children before the first day of March next."50 Votes, of a similar pur- port, were passed by the town, several of the subsequent years previous to 1775. In 1761, for example, £400, Old Tenor, was raised "for maintaining the Grammar School and other Schools"
" Town Records, Vol. VIII., p. 172.
50 Town Records, Vol. VIII., p. 291.
20*
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in the town that year. Of this sum, £100 was granted, to be equally divided between the extreme parts of the First Parish, "provided they hire some suitable person to keep a school for the instruction of their children," in the course of that year.51 In 1773, £40, lawful money, was raised for schools in Woburn; of which sum, £3 6s. 8d. was allotted expressly to each of the east- erly, southerly and westerly extremes, £10 in all, for the instruc- tion of the children in those quarters; and a committee was chosen to procure a suitable person or persons, for performing this service among them, and for determining the times and places of cach school, while another committee was chosen to provide a suitable master to keep the grammar school nine months, viz, five months in the school-house in the First Parish, and four months in the Precinet.52 In March 1774, £40, lawful money, was raised for the grammar school, to be kept in the Precinet its propor- tional part, and the rest of the time in the school-honse near the meeting-house in the First Parish; and in May, £15 more, lawful money, was raised for schools in the remote parts of the town; whereof, £5 was appropriated to the Precinet, as their propor- tionate part, and the remaining £10, to the instruction of children in the extreme part of the First Parish.53 And, finally, in 1775, forty pounds was raised for schooling that year, of which sum cach parish was to take its proportionate part, and had liberty to unite with each other in hiring a grammar school- master to serve the town in that capacity nine months that year, and " the remaining part of said forty pounds to be appropriated for the instruction of the children in the extream parts of the parishes, as each parish shall think will be for their best interest, and to no other use." 54
Thus was inaugurated a system of graded schools in Woburn, , which had apparently much influence in setting aside the old custom of a moring grammar school, and in laying the foundations of the school districts which followed. As late as 1775, there were no school-houses in which to keep the schools in the outskirts; but they were kept in such private houses, and for
51 Town Records, Vol. VIII., p. 312.
& Town Records, Vol. IX., pp. 235, 239.
& Town Records, Vol. 1X., p. 198.
" Town Records, Vol. IX., p. 276,
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HISTORY OF WOBURN.
such lengths of time, in proportion to their taxes, as a committee, appointed by the town for the purpose, was pleased to determine. They were taught by male teachers, engaged for this employment by a committee nominated by the town at March or May meet- ing; and as the pay of these teachers was smaller, so it is to be presumed that their work was less laborious and diversified than that of the instructors of the grammar school.
It would be gratifying to exhibit here a complete list of the books used in the Woburn schools during the period of the above survey ; but such a list, it would now be hardly possible to find or collect. But the following school-books are still extant in Bur- lington (Woburn precinct), inscribed, some of them, with the names of their former owners, natives of Woburn, and pupils of its schools before 1775, and all of them furnishing strong tokens of having been studied in those schools previously to the year just named.
1. " The Universal Spelling Book"etc. (place and date of printing lost) : Part II. of which is styled " An casy Guide to English Grammar, by Way of Question and Answer etc. etc.
Let all the foreign Tongues alone,
Till you can read and spell your own."
2. " The Youth's Instructor in the English Tongue: (Title page wanting) In three parts ; of which part III. contains " Rules in Arithmetic, with Forms of Bills, Bonds, Releases etc. etc."
3. "A New Guide to the English Tongue : In Five Parts :
The Twenty Second Edition : By Thomas Dilworth, School Master etc. London 1760."
[With a likeness of the author prefixed, dressed in the costume of an English school-master of that day.]
N. B. The work last mentioned has lost a number of pages. Part III. contains " A short, but comprehensive Grammar of the English Tongue, delivered in the most familiar and Instructive Method of Question and Answer," etc. etc. Part IV. " An useful Collection of Sentences in Prose and Verse; Divine, Moral and Historical," etc. ; and Part V. " Forms of Prayer for Children, on several Occasions."
236
HISTORY OF WOBURN.
Such was the condition of the public schools in Woburn, and the progress evidently made in them, between 1690 and 1775. At the commencement of the above term of time, primary schools were but feebly and meanly sustained by the town; and as to a grammar school, scholars could not be found to attend onc. But long before the completion of that period, a grammar school was constantly maintained in Woburn; highly respectable teach- ers were encouraged to take charge of it ; and parents manifested much solicitude that their children might enjoy its privileges, and that it might be located where they could conveniently attend it.
And here it may not be amiss to give some account of a con- tention respecting one of the masters of the grammar school during that period, with which the whole town was agitated. In July 1725, the Selectmen, being the School Committee, hired Mr. Ebenezer Flegg, a nephew of their chairman, Col. Eleazar Flegg [Flagg], to keep the grammar school three months.55 But it appears that previously to this, one or more of the Selectmen, or some one authorized by them, had spoken to Mr. Timothy Walker, a son of Deacon Samuel Walker, in such terms as that he considered the school as engaged to him, and was unwilling to give it up. Mr. Flegg commenced keeping the school July 26, according to agreement; and Mr. Walker still insisting upon his right, the Selectmen were requested to call a meeting of the town to settle the difficulty; but this they refused to do. Whereupon, application was made to Oliver Whiting, Esq., of Billerica, a justice of the peace, who granted a warrant for the meeting of the inhabitants of Woburn, " to reconcile the differ- ence that has happened relating to their Schoolmasters, and to determine which of them shall keep the said Town Schoole." 56
53 Col. "Flegg's" name and that of his nephew are here spelt as they are found In Woburn Records, although Gershom, the Colonel's father's name, and that of his remoter descendants in Woburn to this day, Is spelt Flagg. Dr. Bond, however, in his " Genealogles " and History of the Early Settlers of Watertown, where the Woburn Flaggs originated, observes, that there can be but very little doubt that the spelling of their name Flagg, though now universally prevalent, is erroneous, and that the correct orthography is Flegg. - See Bond's Genealogies, etc .. p. 762.
