USA > Pennsylvania > Lehigh County > Bethlehem > A history of Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, 1741-1892, with some account of its founders and their early activity in America > Part 70
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In the early autumn of 1840, several young men, students of the Theological Seminary and others-the prime mover being David Zeisberger Smith, son of a missionary to the Indians, and himself a candidate for that service-promulgated the following: "A Plan for instituting a Missionary Society of Young Men at Bethlehem, Penna. All single men who are in favor of furthering the missions of the United Brethren among the Heathen are here respectfully invited to sign their names, in order to form a society exclusively for this purpose." Twenty-nine young men signed the paper. A meet- ing was held in the boys' school-house, September 7, 1840, and the Society was organized by the election of David Zeisberger Smith as President ; Henry J. Van Vleck, Vice-President; Augustus Wolle, Recording Secretary; William H. Warner, Treasurer ; Amadeus A. Reinke, Edward H. Reichel and Albert Butner, Directors. A month later the office of Corresponding Secretary was added, the first incumbent being Maurice C. Jones. A constitution was adopted at that meeting and signed by thirty-one young men. Thus. was founded the Young Men's Missionary Society which, through many vicissitudes, with frequently alternating ebb and flow of zeal ; through various experiments with notions to alter its character, elaborating its scope and variety of objects, expanding it at times into a kind of general Christian Association, converting it into a literary, library and lecture bureau, or into a guild for the intellectual and moral improvement of the young men of the town, the organization mean- while several times almost dying, but always getting back again to its real purpose, has had an unbroken existence to this time. Only
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two of its original members survive at this writing: Simon Rau, of Bethlehem, and its first Vice-President, Bishop H. J. Van Vleck, of Gnadenhuetten, Ohio. In connection with reference to these revivals of interest in evangelization among the heathen, another symptom of the opening and broadening spirit in relation to general condi- tions in the country, that was at work at Bethlehem, as in other old Moravian congregations, may be mentioned. This was the growing conviction among many who were living and thinking in touch with the movements of the time, while they also kept in mind the old pro- fession of Moravian settlements to be centers of religious influence, that Moravians ought to resume their share of duty in the cause of evangelization at home and engage in Home Mission work. There were those at Bethlehem who felt that in this matter also the com- munity ought to extricate itself from the trammels of the system they were endeavoring to shatter. It was a natural feeling for those men to cherish who were both business men and Christians and who in both respects were alive to the demands of the time. This sub- ject had engaged attention at a Synod in Bethlehem in 1824. It was considered in discussing the American situation at the General Synod of 1825. Interest was awakened at Bethlehem in the first distinct move in the direction of modern church extension made in the State of Indiana in 1829, in the proposition to organize work among the German colonists who had settled in the beech forest of Wayne County, Pennsylvania, in 1828, and in the enterprise started by New York Moravians in 1830, in Washington County, in that State. The next General Synod in Europe, held in 1836, gave utter- ance to views decidedly favorable to such a return, on the part of American Moravians, to the attitude and policy of the days before the Revolution. Although the movement then halted while further local problems were engrossing attention, and, so far as Bethlehem was concerned, a definite organization for aggressive church activity at home did not come into existence until the Bethlehem Home Mis- sion Society was formed in 1849, the first stirring in this direction took place, along with other agitations, when the advent of coal and canal opened a new era of progress. There were some at that time whose ideas of moving forward were large enough and high enough to embrace more than merely floating some kind of business on the new waves of prosperity that glided down the canal, and breaking up the lease-system so that they might redeem their ground rents, build houses ad libitum, purchase other lots and share in the advan- tage of a rise in value.
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A HISTORY OF BETHLEHEM, PENNSYLVANIA.
