USA > New York > Suffolk County > Riverhead > History of Suffolk country, comprising the addresses delivered at the celebration of the bi-centennial of Suffolk county, N.Y., in Riverhead, November 15, 1883 > Part 10
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NOTE A .- The following should have appeared as a foot note on page 64, but through an oversight was omitted:
It is perhaps proper, as a passing tribute to one of the foremost men to whom Suffolk County ever gave birth, to refer to the eminent services rendered to his country by Nathan Sanford, who was born at Bridgehamp- ton 1777, became a Senator of the United States, succeeded the immortal Kent as Chancellor of this State, was again a Senator and the colleague of Van Buren, and in 1825 was defeated by John C. Calhoun as a candidate for the Vice Presidency. In 1815, at the close of the unequal but glorious struggle which this country had maintained for three years against all the naval power of Great Britain to assert and defend "Sailors' Rights and the Freedom of the Seas," Mr. Sanford devoted the full energy of his powerful intellect to a ·restoration of American commerce, prostrated by the war, and aided largely in bringing about that restoration on a sound and healthy bas s. This much seems due to a Suffolk County statesman, who remem- bered the ancestors from whom he sprung, and the toilers by the sea among whom his early years had been spent.
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COMMERCE, NAVIGATION AND FISHERIES.
NOTE B .-- As showing the extent to which the business of taking men- haden in shore seines for manure had been carried in the waters of Southold town during the first half of the present century, I quote from the Repub- lican Watchman, of July 4. 1835, the following "statement of fish (called bunkers) that have been taken in the waters of the town of Southold the present season, " and append thereto the proof of its authenticity in the shape of a certificate from the assessors of the town:
We, the undersigned, do certify that the foregoing is a correct state- ment of fish taken in the' town of Southold, the present season, being drawn up under our supervision. That the length of seine employing ten men is about 150 rods, exclusive of line, which is generally double that length. That those seines employing a greater or less number of men are in the same proportion in regard to length. That the average time employed in fishing has been about five weeks. That the number of fish requisite for manuring an acre of land sufficient for any crops is 15,000. That the prices of fish have ranged from 50 to 75 cents per thousand, and consequently the expense of manuring an acre will range from seven dollars fifty cents to eleven dollars twenty-five cents. That the number of porgies, or skippaugs, taken in Southold bay by fishing smacks and carried through Helgate to New York market, at a single tide, on or about the 18th inst., has exceeded 100,000; the average weight of the same is one pound each, and the proceeds of the sale 3, 500 dollars.
JOHN CLARK,
OLIVER COREY,
Assessors of the
HENRY H. TERRY.
JOSHUA HALLOCK,
Town of Southold.
BARNABAS WINES, L
Southold, June 30th, 1835.
It is further stated that about 12,000,000 menhaden were taken in the town of Riverhead, the same season.
Name of Seine.
Number of Fish.
Number of Men on Each.
Weazle
540 000
9 .
Dragon
I
300 000
IO
Cove
2 900 000
20
Coots
I
340 000
IO
Crow
850 000
8
Shunks
I
500 000
IO
Munfudgeon
440 000
8
Wolf
I 416 500
IO
Sea Serpent
I 750 000
IO
Turks
3 320 000
20
Hawks
I 700 000
IO
Greek
I 650 000
IO
Owl
200 000
S
Water Witch
400 000.
8
John Garner
480 000
S
Jackson
2
833 000
IO
Union
2
450 000
1 2
Opposition
574 000
7
Night Hawk
I 100 000
7
Indian Chief
2 000 000
IO
.
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COMMERCE, NAVIGATION AND FISHERIES.
Name of Seine. Number of Fish.
Number of Men on Each.
Little Jackson
500 000
5
Little States
515 000
5
Pipe's Neck
550 000
5
*Two seines not heard from.
