USA > Ohio > Cuyahoga County > Cleveland > Official report of the centennial celebration of the founding of the city of Cleveland and the settlement of the Western Reserve > Part 28
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gifts, whose honors are yet undimmed. Jan. 1, 1848, Mr. E. Hosmer, a thoroughly educated gentleman, with an equally well educated wife, opened a private boarding and day school, finally located on Superior street, east of the Army and Navy Hall. This institution, in which Doctors Delemater, Ackley, Cassels and St. John were en- gaged as scientific lecturers, was the first one in the city which met the advancing ideas of education, and it drew at once a high-class of patronage. Helen Handy (Newberry), Mary Witt (Eells), Elizabeth Blair, Lizzie Sanborn (Fitch), Olive Thorne Miller are living testimonials of the value of that instruction; and there Mary Clark Brayton (Maynard) developed her extraordinary talents. Mrs. Hosmer was a lady most refined in mind and manner and peculiarly adapted to gain the love and respect of the young ladies she gathered about her in various places through several years. In '51 the school was removed to the Kendall mansion, which has since given place to the Ken- dall Block. Within a year Mr. Hosmer died suddenly, Mrs. Hosmer relinquished the enterprise and, with her sister, returned to New England. Her future work as an educator here belongs to the history of the next decade. In approaching the end of this, we may note a boys' classical school on the southwest corner of Euclid and Erie streets, where from time immemorial a slough had existed but was then disappearing. The principal, Mr. Henry Childs, a graduate of Amherst, had been in the Prospect street school for a short time, but he made a successful teacher of boys till he went to Buffalo and engaged in iron manufacturing. His extraordinary wit made him delight- ful in the social circles; his business ability and high principles won him an honorable position in the city of his adoption. Not far from Mr. Child's school, in a grove west of the now public library, a place sequestered and shady not now to be conceived, there was, in September, 1849, in a long low white building, a girls' school under the care of Miss L. T. Guilford. It was the beginning of still another Cleveland Academy.
The middle of the century properly closes what we have been able to gather im- perfectly of the early schools and teachers of. Cleveland. Without exception, the schools have passed and left no successors. The buildings where they were held have been demolished, the teachers, all but a little remnant, have passed to the Silent Land. By their results we can judge them. With all their shortcomings or misguided zeal, they trained an intelligent, law-abiding, God-fearing generation, whose fast disappear- ing members we cherish with reverence. The young brains that were troubled over Smith's Arithmetic have created the commerce, the manufactories, the institutions of a great city; little hearts, that swelled with vexation over schoolroom injustice, or vibrated with mischief over schoolroom pranks, have throbbed with noble patriotism and prompted great enterprises of benevolence; and some little hands held out to the ferule have guided the ship of state.
Mr. L. H. Jones, Superintendent of the Cleveland Public Schools, was the next speaker. He read an important paper on "Present Ideals and Future Prospects of Public Education in Cleveland." The purpose was not so much, he said, to recall the historical development of private and public education, that subject having been covered by others, but rather to suggest that if historical knowledge had any worth, it lay chiefly in the fact that it afforded light for guidance in the present and the future. Mr. Jones compared the ideals of education of the past with those of the present. An abstract of his address follows:
In listening to the recital of what has been, it is well to ponder carefully what Shall be. It is worth while then to compare somewhat thoughtfully the ideals of edu- cation of the past, immediate and remote, with those of the present, to the end of a more helpful and hopeful outlook for the education of the future. It is true that each age must prepare its youth for a succeeding one-for living in a period whose economi- cal, industrial and social problems differ more or less from those existing in their child- hood. It is impossible, therefore, with us, to prepare the child to live in a form of society which has remained in prescribed form for ages and will continue the same for ages more. We must rather educate for power and adaptability than for prescribed action ; be governed by principle rather than by rule.
It is but reasonable that we form ideals of education and strive for what we think ought to be, and that a comparison of ideals of education of the different ages becomes instructive to us. If we put into the education of to-day what ought to be in the social order of to-morrow, we shall in so doing take an important step toward making it become so. It is therefore true that any philosophical discussion of educational ideals
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will necessarily be along ethical lines; since it is as a social being that man needs and develops his moral nature.