The period of new prosperity that opened with the completion of the canal did not last long. The financial reaction that so generally followed the inordinate rush of public improvements in the country and the attendant headlong ventures in speculation, soon affected Bethlehem also, and many who had encumbered themselves in over- confident undertakings were stranded, for their resources were too meagre to enable them to survive the crisis. A season of dire per- plexity for those who controlled the property and managed the finances of the Congregation and of the Unity or Church General at Bethlehem ensued. The enlargement of the credit system that had proceeded beyond the limit of safety almost proved ruinous. The Bethlehem Diacony was heavily in debt to the Administrator who represented the General Wardens of the Unity, for several suc- cessive years closed its annual accounts with a considerable deficiency and yet had abundant resources latent in the land held for it in trust by the Proprietor. The increasing desire of property owners to have the lease-system abolished and the disposition of some to agitate the matter without due consideration of all the interests that needed to be guarded by proceeding with much delib- eration and caution ; even the readiness of some to use various little advantages of the situation to embarrass and undermine, with a view to forcing the issue, served to render the state of affairs pro- duced by this financial crisis very perplexing. There had been what would be called in present-day speech "a building boom." The straits into which various individuals were brought sub- jected the Administrator and the Congregation Diacony to the necessity of purchasing numerous houses in order to prevent them from coming under alien ownership at sheriff's sale; for it must be remembered that the real reason for maintaining the lease-system had been, not financial policy in view of increasing value, but to preserve the exclusive church-village organization by enabling the authorities to thus discriminate and restrict in the matter of possession of buildings and residence in the place. The number of persons among residents who were not members of the Church had, up to this time, been very small and the authorities had been able to exercise strict control in the question of persons to whom they would lease property, besides retaining, by mutual agree- ment, the power to terminate each lease at the expiration of a year or, in case of a clear violation of contract, to annul it at their dis- cretion. But the number of such non-members was slowly increas- ing through various circumstances which could not be prevented.
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1826 -- 1845.
The necessity of deriving income from the properties that had to be thus bought in compelled the authorities to be less select and rigid in the matter of tenants than they desired. It is easy to understand that if one after another such property were allowed to simply go to the highest bidder at sheriff's sale, all control over the ownership of many buildings would soon be lost, and complete demoralization of the system would ensue.
Two. unpleasant features of the situation especially aggravated these embarrassments. One was the fact that some who were com- pelled to sacrifice their houses and some who saw the shortest and easiest way out of their difficulties in letting them simply get into the sheriff's hands, knowing that under existing circumstances the Administrator would have to buy them, took improper advantage of this way out. Even worse were cases in which by collusion the valuation was run up unfairly by the jury appointed under the arrangement that existed to appraise the buildings. The other feature of the troublesome situation referred to was the assertion, freely circulated by designing persons, that there were flaws in the form of the house-leases, so that their terms and conditions could not, if put to the test, be insisted upon. Inasmuch as all the power the authorities had to maintain the regulations of the village and be rid of undesirable people lay in the terms of these leases, this grow- ing impression, fostered by indiscreet and not over-conscientious individuals among those men of the place who were trying to hasten the dissolution of the system, produced a disposition in some quar- ters to violate contracts and defy ejectment ; in others to ignore the existing rules of the village when an advantageous opportunity occurred to sub-let apartments. In 1830, a legal opinion on this subject was procured of that distinguished jurist, Horace Binny. He declared that there was no flaw in the leases and that no jury could without violation of conscience frustrate the purpose of a quit-notice under their terms ; but that, on the other hand, if the jury required for summary procedure by the sheriff rendered an unjust verdict, there was no process for redress. The Proprietor could avoid this last resort by the slower course of issuing a writ of ejectment against a refractory tenant. A further legal opinion was gotten on the ques- tion whether the Proprietor, in cases of seizure by the sheriff, to which some were purposely letting things come, was compelled to enter as a bidder in order to save the situation. The opinion was that, while there was nothing to prevent the sheriff from seizing the property of a lessee, the purchaser could not acquire more right in
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A HISTORY OF BETHLEHEM, PENNSYLVANIA.
the house than its owner had, but, like him, was bound by the terms of the lease; that the sum bid at the sale could not control an appraisement made under the terms of the lease, even though it might influence the appraisers, but that they could not go beyond "the actual present value of the property" which their oath bound them to determine. Mr. Binny advised that the Proprietor com- municate at such a sheriff's sale what the circumstances were under the lease and enter objection to the sale taking place. Then, if the sheriff proceeded-as he probably would have to-at once annul the lease in the hands of the possessor and insist on the appraisement, as provided for. If the purchaser was one who would be an unob- jectionable possessor or occupant, a new lease could then be made to him. It was advised, however, by all means to avoid litigation in the courts, in the interest of all concerned, in view of the unusual nature of the whole arrangement and the questions that might be raised by counsel not thoroughly conversant with its peculiarities or disposed to needlessly shake confidence.