31.218,500
220
NOTE C .- In partial acknowledgement of the kind help I have had from various quarters toward the preparation of material for this paper, it is due that I should mention those to whom I am under obligation for some of the more important information it contains. These are: Joseph Nimmo, Jr., Treasury Department, Washington; James H. Wardle, Census Bureau, Washington; Hon. Perry Belmont, House of Representatives, Washington; Geo. R. Howell, State Library, Albany; Alex. Starbuck. Waltham, Mass,; Benj. A. Cook, New York; Charles P. Cook, Sag Harbor; L. C. d'Homergue, Brooklyn; Wm. O. Winters, Brooklyn; James E. Bayles, Port Jefferson; Jesse Carll, Northport; Jesse Jarvis, Northport; E. M. Jones, Cold Spring; Charles R. Street, Huntington; O. Perry Smith, Patchogue; W. J. Terry, Sayville: Egbert T. Smith, Mastic: Dan'l B. Cook, West-Hampton; James H. Pierson, Southampton; B. D. Sleight, Sag Harbor; John H. Hunt, Sag Harbor; Gilbert H. Cooper, Sag Har- bor; Wm. Lowen, Collector, Sag Harbor; B. C. Cartwright, Shelter Island; N. Hubbard . Cleveland, Southold; Rev. Dr. Epher Whitaker, Southold: W. Z. King, Surveyor of Customs, Greenport; Dan'l. T. Vail, East Marion; John A. Rackett, Orient; Edwin P. Brown, Orient; Ira B. Tuthill, Jr., New Suffolk; Wm. E. Parrotte, Northport.
LITERARY CULTURE, A
-IN-
SUFFOLK COUNTY.
-BY-
LON. OHN R. REID.
TO TO attempt a formal or extended address at this late hour would be an inexcusable trespass upon your patient forbearance. In listening to the elaborate, scholarly discourses which have occupied the day and evening, you have faintly realized the ordeal to which the fathers were sub- jected fifty-two times each year. Instead of our suggestive seven, their sermons were divided into two parts. When audience and preacher were exhausted, a brief respite was permitted for a frugal dinner; and then, re- freshed and strengthened for their work, the afternoon would be occupied in completing the masterpiece and enforcing its precepts.
The gentlemen who have for many hours entertained, instructed and, I trust, not wearied you by their sermons, allow me the clerkly.office of saving "amen" to their local offerings-hence my talk must be passing brief, even though it be discursive and obscure. I fully realize that even a hurried glance at the topics consigned to my tender mercy, must be, to adopt a Motleyism, a kind of Barmecide's feast in which my hearers have to play the part of Shacabac and believe in the excellence of the lamb stuffed with pistachio nuts, the flavor of the wines, and the perfume of the roses, upon my prejudiced assertion and without assistance from their own perceptions.
The people of this county were so engrossed in subduing a wilderness and substituting civilization for barbarism that during the early years of their advent but few memorials of their progress have given joy to the his- toriin. They evidently deemed their "acts hostages for worldly fame and failed to exhibit the egotism of making a written commendation of their personal achievements. Indeed, we find this reticence one of the pecu- liarities of our colonists, and they neither became their own trumpeters nor paid a professional flatterer to make them-on paper-the grandest gentlemen the world e'er saw. Fortunately their children have outgrown this inexcusable modesty, and the would-be great and good of the Nine-
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LITERARY CULTURE.
teenth Century will not die and make no sign concerning the unequalled merits which they are unable to conceal. By careful groping, we occa- sionally find a land-mark in the dusty dells of departed years; and by con- trasting these with the history we are making, we may ascertain whether the precepts of the past have brought guerdons to the practical prosaic, present.
The sponsors of our county organization were strong men-bold, in- dependent, intelligent. While few could boast a classical education, there were less who were profoundly ignorant. The Bible, Milton and Shake- speare, could be found in many homes of every neighborhood, and they were earnestly studied not pedantically displayed. They had left a world of statesmen, philosophers and poets whose works have immortalized their authors. Algernon, Sydney, Cromwell, Newton, Bacon, Locke, Milton and Dryden-intellectual kings who would be the pride and glory of any age-were to our progenitors as familiar as household words. Their at- tainments, though limited, were solid and substantial, not flippant and fanciful. Thought preceded action, and wisdom brought its own exceed- ing great reward. They regarded a great book as a ship deep freighted with immortal treasures, breaking the sea of life into fadeless beauty as it sails; carrying to every shore seeds of truth, goodness, piety, love, to flow- er and fruit perennially in the soil of the heart and mind.