The ideal of Greek education will always remain clear in the memory of man be- cause of the singleness of its purpose and the simplicity of its method. Over the door of the temple of Delphi was inscribed the motto of Greek education and the principle of Greek life, "Know thyself." It was the individual self whose perfection was sought as an individual. It was the individual real freeman alone amid a race of slaves to whom the individual grace and perfection and refinement, implied by a liberal educa- tion, applied. There is a phase of the education of every child in which the Greek ideal properly belongs; a stage of individual development, of body and mind, in which all fullest capabilities of each should be wrought out by methods adapted to the pecul- iarities of the individual. But the complexity of modern life, the interpenetrations of interests, the idea of each for all and all for each, was unknown to the Greek. The first part-each for all, was fairly typified by the absolute subjection of the individual to the state, but the state lived for itself, too, and rarely returned to the individual the enlarged beneficence which institutions are fitted to give their members. The individ- ual Greek man was by no means the colossal man of modern institutions, who by ally- ing himself in helpful co-operation with the world makes of himself a world man, lay- ing under tribute through his more than a hundred hands the products of all climes, the thought of all minds, the hopes and aspirations of humanity. If I were allowed, therefore, to write the inscription appropriate to be placed over the modern temple of learning, I would not so much change its form as I would its meaning by an extended comprehension as to the possibilities of life which should be made manifest to every boy and every girl who enters a modern public school. It is the meaning of life rather than the meaning of the spelling-book that the child of to-day needs to enable him to enter into his inheritance. To "know thyself" in the Greek sense was a comparative- ly easy task; to "know thyself" to-day is a totally different matter. We are connected longitudinally with the past to remotest ages and laterally by numerous associations to many interests. The intimacy of our economic and social relations are such that to know ourselves fully we must know pretty well all that has occurred in the past and pretty much all that is now occurring in the world. That is the best education which makes us most aware of how we are all joined together as a whole humanity, for bet- ter, for worse, for richer or poorer, in sickness and in health to the end, and how the criminal is one who finds himself in a state of maladjustment to the social whole, fight- ing the hopeless fight against morally and ethically organized society. I do not be- lieve in neglecting the essential details of individual education. I believe in teaching the child to spell correctly, to read readily, to write legibly and to calculate accurate- ly. I believe in teaching the child the dignity of labor, through a well arranged course of manual training. But these are the mere beginnings of education, and by confining ourselves to these we are denying to our children their divine birthright-we are really denying them as yet the rights guaranteed them by the Declaration of Independence ; the right of life-which is not mere existence, to liberty-which is not mere freedom from physical bondage - the pursuit of happiness - which does not consist chiefly in the getting of money or the gratifying of the animal propensities. I believe in prepar- ing the child by a very practical drill in the elements of an education to earn an honest living; but I believe also in teaching him to recognize what is honest, and pure, and sweet, and wholesome in life. I believe in teaching him that work is honorable - that drudgery may even be divine, if inspired and controlled by sound principle. Indeed, to live up to a high standard of life in a civilization still holding many of the crudities and evils of savage life requires that each of us shall daily do many things which in themselves are not only not pleasurable but are positively distasteful. I believe in giving the young ideals of life and character and human worth and human dignity, which will enable them to stand firm under all tribulations and drudge till the glorious end be achieved. In and of itself much of our daily work is necessarily drudgery, while much of it requires that we bear large responsibilities, to endure petty annoy- ances and to do disagreeable things. It is impossible that we shall feel any real inter- est in these things by reason of any gratification of any power of ours by any attribute of theirs. There is, therefore, no motive to do these things unless one can be found elsewhere, so related to these acts as to constitute for the time being a valid and vicarious interest. The end not only justifies the means, but glorifies it as well. The continued contemplation of the ideal conditions to be achieved by work for the service of loved ones gives a pleasure akin to realization, gliding at last into the glory of act- ual achievement. Happy is he in life who can so live and think and feel that the ef- fulgent glory of his ideal life is thrown backward till it lights up all the pathway of Ins actual life. His ideal becomes the magnetic pole of his life and conduct. He will
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work and drudge ten hours per day, if need be, that he may found his ideal family life and keep it sweet and pure under the shadow of his own vine and fig tree. If properly educated he will march with steady step to the cannon's mouth at the call of his patriotic ideal, counting life and limb as mere incidents in the series of move- ments by which civil and religious liberty are established. He will counsel together with his neighbors, foregoing his personal preferences in order that the social whole may be unbroken. His interests are so set in the best things that he cannot unbend to the mean or the low, and the high sense of gratification coming from the realization within himself of a high grade of manhood compensates for laborious effort and fre- quent disappointments in external plans and purposes. The end of modern education requires that one become able to think clearly, to aspire nobly, to drudge cheerfully, to sympathize broadly, to decide righteously and to perform ably; in short, to be a good citizen.
But what is it to educate for citizenship in this day when civilization means so much? We who believe representative self-government the best form of human asso- ciation must needs have a high ideal of citizenship. To the Greek a liberal education was for the freeman as distinguished from the more numerous slaves. To us a liberal education is the means of making each man free and capable of preserving and using his freedom aright. The stupendous example of self-government now being displayed to the world on the western hemisphere never had its equal before anywhere on the globe. In a similar way the beneficent attempt to educate all the people was never before undertaken on so vast a scale.