These various points sufficiently reveal the perplexities of the situ- ation, the internal conditions that were making it very difficult to maintain the lease-system and all that was dependent upon it, and the circumstances that forced the conviction upon deSchweinitz, who was then the Proprietor and Administrator, and upon the majority of his colleagues in the Provincial Board, that the time had come to take steps in the direction of reconstructing the entire system; even doing away eventually with the proprietorship and abandoning the exclusive polity. It was concluded, however, that it would not be wise to proceed with such measures during the financial crisis and the excitement that prevailed, and that the preliminary steps must be taken quietly and leisurely ; at every step consulting legal counsel thoroughly competent, through a careful study of the situation and its genesis, to give advice that could be relied upon. In June, 1833. when these conclusions were recorded, five such properties that had passed into the hands of the sheriff had been purchased in one year at a cost of $13,790-one of them being the new hotel of Henry Woehhler at the canal, for $6,000. Among the special financial meas- ures adopted in 1829 and 1830, to relieve the Congregation Diacony of unprofitable operations, was the sale of several industries that had been conducted by lessees. The grist-mill was sold to Charles Augustus Luckenbach and the tannery to Joseph Leibert and his son James. The plan of having the hotels conducted by salaried
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1826-1845. 653
landlords was given up. Although these establishments were not sold at that time, they were leased to private parties.
During the summer of 1831, the hardships of the situation were increased by an epidemic of fever. The hotels were emptied and scores of people in the village were prostrated. During July and August, there were frequently two and once three funerals on one day. The record states that seven persons who were not members of the Church died. One of these was the Hon. William Jones, of Philadelphia, who had been Secretary of the Navy under President Madison. He was on his way to the mountains for the benefit of his health, was taken seriously ill after he left Bethlehem, had to return and on September 6, passed away at the Sun Inn. In accordance with his special request his remains were interred in the Bethlehem cemetery. The diary notes the interesting fact that sixty years before, he had worked as an apprentice at boat-building on the Lehigh at Bethlehem. On July 3 of that same year, the venerable Bishop Jacob Van Vleck departed this life. He had continued to be the Proprietor of the estates of the Church until, on December 4, 1829, he was persuaded, in view of his feebleness and the pre- carious condition of affairs, to make a general deed to the Adminis- trator, the Rev. L. D. deSchweinitz, who then constituted the son of the previous Proprietor, the Rev. William Henry Van Vleck, his heir and thus the next in the succession of Proprietors. Following upon all of the depressing circumstances, came a severe blow in the sudden death of deSchweinitz on February 4, 1834. Bearing the brunt of the difficulties, and relied upon by all for leadership, it seemed as if none could so ill be spared just then. His health had been failing for some time, but none were expecting his sudden departure. He was greatly mourned throughout the Church, and his wide reputation in the scientific world as a botanist of distinguished rank, caused his death to attract much public attention. Eugene A. Frueauff, a son of the Rev. John Frederick Frueauff, had been assist- ing him and now took temporary charge of the business of the Administration, in consultation with the Rev. John Gottlieb Herman, Principal of Nazareth Hall, one of the executors of deSchweinitz's estate, along with Warden Stadiger, of Bethlehem; the Rev. John C. Bechler, President of the Provincial Board at Salem, N. C .; the Rev. Theodore Shultz, the Administrator at that place-deSchweinitz having been also the Proprietor of the Wachovia lands-and the Rev. W. H. Van Vleck, who now became Proprietor. On Septem-
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A HISTORY OF BETHLEHEM, PENNSYLVANIA.
ber 27, 1834, the Rev. Philip Henry Goepp arrived from Europe to assume the office of Administrator.