Their methods of education blended literature and religion. Having no public schools, the clergyman of each parish devoted five and a half days in each week- during the winter, for the summer was given to man- ual labor-to instructing the children in " the three R's," ending in a Sun- day sermon whose length was only exceeded by its breadth and brimstone. That was the orthodox era, and earthly threatenings and contemplated punishments in the world to come made the Day of Doom a continued guest and fireside companion. At that time our county comprised about eighteen hundred souls-the entire province numbered but ten thousand- and less than forty preacher-pedagogues moulded the minds of the young and strengthened the faith of the nature. This method was varied but little during Suffolk's first century; and it seems to have been akin to that adopted by its sister counties. About this time, William Smith, the histo- rian, wrote of the educational condition of our people: "Our schools are " of the lowest order-the instructors want instruction; and through a long " and shameful neglect of all the arts and sciences, our common speech is "extremely corrupt; and the evidences of bad taste, both as to thought and "language, are visible in all our proceedings, public and private." Yet the people were striving for something better, anticipating the coming day when generous culture should make men little less than gods. While they were hampered by iron fortune, they held a kinship with those grand spirits of whom Lowell wrote that the country grew
"Strong thro' shifts, an' wants, an' pains, Nussed by stern men with empires in their brains."
At the time our county was organized, there was not a newspaper on this continent; now we claim fifteen, and in the United States there are more than six thousand. In the entire world there were not so many as are now published on Long Island alone. Our first newspaper was pub- lished at Sag Harbor in 1791.
Public libraries seemed then as far removed as the stars; now we can boast of one in every school district, with extra ones of thousands of vol-
SI
LITERARY CULTURE.
umes in Greenport, Bridge-Hampton, Patchogue and Huntington. The private collections in the homes of our county are extensive in numbers and of rare value; and I doubt if it would be extravagant to say that our people have at least one million dollars invested in books, comprising more than three hundred thousand volumes.
We have now 142 public schools with 223 trained teachers; our school property is valued at $240,000; and the public money allotted to our schools, this year, was $32,386.95.
These figures, like Gadgrind's facts, cannot lie; and they tell of ad- vancement in the cultivation of mind which exceeds the wildest dreams of the patriarchs of our county who saw in Harvard the only college which this continent could boast.
This is the culmination of the good work commenced long ago and continued unremittingly. Indeed, we had so far progressed in 1840, that N. S. Prime, the historian, said there were then but fourteen individuals in Suffolk County who could not read and write. According to the average of white people in the balance of the United States, we should have had more than 1, 250. And this reminds me of the envy of our sister county which was displayed by one of its magnates, afterwards Governor of the State, in announcing with sang froid, that he "contemplated a missionary expedition into the dark and benighted regions of Suffolk." And the speaker deemed himself a King in his own right.
The great landmark in the Educational history of our County was the establishment of a Teachers' Association, through which those who con- trolled our common schools might meet for counsel, advice and guidance. Thought had been awakened concerning the great problems entrusted to our educators and the importance of unity in action realized. In 1852, Hon. James H. Tuthill, now our Surrogate, was the President of the County Association. He brought to his high office, ripe scholarship, rare culture, and practical experience in the school room. He appreciated the high calling of those who moulded mind, and strove to make them magnify their offices. He valued the teacher's occupation as one of the most exalted known to man-vivifying and self-sustaining in its nature, to struggle with ignorance, and discover to the inquiring minds of the masses the clear cerulean blue of heavenly truth. To him this vocation was the most widely- extended survey of the actual advancement of the human race in general, and the steadfast promotion of that advancement. He respected men and women fitted for their chosen task as instructors, and bestowed but little sympathy upon the educational shams who made their schools simply stepping stones to other callings or the advertising mediums of advantage- ous marriages. He wished teachers who were worthy and well-qualified, who loved their profession, and had scholarship equal to the demands of the age. Like Virgil, he loved not those superficial scholars who
"Lightly skim,
And gently sip the dimply river's brim."