The rumblings of discontent and the threats of revolution now rife in our land have a foundation in the injustice of capital and employers; but it has a much more efficient cause in the half educated condition of masses of people whose corresponding classes in other lands have none at all. A little learning is a somewhat dangerous thing, but the danger line is passed when enlightenment has been reached. Truly, "we must educate," "we must educate; " rich and poor, high and low, all races and both sexes; better all together, but at any rate and by some method we must educate for our own preservation.
It has seemed that it is just possible for a great city like Cleveland to forget its privileges and neglect its duty in regard to the proper education of its youth. We have been busy and careful about many things. The first century of lusty young life has passed and its close finds us' building boulevards, laying out parks, extending sewers and paving streets-all necessary and commendable things, whose beneficent results are so immediately apparent that there be almost none to object or attempt to stay our onward progress. But what shall it profit this city if it shall gain all these things and shall lose the children? Even in an economical sense, which is the least important of all, Cleveland cannot afford to raise up in her midst one single illiterate child, handicapped in the race of life by incapacity and doomed to a criminal life by rea- son of lack of ideals of life. I am told by competent authority that counting all the expenses attendant upon the clumsy administration of justice in our courts, it costs on an average $5,000 to send a man to the penitentiary and maintain him through his . period of detention .. Half this amount spent upon the education of the child in the formative period of his hfe would be cheaper and more effective. Herein lies the un- answerable argument for the kindergarten as a preparatory step in public education.
The period between four and six is a very dangerous period morally to children that are not well cared for in their homes. Many of the evil habits learned during this period require for their correction the strength of the teacher for many years of school life. This reason in itself is sufficient proof of the wisdom of placing the child during this period where he will not only not form bad habits, but will form good ones.
Recent studies of physiological psychology have fairly well established a definite relationship between certain conditions of the brain and the adaptability of the mind to certain classes of study, the main principle being that during periods of the great- est growth and most rapid development of the brain the mind is adapted to receive lasting impressions and to the forming of permanent habits; that during the later periods of slighter change the mind acquires less rapidly, but tends to reflect more upon its acquisitions. Now, early school life is chiefly acquisition, and life afterwards gives the opportunity for reflection.
Physiologists agree that the brain has three marked periods of difference in rate of growth. From birth to seven years of age the growth is most rapid; from seven to fourteen slightly less so; from fourteen to twenty-one growth is very slow, while at the latter age, in most cases, the brain has reached its full weight.
Physiologists, from their side of the subject, have long since determined by ob- servation the adaptation of the mind in these periods in quite different lines of acquisi-
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tion. Within the first seven years environment is tyrannical, controlling, through the sense and emotions, the culture of the child. Memory and the fancy are at their flood tide. The tendency to form habit is at its greatest. Long continued attention is im- possible. Most work must come under the guise of play. During the second period memory is quite active, fancy changes to imagination, and some disposition is seen to seek for important relationship of facts learned. The third period includes the time devoted in grammar schools and high schools and colleges, to the serious mastery of the higher tools of culture. Now, it is well known that a large ratio of children do not complete the second period and that a very small ratio finish the three periods. It is manifest that all should complete the first and second periods, though, as has been said, the exigencies of life with the poor and the lack of discipline and aspiration in the families of the poor make it well-nigh impossible to keep their children in school to the age of fourteen.
Now, seeing that in all probability children will leave school at an early age any- way, and in view of the physiological proof of the great value of the years from four to seven, morally and intellectually, it seems downright stupidity to lose the two most valuable years, from four to six, from our school curriculum.
If no serious school work were done by the children in those years, but the time were chiefly taken in arranging, through play and voluntary activity on their part. the entire environment, so that distinct moral and esthetic impressions should be imper- ishably made upon the growing brain and through it upon the immortal spirit, the gain to the community would be incalculable. As an economical proposition, I claim that it is wiser to expend our money in reducing the probabilities of crime than wholly in punishing the perpetrator after the crime is committed. I believe that public kindergartens as a part of our general educational system would prove an economical investment for this city, aside from the increased happiness brought to all by the higher standard of living which would be brought about in the next generation.
After the kindergarten shall have done its work for the children I hope to see them enter a sounder, more practicable and more hospitable primary school than has yet been developed. The primary school is the school of the people. It is the place to spend money generously that we may spend it economically. Higher education will in a manner take care of itself; but primary education must be fostered, since for the most part it is carried on for the benefit of those not yet old enough to appreciate to the full its advantages. I hope ere long to see a larger element of manual and tech- nical education brought into the primary school, both because it is adapted to the real education of the child and because it is one of the largest elements of fitting the young to their probable environment of work when they leave school and enter the life struggle. It has been a little difficult thus far to say the fitting word upon manual training in the school because of an unseemly strife between a class of pedants on the one hand and a band of groveling materialists on the other-a struggle between those who believe in the disciplinary value only as contrasted with those who see value only in that kind of education which will return immediate value in dollars and cents. But there is now dawning upon us a higher view than either; a conception that it is possible for spirit to live amidst matter, using it for nobler purposes of human life, 'shaping it into forms of beauty and utility through intelligent hard working in harmony with the guiding spirit. Manual labor is dignified and helpful when it is intelligent and efficient. The beautiful dream city by the lake, the noble city of the World's Fair, could not have been produced without the co-operation of hand, head and heart. The intelligent artisan stood helpfully beside the thinker. Manual train- ing well taught for a generation in the public schools would not only solve many of the labor problems incident to the large manufacturing centers, but it would enable the workingman to beautify his own home in a thousand ways, thus removing much of the ugliness which now meets our eyes at every turn in the poorer parts of our city. I long for the time when the man who must work with his hands shall receive in the schools the means of making his work interesting, intelligent and effective.