10 Town Records, Vol. VI., p. 224.
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HISTORY OF WOBURN.
At that meeting, August 27, 1725, "after considerable debate," the Moderator, Mr. Ebenezer Johnson, ordered Capt. Fowle, the Town Clerk, to put upon record the warrant by which they were then met, and also to record Mr. Timothy Walker as school-master for the current year. At the same time, forty- three persons entered a protest against passing, at that meeting, any votes to be put upon the Town Book.56 In accordance, however, with the above injunction given by the Moderator to the Town Clerk, Mr. Walker seems now to have been forcibly put in possession of the town school-house. But as the Select- men, who were the School Committee, still refused to acknowl- edge his claims, he appealed to the law, by entering a complaint in the Supreme Court against them and the Town Clerk. Mr. Flegg appears to have continued keeping school in some private dwelling, under the patronage of the Selectmen; and when his first engagement expired, they prolonged it one month more ; 57 and then hired a different master for the remainder of the year. They also, in opposition to the meeting in August preceding, or in order to justify themselves and the course they had taken in view of the community, called another meeting, January 6, 1725-6 : the warrant for which is not upon record, but at which it was voted, among other particulars,
1. " That the publick schoole and schoolchonse in said Town should be under the care and regulation of the Selectmen of said Town as formerly.
2. " That the Selectmen should prosecute in the Law any person or persons that shall pretend and doc keep possession of the publick Schoolhouse of said Town, without their order ; and also proscente in the Law any person or persons that shall demolish or harme the same.
3. " That what was voted at a meeting of some of the free- holders and other inhabitants of said Town upon the twenty- seventh of August last past concerning Schoolemasters should be null and void, it being counted irregular." 58
But before any votes were taken on this occasion, except that for the choice of Moderator, a large number of the inhabitants
57 Town Records, Vol. VI., p. 262.
18 Town Records, Vol. VI., p. 245.
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HISTORY OF WOBURN.
present entered a Protest against any further action upon the articles of the Warrant, for the following reasons among others, viz :
" 1. Because that in the Preface to the Warrant for this meet- ing it seems to be intimated, that the Town is to signifie their minds concerning the difference in Town relating to the Gram- mar Schoole : Whereas we esteem [it] very unnecessary for the Town to give themselves the trouble to signifie their minds con- cerning a matter that is already in the hand of authority, and waits for a determination ; the signification of the Town's mind concerning which will be of no consequence, neither pro nor (con) : and also we esteem it high presumption and contempt, for the Town thus to pretend to wrest the sword of Justice out of the hands of the King's Justices.
"2. Secondly, Because that the first Particular mentioned in said warrant seems to be grounded upon a supposition, that private men have hired a Grammar Schoole master, and put him into the publick Schoole house of said Town; which supposition is absolutely false ; and therefore for the Town to be convened to signifie their minds concerning a matter that is not, nor as we know of, ever will be, is grossly absurd.
"3. But granting the supposition to be true. yet the Law prescribes that nothing shall be enacted at a Town Meeting, but what is plainly set forth in the warrant, to the end that all men may be well apprised of the occasion of their meeting; but yet in any of the particulars of this warrant they have neither set forth who the schoole master is, nor the private men that have hired him.
" 5. Because - what in the second particular of said warrant, " they call the publick School house, is a particular propriety ; and for the Town to commit the care and trust of any thing to other men which is not their own, is inconsistant with reason.
"6. Because we do not understand what they mean by Regulat- ing the Town meeting in Angust: for if they mean to confirm and establish any vote then passed, it is a thing unnecessary;
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and if it be, to repeal and disannul any, it is beyond their power." 59
To this Protest, seventy-eight names were subscribed. Among the subscribers, were many of the most respectable inhabitants of the town, especially of the Johnson and Richardson, the Thompson and Wyman families. And the reasons upon which it was professedly grounded, do all seem weighty and forcible, except the fifth, denying the right of the town to dispose of the school-house, which was certainly lame. For, although that building was erected at the expense of private individuals, yet it was built upon the town's land and expressly for the town's use. But all the conflicting votes, opinions and measures of these two several meetings of the town, on this subject, were soon superseded by the decision of the Court, which was in favor of Mr. Walker, the complainant, and in pursuance of which, a writ of mandamus 60 was quickly issued against the Selectmen and Town Clerk. In compliance with this writ, the town came to an amicable settlement with Mr. Walker not long after. At a town meeting, June 13, 1726, it was voted, " that Mr Timothy Walker should have the sum of twenty seven pounds, ten shill- ings paid him out of the town treasury for services done in keeping the school in Woburn in the year past: which money was paid for peace and the ending of all former differences." 61 At the same time, Mr. Walker signed a certificate, acknowledg- ing himself fully satisfied; and discharging the Selectmen and Town Clerk of all cost, to which they ever had been or might be liable, in virtue of the writ of mandamus, whether claimed by him, or by any under him.ª
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