With Horace Mann he believed that the education already given to the people created the necessity of giving them more. What has been done has awakened new and unparalleled energies; and the mental and moral forces which have been roused into activity, are now to be regulated. These forces are not mechanical, which expend their activity and subside to rest: they are spiritual forces, endued with an inextinguishable principle of life
82
LITERARY CULTURE.
and progression. The coiled spring of the machine loses power as it unwinds; but the living soul of man, once conscious of its power, cannot be quelled; it multiplies its energy, and accelerates its speed, in an upward or downward direction, forever. For our teachers to form a County Association under the leadership of a President imbued with such ideas, was to ensure the success which soon made them the recognized leaders in public schools throughout the state. Doubtless much also was due to the earnestness and wise co-operation of the School Commissioners of our county. One of them (the Chairman of this Meeting) made himself con- spicuous for his zeal, his wide knowledge of the requirements of the schools under his immediate supervision, and his devotion to the most advanced methods of education. I remember well his sympathy with the teachers, his magnetism in the school room, his sunshine which made teachers and pupils alike rejoice whenever he visited their schools. Aiding and strength-
ening the County Association, insisting upon a high standard of scholar- ship, bringing the brightest minds in contact with each other in discussing the perplexing questions of the school-room, he did a work for our schools which will keep his memory green forever. Alter a few years of such guidance, we could boast of better schools and better teachers in Suffolk County, than in any other County of the State. Our educational torch- bearers did not hide their light, and scores of them became missionaries in school work in other fields where the educational wants were greater and their golden calls more winning. Cruikshank, Higgins, Merwin, Davis, Funnel, were our avant couriers; and through those we sent abroad, the citizens of Brooklyn and other cities of our state gained practical knowl- edge of our advancement in the best methods of ,moulding immortal minds. How poor was the gift of Midas, fabled to possess the power of turning whatever he touched into gold, compared with the power of turning gold into knowledge, and wisdom and virtue ! And to-day, Suffolk remains a recognized leading County in educational matters. When any of our sister Counties desire a teacher of marked superiority, attention is given to our County and its school exemplars. We have yielded many of our brightest and best, and still we point with pride to the little army that remains, each fitted to command, all worthy to be termed teachers in fact as well as in name. With Principals Hall, Gordon, Shaw, Hallock and their compeers, Suffolk may well feel proud of her educators. And I must not forget that in Prof. Stackpole, who has but so recently surrendered his throne in your village, our County possessed a teacher equal to any who ever held the master's sway in any school of our State; and hundreds of his pupils will rise up to call him blessed.
If we look at the subjects taught in our common schools; the facilities for illustration; the mechanical conveniences; the improvement in every external aid, including admirably lighted, well ventilated and cozily con- structed school-houses, and contrast them with the inconveniences to which our ancestors were subjected, we need no longer wonder at the marvelous advancement of our children compared with the children of a century ago. Especially is this mere common-place to us, when we see that now the teachers' office is not so much to impart knowledge as to show his pupils how to get it; to give strong impulses to their minds and lead them, in conscious self-reliance, to put forth their utmost energies. To thus inspire them with a love of study and delight in mastering difficulties, till they feel all the incitements of victory and are encouraged to go on from conquest
83
LITERARY CULTURE.
to conquest. Many subjects which were matters of speculation to our pro- genitors have become established truths under the guidance of the discov- ering minds of the nineteenth century; and it has been well said that our children have more correct notions of nature and natural phenomena than had Plato. And this is but the legitimate outcome of our common schools -the people's colleges-the perfection of which is the grandest tribute to man's wise ambition. They are, indeed, the glory of our nation, and when they cease to be its glory, this nation will cease to be the glory of the world.
To secure so grand a result has cost not only infinite labor but vast treasures. The fathers recognized education as our only political safety; that outside of this ark all was deluge. That the people must spend money to educate their children, or they must pay taxes to build prisons to punish crime. That good government means the acts of wise and good men organized for the general good. That honesty and intelligence must go hand in hand. It is said that when President Lincoln was urged to appoint an ignorant office-seeker because he was "honest," remarked "I don't see any difference between an honest blank fool and any other blank fool," and he refused to make the appointment. It is sometimes suggested that if our intelligence were measured by our votes, we might not be pleased with the standard which justice would designate. Yet it is no less true, that suffrage should practically exemplify our knowledge and justify our claim to be the most enlightened people under heaven.
And this reminds me that once many of the worthy followers of the Wesleys, thought to interpret the Bible demanded inspiration and no worldly knowledge. It is said that a local preacher, speaking in the pres- ence of Bishop Simpson, thanked God for his ignorance. To which the Bishop remarked, "you have a great deal to thank God for." Now in every hamlet, we find a church spire pointing to heaven; and in each temple of the Father there is a clergyman whose pure and holy life is adorned by the learning of the schools and the culture which exemplifies the highest evidences of education.
