USA > Nebraska > Douglas County > Omaha > Omaha: the Gate city, and Douglas County, Nebraska, a record of settlement, organization, progress and achievement, Volume I > Part 37
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MISCELLANEOUS
During the exposition nearly one hundred conventions and congresses of societies, lodges, etc., were held in Omaha. The delegates to these conventions all visited the exposition and upon their return home carried a good report of Omaha as a great city. These conventions were one of the features of the exposition season.
The total number of admissions from June i to October 31, 1898, was 2,613,508, and the total admission receipts were $801,515.47. The total receipts from all sources were $1,977.338.69. In a statement issued at the close of the exposition, Secretary John A. Wakefield said: "This was the first exposition it America promptly to open its gates to the public on a completed show on the clay and hour originally appointed ; the first to open free from mortgage or pledge of all or some of its gate receipts ; the first to make money each and every month of the exposition season, and the first to repay its stockholders any considerable portion of the funds advanced by them. In these respects the Trans-Mississippi and International Exposition stands without a rival."
The general effects of the exposition upon the City of Omaha and the West were thus summed up by President Gurdon W. Wattles in his address on October 31, 1898, the last day of the exposition: "To this city the exposition has been like a rain in a drouth. It has put new life and energy in all our business interests, in the clearings of our banks, in the business of our merchants ; to the values of our real estate, to the fabrics of our factories, it has brought a new and life-giving influence. Our people have forgotten the evils of panic and depression in the enjoyment of the beauties and pleasures so abundant on these grounds. To the state and the entire West it has given a new standing among the people of the East and far-away countries, which will influence immigration and investment in all future years. The greatest benefits are still to come, when visitors from less favored elimes have time to think of and publish the good impressions they have received of the country represented here. The future historians of the West will record great impetus given in the development of all departments of its industries by this great exposition."
CHAPTER XXI
EDUCATIONAL DEVELOPMENT
CHARACTER OF THE EARLY SCHOOLS ON THE FRONTIER-THE PIONEER TEACHER -- COURSE OF STUDY AND TEXT BOOKS-FIRST SCHOOLS IN OMAHA-PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM-THE HIGII SCHOOL-GRADED SCHOOLS-BOARD OF EDUCATION-RURAL SCHOOLS-CREIGHTON UNIVERSITY-BROWNELL HALL-THE OMAHA SEMI- NARY-UNIVERSITY OF OMAHA-PAROCHIAL SCHOOLS-OMAHA PUBLIC LIBRARY-SOUTH OMAHA LIBRARY-A WORD OF COMMENT
One of the first problems to confront the settlers in a new country is to provide ways and means of educating their children. The young people who enjoy the advantages offered by the excellent public schools of Omaha and Douglas County in this year 1916 can hardly be expected to realize how difficult was the solution of this problem when their grandfathers came to Nebraska in 1854. Without public funds with which to build school houses and pay teachers, the pioneers were wholly dependent upon themselves. When a sufficient number had located within a reasonably small radius of each other they would cooperate in the building of a school house that would be situated at some central point, where it would be most convenient for the children. The early school house was almost invariably of logs, with clapboard roof, and often had no floor except "mother earth." Window glass was a luxury on the frontier, but if sufficient money could be raised, and the distance to the nearest trading post was not too great, the schoolhouse would have a real window on each side. But if money was very scarce, or the trading post too far away, a section of a log would be left out of the structure on either side, a frame-work of light sticks fitted to the aperture, and over these sticks would be drawn a strip of muslin or oiled paper, which would admit enough light on ordinarily bright days to enable the pupils to study their lessons.
The furniture of the school room was as primitive in character as the building. Seats were made in the form of long benches by splitting in halves a log of some eight or ten inches in diameter, driving pins into holes bored with a large auger in the half-round side for legs, and then smoothing the upper surface with a draw-knife. The legs of the bench were placed at an angle that would insure stability, and upon these rude seats the children sat in long rows as they studied the old blue-backed Webster's spelling book, McGuffey's or Wilson's reader. Pike's, Daboll's or Ray's arithmetic, and, in some of the more aristocratic districts. Kirkhanı's or Butler's grammer and Olney's or Mitchell's geography. Under the window was the writing desk, formed by driving stout pins into holes bored
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in one of the logs to support a wide board for a table, and here the pupils would take their turns at writing.