To preserve the connection of leading officials, it may be men- tioned, furthermore, that on March 21, 1827, Bishop Hueffel, whose wife died in December, 1824, left Bethlehem to return to Europe, where he became a member of the Unity's Elders' Conference. Bishop John Daniel Anders arrived from Europe on March 29, 1828, to take his place as President of the Provincial Board. He assumed, temporarily, the duties of the Head Pastor at Bethlehem after the death of deSchweinitz. The other members of the pastoral corps were the Rev. C. F. Seidel, Principal, and the Rev. J. F. Frueauff, who, after an interval of absence in Europe, resumed this connection in November, 1835, and continued in his old age to render assistance until his sudden death, November 14, 1839, at an inn eighteen miles from Bethlehem, on the way to Philadelphia.
The turmoil of the previous few years had, to a great extent, abated when the Rev. Philip H. Goepp entered upon the difficult duties of his office as Administrator, in September, 1834, but the financial burdens and the inherent problems of the situation remained. Upon him devolved the task of directing the course of development which his eminent predecessor had prepared for.
Now came the second important epoch of this transition period with which distinct forward movements are associated. This was the advent of the era of public schools. During the preceding six years, two special efforts had been made to give the boys' school of the village a more satisfactory character. On January 14, 1830, a meeting of citizens, with John Warner as President and John Oerter as Secretary, appointed Charles F. Beckel, Timothy Weiss and John Oerter a committee to report a plan of improvement. Their report was adopted at another meeting on the 19th, and submitted to the Elders' Conference of the village, who appointed eleven men to further take the matter in hand. Consultations were held and inter- views were had with Jacob Kummer and David Schneller, teachers of the first and second divisions of the school respectively, and some minor measures in the direction desired were taken, but nothing very decided resulted from the effort. George Fetter, who at intervals engaged in some lines of special teaching, removed to Lancaster in 1830. His wife had been keeping the primary school, and there were now two applicants for the position. One was the wife of the old organist, John Christian Till. The other was Mrs. Christ, wife of Matthew Christ, who in April of that year retired from the man-
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1826-1845.
agement of the Sun Inn. The school was entrusted to Mrs. Christ. Subsequently its enlargement and division brought her husband, a former Nazareth Hall teacher, also into requisition, and thus two of the most prominent and capable Bethlehem school-teachers of that period came upon the scene. Matters then ran on until 1834, when agitation began anew, perhaps under the stimulus of general popular discussion on the subject of common schools. A meeting of fathers, guardians and masters, on May 26, 1834, referred the problem of school improvement to a new committee consisting of Dr. Abraham L. Huebener, President; James T. Borhek, Secretary; John M. Miksch, John F. Rauch, C. A. Luckenbach, Charles C. Tombler and Abraham Andreas. Sundry meetings followed, at which many sug- gestions were discussed, most prominently a scheme for re-organiz- ing the school laid before the committee by Jedediah Weiss. A proposition of the committee sustained by some others, to increase tuition fees in order to meet the main difficulty, that of trying to get good work for poor pay, encountered opposition on the part of those who were in favor of improving everything but the salaries; being more pretentious than liberal, and wedded to the old idea, so hard to eradicate among many of the people brought up in a Moravian village, that, somehow, the authorities must provide them with the best to be had at little or no cost to themselves.
Another interesting feature was that, while at Bethlehem the boys' school, as compared with that of the girls, was continually regarded as unsatisfactory, at Nazareth the girls' school was the cause of com- plaint, while no fault was found with that of the boys. The reason was clearly the presence of the boarding-schools with their superior standard and equipment-the day-school for girls at Bethlehem being combined with the Seminary and that for boys at Nazareth with Nazareth Hall, in the grades above the primary out of which, in both cases, the children passed into the day-school departments of these institutions. It must be borne in mind, however, that even when the most reason was found for declaring these schools unsat- isfactory, they were so, not by comparison with like schools of that time at neighboring points, for they were very decidedly better, even at their worst, than these usually were at their best. They were unsatisfactory by comparison with the standards had in mind by people of a Moravian village, with superior schools as a tradition of the place. The schools of some neighborhoods were quite satis- factory to the majority, even if kept only three months in a year by a person barely able to teach reading, writing and a little "ciphering."