Turning from our schools to their graduates and to the people of our County, we find fitting illustrations of that progress which marks the English speaking race in its highest attainments. In Art, our country will not forget Suffolk's sons, William S. Mount and Shepard A. Mount-men of genius whose works made them known throughout the civilized world. In History, Wood, Prime and Thompson form a trio who will not be forgotten. In Poetry, Terry, Gardiner and Tooker, hold no mean place; and in Journalism, the editors of the county are the peers of their brethren throughout the State. In the Law, Buffett, Strong, Wickham, Sanford. stand like stars in the night-the lesson of their lives being their best monuments. In forensic oratory, Judge Rose is remembered with pride while recalling the Hoffmans, Emmetts, Grahams, VanBuren, Jordan, and equal celebrities, who charmed jurors and delighted audiences in other parts of the State-our Orator not suffering by the comparison. In our churches, the eminent divines are legion.
With this passing glance at the select few, let us remember the thous- ands who are the sons and daughters of Suffolk. It will be conceded that we are a prosperous people, and Macauley has well said that the progress of elegant literature and the fine arts is proportionate to that of the public prosperity. We cannot be intelligent, happy or useful, if we lack the
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LITERARY CULTURE.
culture and discipline of education. It is this that unlocks the prison-house of the mind and releases the captive. Carlyle calls literature "the thought of thinking souls". It is that part of thought that is wrought out in the name of the beautiful. A poem like that of Homer, or an essay upon Milton, or Dante, or Cæsar from a Macauley, a Taine, or a Froude, is created in the name of beauty, and is a fragment in literature, just as a Corinthian capital is a fragment of art. When truth, in its outward flow, joins beauty, the two rivers make a new flood called "letters". It is an Amazon of broad bosom resembling the sea. The advantage in literature, as in life, is of keeping the best society, reading the best books, and wisely admiring the best things.
In the words of De Quincey, There is first the literature of knowledge; and secondly the literature of power. The function of the first is to teach, of the second, to move ; the first is a rudder, the second an oar or sail. The first speaks to the mere discursive understanding; the second speaks ultimately, it may happen, to the higher understanding or reason, but always through affections of pleasure and sympathy. If we consider how much literature enlarges the mind, and how much it multiplies, adjusts, rectifies and arranges the ideas, it may well be reckoned equivalent to an additional sense; it affords pleasure which wealth cannot procure, and which poverty cannot entirely take away. It is indeed the garden of wis- dom; and if we wish to gather its choicest flowers, we must enter its divine precincts through the gate of learning. Nevertheless it is so. common a. luxury that the age has grown fastidious. The moralist is expected to allure men to virtue by his beautiful rhetoric; philosophy must be illus- trated by charming metaphors of captivating fiction; and history, casting aside the odiou's garb of formal narrative, is required to assume a scenic costume, and teem with the connected interest of a facinating tale. Edward Everett pronounced it the voice of the age and the state. The character, energy and resources of the country are reflected and imaged forth in the conception of its great minds: they are organs of the time; they speak their own though s; but under an impulse like the prophetic enthusiasm of old, they must feel and utter the sentiments which society inspires. There is no reason why the brown hand of labor should not hold Bryant or Longfel- low as well as the plow. Ornamental reading shelters and even strengthens the growth of what is merely useful. A cornfield never returns a poorer crop because a few wild-flowers bloom in the hedge-row. The refinement of the poor is the triumph of Christian civilization. In our County, we have few who are immensely rich in land or gold. But we have not a dozen families so poor that they have no books, nor so ignorant that they cannot profit by them. And the character of the books read by our people shows their literary culture in a practical manner. As we deter- mine a man's condition by the company he keeps, so we judge the culture of our people by the authors they study. In almost every house, a selection of the classics may be found. Works in science, literature and art; philosophy, history, poetry; the leading writers of Europe; and those of our real sovereigns, Bancroft, Prescott, Motley, Emerson, Channing, Franklin, Adams, Hamilton, Jefferson; Cooper, Irving, Hawthorne, Mitchell, Aldrich, Howells, James, Curtis; Doane, Simpson, Durbin, Bascom, King, Chapin; Longfellow, Bryant, Whittier, Lowell, Holmes, Saxe-these and the offerings of scores of others, are as familiar to our people as the surgings of the mighty ocean that kisses our shores. And
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