The pioneer teacher was rarely a graduate of a higher institution of learning and with very few exceptions had made no special preparation for his work. If he could spell well, read well, write plainly enough to "set copies" for the children to follow, and "do all the sums" in the arithmetic up to and including the "Rule of Three," he was considered as qualified to teach. There was one qualification, however, that could not be overlooked in the teacher of that early period. He was required to have sufficient physical strength and courage to hold the boisterous boys in subjection and maintain order in his school. Pete Jones, one of the school directors in Eggleston's story of the Hoosier Schoolmaster, was a believer in the truth of saying: "No lickin', no larnin'," and the pioneer pedagogue went on the theory that "to spare the rod was to spoil the child." Not many children were spoiled, for at the beginning of the term a bundle of tough switches were displayed to the best advantage in the schoolroom as a sort of prophylactic. If the mere sight of these switches failed to hold the mischievous boy in check and prevent him from committing some infraction of the numerous "rules," a vigor- ous application of one of them generally had the tendency to cure his frolicsome disposition, even though it did not increase his affection for his teacher.
To be a good speller was considered the foundation of an education. Conse- quently more attention was given to orthography during the child's early school days than to any other branch of study. Friday afternoons were usually devoted to spelling contests and spelling schools of evenings were of frequent occurrence. In the evening exercises the parents would nearly always take part, especially those who deemed themselves good spellers. Two "captains" would be selected to "choose up," the one who won the first choice selecting the person he regarded as the best speller present, the other the next best, and so on until all who desired to participate were arranged into two opposing lines. Then the match was on. The teacher "gave out" the words from side to side alternately. When one missed a word he took his seat and the one who stood longest was proclaimed the victor. To "spell down" a whole school district was quite an achievement.
After the child could spell fairly well he was taught to read. Then came the writing lessons. The copy-books of that day bore no lithographed line at the top for the boy or girl to imitate. They were generally of the "home-made" variety- a few sheets of foolscap paper covered with a sheet of heavy wrapping paper. At the top of the page the teacher would "set the copy," a line often intended to convey a moral lesson as well as to give the pupil a specimen of penmanship, such as "Evil communications corrupt good manners," "Procrastination is the thief of time," etc. And, when one stops to consider that the term of school was seldom over three months, that the same teacher hardly ever taught two terms in succession in the same place, and that each teacher had a different style of penmanship, it is a wonder that the young folks of that day learned to write as well as many of them did.
Next came arithmetic. In the pronunciation of this word the sound of the initial letter was often dropped and it was called 'rithmetic. This gave rise to the expression "the three Rs," Readin', Ritin' and 'Rithmetic being the three great essentials of a practical education. If one understood "the three Rs" he was equipped for the great battle of life, so far as ordinary business transactions were
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concerned. The family that desired better education for their children were spoken of as having "highfalutin'" notions and too good to associate with common folks.
But the three score years that have elapsed since the first white people settled in Douglas County have witnessed great changes, and the educational develop- ment has kept step with industrial and civic progress. Instead of the old school- house of logs, sod, or cottonwood boards, with its crude furniture, stately edifices of brick or stone have been erected. Steam heating apparatus, or a warm air furnace, has superseded the old fireplace or the box stove. The teacher now must show fitness and training for his calling. The bundle of "gads" is no longer kept on exhibition as a warning to evil doers, and corporal punishment is no longer regarded as a necessary part of the educational system. Yet, under the old regime, professional men who afterward rose to eminence and achieved world-wide reputations, great jurists, United States senators, inventors and scien- tists, whose discoveries have startled the world, and even presidents of the United States acquired their rudimentary education in the old log schoolhouse. Many such men are yet living and their memories treasure hallowed recollections of the old district school.
FIRST SCHOOLS
Probably the first school in what is now the State of Nebraska was the one opened by Samuel Allis and Reverend John Dunbar in 1834, at a place called Council Point, some distance up the Platte River, for the purpose of educating the Pawnee Indians. The school was broken up by the hostile Sioux and Mr. Allis went to Bellevue, where an Indian mission had been established the year before by Reverend Moses Merrill. At Bellevue Mr. Allis opened a school for the Indian children, though it was attended by a few whites. Bellevue was within the limits of Douglas County as at first established and the Allis School was the first ever taught in the county, twenty years before the first counties of Nebraska were designated by the proclamation of Acting Governor Cuming.