But the workingman because he is a workingman must not be left with manual education 'alone. He has the same rights and needs as others for those institutional ideas which will help to elevate his ideals and make not only a workman but a helpful citizen. There is a vast amount of capital lying around unused in this wealthy city. Other means of education must be devised and encouraged to aid and in many ways supplement the public schools. £ Public-spirited men must be encouraged to build more libraries, establish museums, open art galleries and found all those institutions which tend to make the life of a great city more sweet and wholesome and hopeful. I plead for a renaissance in education in the opening years of this, the second century
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of our city's prosperous life, that shall keep our spiritual interests at least up with our marvelous material advances.
This paper brought the afternoon meeting to a close.
SECOND SESSION.
The evening session was opened with a song by the Arion Quar- tette. Rev. A. B. Chalmers, of the Dunham Avenue Disciple Church, offered prayer. The chief address was delivered by Professor B. A. Hinsdale, of the University of Michigan, formerly superintendent of the Cleveland public schools. It was an elaborate and scholarly treatise of "The History of Popular Education on the Western Reserve."
After speaking of the dedication, by the State of Connecticut, of the proceeds of the sale of the Reserve to common schools, Dr. Hinsdale gave a sketch of public school legislation in the State from the beginning down to 1853. He spoke of the prominence of the Reserve in the State forward movement, and then passed to the rise and progress of popular education on the Reserve itself. The following are the portions of the address in which the speaker dealt with the city of Cleveland :
In dealing with the Reserve, I have been dealing with Cleveland. The majority of men are so little gifted with imagination, or are so poorly instructed in history, that they continually assume that all things continue as they were from the beginning. It is a very great mistake. In this particular instance, Cleveland is in no way marked off from other towns and villages until quite recent times. The city merely repeats the history of Youngstown, Akron and other places, only it has come to do things on a much larger scale. We can therefore run over the Cleveland story somewhat hastily.
Tradition tells of a school of five pupils when there were but three families on the ground. Who taught this school, as well as its exact date, cannot be told. We hear nothing more on the subject until 1814, when a school taught by a Mr. Chapman is mentioned- l'or, et præterea nihil. In 1817, when the population had grown to 250, a school house was built on the lot now occupied by the Kennard House; just how it was built is hard to say. This was undoubtedly the first school house built on the site of Cleveland, unless there may have been an earlier one at Newburg, or some other of the numerous local centers that have been swallowed up by the growth of the city. In this school house children were taught on the payment of tuition fees. The Cleveland Academy, afterwards called "The Old Academy," was built on St. Clair street in 1821 by subscription. There is no trace of a public school system until the granting of the city charter. The trustees of the town do not appear to have exercised the powers conferred by the acts of 1821 and 1825, and the only schools were private schools.
The late S. H. Mather, in a published document, states that in 1833 or 1834 an at- tempt was made to organize a mission Sunday-school in the Bethel Church; that the children were found so ignorant that proper Sunday-school teaching was out of the question; and that, to make good this deficiency, a day school was established to teach the children to read, the teacher being paid by voluntary subscriptions. This school, says Mr. Mather, was continued on this basis until the city, in 1835, assumed the charge of it and made it a city free school. So far as existing records show, the first public expenditure ever made for education in Cleveland was the cost of maintaining this school one year, $131.12. Not a large educational budget, surely, for a city that has come to expend a million dollars annually on its schools!
In 1836 Cleveland became a chartered city. The population was then five thou- sand. Two sections of the charter related to schools. The Common Council was au- thorized to levy a tax of not more than one mill on the dollar for the purchase of school sites and building school houses, and an additional mill for the support of a school in each of the three wards into which the city was divided, which should be accessible to all white children not under four years of age; the Council should fix, by ordi- nance, the beginning and end of the school year, and appoint every year a board called the Board of Managers of the Common Schools, in which the particular administration should vest. This board should make rules and regulations for the schools, examine and employ teachers, fix their salaries subject to the rules of the Council, make re- pairs of schoolhouses and furnish supplies, and certify to the Council all expenses in-
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