Section 34 of the Kansas-Nebraska Bill, under which the Territory of Nebraska was organized, provided: "That when the lands of said territory shall be surveyed under the direction of the United States, preparatory to bringing the same into market, sections numbered sixteen and thirty-six in cach township in said territory shall be, and the same are hereby, reserved for the purpose of being applied to schools in said territory, and in the states and territories hereafter to be erected out of the same."
This provision was carried over into the enabling act, under which Nebraska was admitted into the Union as a state, but it was several years before the value of the lands was sufficient to afford much of an income for educational purposes. The first schools were therefore of that class known as "subscription schools," cach patron subscribing a certain sum for each scholar sent to the school, the subscription money being paid directly to the teacher, unless the latter collected a portion of it by "boarding 'round" during the term, which was a common custom, the teacher staying a week with one family, then a week with another and so on until the school closed.
The first school taught in Omaha was opened on July 1. 1855. in a room of
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the old state house on Ninth Street, by Miss Julia .A. Goodwill, a daughter of Taylor G. Goodwill, who was a member of the upper house in the first Territorial Legislature and later the first treasurer of Douglas County. Miss Goodwill enrolled forty pupils, among whom were: Ewing and Robert Armstrong, Nellie Brown, Justin, Elizabeth, Annie and Katie Davis, James Ferris, Maggie and William Gilmore, Carrie E. Goodwill. Benjamin, Enos and James Johnson, Lizzie Jones, Emma Logan, Emma, James, Mary, Nancy and Sarah Peterson, James and Mary Ryan. Miss Goodwill taught for nearly six months, or until she was required to give up the room for the second session of the Legislature, which convened on December 18, 1855. She afterward became the wife of Allen Root, who came to Omaha in 1855 and was admitted to the bar in the fall of that year. Mrs. J. P. Manning was probably the second teacher.
In 1855 the Legislature granted a charter to an educational institution known as Simpson University. The incorporators named in the act were: Reverend W. H. Good, Mark W. Izard, William N. Byers, J. R. Buckingham, Charles B. Smith, Thomas B. Cuming, J. H. Hopkins, Moses F. Shinn, W. D. Gage, Charles Elliott, O. B. Selden, Thomas H. Benton, Jr., and John B. Robertson. Governor Izard, in his message to the Legislature in 1857, stated that Simpson University was "permanently located and donations of a considerable amount have been received." On February 10, 1857, the Legislature adopted a memorial to Congress asking for a grant of land, of "not less then ten thousand acres," for the benefit of the institution, but nothing ever came of the memorial. A site was selected in what was afterward known as Shinn's Addition, but no buildings were ever erected and the donations mentioned by Governor Izard never materialized.
Another institution of learning chartered by the Legislature of 1857 met with no better success. It was to be located at Saratoga, about two miles north of Omaha, and the following persons were named in the act as incorporators : Fenner Ferguson, William Y. Brown, John H. Kellon, O. F. Parker, LeRoy Tuttle, William L. Plummer. Cortland Van Rensselaer, Joseph S. Grimes, George J. Park. B. B. Barkalow, L. M. Kuhn, William Hamilton, C. D. Martin, Samuel Gamble, John Hancock and Thomas Officer, the last named a resident of Council Bluffs.
Mr. Kellom, one of the incorporators of the above school, was made superin- tendent of public instruction and on October 23, 1857, he published an announce- ment in the Omaha Times to the effect that J. S. Burt was about to open a "select school," and expressed the hope that the people of the city who had children to educate would give him liberal encouragement. Mr. Burt remained but a short time in Omaha, going to Fontenelle, where he conducted a school during the winter of 1858-59.
PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM
The public school system was inaugurated on November 10. 1859. under the provisions of an act passed by the preceding session of the Legislature, which was convened on September 21. 1858. The passage of this first territorial school law was due largely to the efforts of two members from Douglas County-Dr. George L. Miller in the council and Clinton Briggs in the house. Alfred D. Jones, John H. Kellom and Dr. Gilbert C. Monell constituted the first district
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school board for Omaha. Mr. Kellom was soon afterward succeeded by Edwin Loveland. The board employed Howard Kennedy, of New York State, to take charge of the public schools, under a contract for one year at a salary of $1,000. No schoolhouses had as yet been built, so Mr. Kennedy opened his school in the old state house, on Ninth Street between Douglas and Farnam, with five assistants, four of whom were employed in the old state house and one conducted a primary school in a small building near the intersection of Thirteenth and Douglas streets. The furniture for the school rooms was made by H. H. Visscher.
At the close of the year 1860 the territorial and county school fund for the support of the public schools in Douglas County amounted to $1,246.50, to which was added $656.60 received from license fees and fines, making a total for educational purposes of $1,903.10. The board that reported this amount of funds was composed of Dr. Gilbert C. Monell, Jesse Lowe and John H. Kellom. In their report to the territorial school commissioner, dated January 2, 1861, the board said: "One male teacher was employed to teach the higher studies and superintend the subordinate teachers in the different schools. One principal and three subordinate departments do not sufficiently accommodate all the scholars. Though the average attendance is about sixty scholars to a teacher, yet eighty or ninety were often present. Four subordinate schools are really needed, but even these cannot be sustained the coming year without more funds. The value of real estate being generally reduced at the last assessment, and the reduction of the school tax last winter to one mill on the dollar, instead of two mills as hereto- fore, will reduce our public school fund to about one-fourth or one-third the amount of last year. This reduced revenue would easily support a single school. Two plans suggest themselves to the directors to supply the deficiency: First, to lay on the city a sufficient tax; and, second, to charge each scholar a moderate tuition."
The board chose the latter remedy and announced the following rates: For instruction in Latin, Greek, French, German, chemistry, surveying and belles- lettres, three dollars per quarter; for the common school branches, including elementary algebra, physics and bookkeeping, two dollars per quarter; primary scholars, one dollar per quarter, and non-resident pupils were charged double those rates. Among those who taught in the Omaha schools about this time were: Howard Kennedy, John J. Monell, Mrs. Isabella Torrey, Frances Sey- mour, Edward Kelley, John H. Kellom, Miss Sarah Gaylord, Mrs. Mary P. Rust, Miss Abbie Hayes, Mr. and Mrs. Shimonski, Mrs. Nye and a Miss Smiley. Mrs. Torrey taught in a small building on Cuming Street, near the old military bridge; Mr. Kellom taught in the old state house on Ninth Street, and Miss Gaylord's school was in the basement of the Congregational Church at the corner of Sixteenth and Farnam streets.
Early in the year 1861 Samuel D. Beals came to Omaha and on April 22, 1861, opened a private school in the old state house. Mrs. M. B. Newton, in an article in Volume III of the Nebraska Historical Society Collections, says: "Professor Beals' school was known as the Omaha High School and was extensively adver- tised." At one time this school enrolled nearly three hundred pupils. One reason for its success was that the shortage of funds in 1860 and the breaking out of the Civil war the following year caused the public schools to be closed. They were not reopened until 1863. Mr. Beals closed his school in 1867 and in 1868 was
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appointed private secretary to Gov. David Butler. On February 23, 1869, he was appointed state superintendent of public instruction and to his power of initiative and executive ability the State of Nebraska is greatly indebted for her excellent public school system. He remained in office until 1872, when he returned to Omaha and became principal of one of the schools. In July, 1874, he was made superintendent of the city schools and held that office for six years, after which he taught for some time in the Omaha High School. He was one of the best known of the early educators of Nebraska.
The first schoolhouse built by the City of Omaha was a small frame structure of one room on the southwest corner of Jefferson Square. It was erected in 1863, the school board at that time being composed of Col. Lorin Miller, George B. Lake and B. E. B. Kennedy. Mr. Kennedy had charge of the erection of the building, in which school was opened in September, 1863. It was not large enough to accommodate all the children who wished to attend and owing to the crowded condition of the schoolroom the teacher found it difficult to maintain order. The first teacher in this house-a man whose name has been forgotten-taught only one month. He was succeeded by another teacher who taught about the same length of time. Says Mrs. Newton: "This second man fashioned a wooden instrument, something like a small spade with a long handle, and with this he alternately spatted and punched the disorderly pupils, even quite a distance from him." After the resignation of the second teacher a Mrs. Cooper took charge of the school, restored order out of chaos and taught a successful term. A little later the room was divided by a partition and a Mr. Hutchinson was employed as pricipal. In 1865 the building was removed to the corner of Fifteenth and Cass streets, where it was used for school purposes until 1878. It was then removed to a lot on the corner of Twenty-second and Burt streets and converted into a stable.
In 1865 the second schoolhouse, a frame building on the corner of Eleventh and Jackson streets, was erected by the city school board. The next year another frame schoolhouse was built on the corner of Twenty-third and Burt streets. The Pacific Street School was built in 1868, at a cost of $23,000, and at that time it was the most pretentious schoolhouse in Omaha, if not in the State of Nebraska. The Izard Street Building was erected a year or two later, at a cost of $35,000.
THE HIGH SCHOOL
By an act of the Legislature in 1869 the old territorial capitol building at Omaha was given to the city as a sort of compensation for the $60,000 contributed by the people to complete that structure, but the donation was made with the restriction that the property could be used only for educational purposes. Pursuant to the provisions of the act, Governor Butler appointed the following board of regents : George W. Frost, Thomas Davis, John H. Kellom, Augustus Kountze, Alvin Saunders and James M. Woolworth. This board held its first meeting on April 13, 1869, and organized by the election of Alvin Saunders, president ; Augustus Kountze, treasurer; and James W. Van Nostrand was employed as secretary. A committee of experts, consisting of Jonas Gise, John H. Green and John D. Jones, was appointed by the board to examine the building and report what repairs
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were necessary before it could be used for school purposes. On May 4, 1800, the board followed up the investigations of the committee by employing G. R. Randall, an architect from Chicago, to make plans for the repairs. Mr. Randall made a thorough examination of the premises and pronounced the building insecure, "owing to faulty construction and inferior material."
The board then decided to remove the old building and erect a new one, accord- ing to plans furnished by Mr. Randall. Twenty thousand dollars were turned over to the board of regents by the school trustees of Omaha, and the people of the city voted bonds to the amount of $100,000 for a new high school building, to be erected on the site of the old capitol. Even this sum was insufficient, for when the structure was completed in 1872 it was found that the total cost was $225,000.
After the new high school had been in operation for several years it was discovered that the city had never obtained a deed to the property. Governor Butler, when asked by the first board of regents to make the conveyance, replied that "the original files of the laws passed at the last session of the Legislature have been sent away by the secretary to have them bound," and promised to attend to the matter as soon as they were returned. Evidently the subject was overlooked, both by the governor and the regents, and it was not until the Legislature of 1889 that the oversight was corrected. That Legislature authorized the governor to make the conveyance and the deed was signed by Gov. John M. Thayer.
On June 6, 1871, W. H. James, secretary of state and acting governor, approved an act of the Legislature by which the old Omaha board of school trustees and the regents of the high school were both legislated out of office and a board of education was created to take their place. The new board was to be composed of two members from each of the six wards of the city, one-half to be elected for one year and the other half for two years, six members to be elected annually thereafter to serve for two years. The first board was composed of Alvin Saunders, Flemon Drake. Dr. Theodore Baumer, Vincent Burkley, Charles M. Connoyer, Adoplh Boehne. Howard Kennedy, Thomas F. Hall, Charles W. Hamilton, Joseph Redman, John T. Edgar and James Creighton. At the first meeting, which was held on April 8, 1872, John T. Edgar was chosen president and Flemon Drake was elected secretary. That was the beginning of Omaha's present public school system.
The new board of education, at a meeting held on June 3. 1872, elected A. F. Nightingale superintendent of the public schools for a term of one year and fixed his salary at $2,400. At the same time the following salary schedule was adopted : Principal of the high school, $1,800; principals of graded schools, $1.500; first assistant teachers, $750; second assistants, $650; third assistants, $550. The board of regents turned over to the new board $8.172.48, and reported outstanding obligations of $23,894.76, not including the bonds issued to build the high school, dated July 1. 1871. The amount of this issue, as already stated, was $100,000, the bonds to be payable in twenty years and to draw interest at the rate of 10 per cent per annum. At that time the financial reputation of Omaha was not as well established as it is today and the bonds were sold for $96,150. Imagine 10 per cent bonds issued by Omaha at the present time selling for less than par!
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