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A HISTORY OF BETHLEHEM, PENNSYLVANIA.
The boys' school, in two departments, with Kummer and Schneller in charge as before, was continued, together with the pri- mary school combined with a department of private instruction for some boys from the neighborhood, in charge of Christ and his wife, and the girls' day-school adjunct of the Young Ladies' Seminary. Some internal improvements in methods, arrangements and text- books, and a general toning up resulted from these consultations, and the contract with the County Commissioners to provide tuition to poor children of the neighborhood within a given radius, at the rate of two to two and a half cents per day each, that seems to have existed since 1828, was also continued to 1836, as well as the pro- visions to accommodate for a stipulated amount, boys from the country whose parents wished them to enjoy better advantages than any other schools within reach could offer. On September 3, 1834, a new School Board was elected, consisting, in the order given in the record, of Dr. Abraham L. Huebener, John M. Miksch, Timothy Weiss, Owen Rice, John F. Rauch and James T. Borhek, with the Head Pastor, the Associate Minister and the Warden as ex officio members. Thus things stood when the Public School era opened at Bethlehem.
In December, 1831, the Governor of Pennsylvania, George Wolf- whom Northampton County has the honor of counting, as the "father of common schools" in the State, among its native citizens- advocated, in his annual message, the establishment of a system of free common schools supported by taxation. The result proved that the time had come when this long-cherished scheme of some broadly-thinking men could be initiated. The desired action was taken by the Legislature in 1834. Although opponents used this public-spirited step against Wolf in demagogic agitation among the ignorant, the parsimonious and the narrowly sectarian, the effort made by these elements to pack the Legislature for the purpose of reversing the action failed; Wolf's successor, Governor Joseph Ritner, sustained the position taken, and the structure of Pennsyl- vania's Public School System arose on the foundation then laid. The act creating the Bethlehem School District, identical in extent with the Election District, and authorizing the levying and collection of school-taxes and the election of District School Directors, was approved, April 1, 1836. The first Board of Directors elected, April 29, consisted of James T. Borhek, Abraham L. Huebener, John M. Miksch, John F. Rauch, Owen Rice and Charles C. Tombler. All excepting the last-named had been members of the previous village
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School Board. They organized, April 30, by electing Owen Rice, President; Dr. Huebener, Secretary, and 'Squire Rauch, Treasurer. On May 27, at a meeting of the citizens of the School District, it was decided "to raise, for the current year, a sum, in addition to that determined on by the Delegate Meeting, equal in amount to the County Tax for the present year." This first school-tax in the dis- trict amounted to $469.79. John C. Warner was appointed collector at a commission of $8.00. In December, the board "resolved to employ Margaret Opitz, at a yearly salary of $8.00, to sweep the school rooms twice a week." At a later meeting, the services of "Gretel" were thought to be worth more and, the following Febru- ary, her salary was raised to $10.00.
The re-organization of the day-schools had finally amounted, therefore, simply to converting them from parish-schools with the ecclesiastico-municipal authorities controlling them, and the clergy, of course, ex officio members of the School Board, into District Schools under the Pennsylvania school-law, with a Board of Direc- tors elected by the citizens of the School District, as such, in accord- ance with the provisions of the law. That the change was decidedly beneficial, under the circumstances which then existed, cannot be questioned, although many were opposed to it. This opposition was of two kinds. Some, taking into account the established principles. of education in a Moravian village, combining secular and religious instruction and churchly training, had exaggerated visions of secu- larizing influences and of drift away from all cherished associations. While some of those who had urged the change undoubtedly regarded with favor this prospect of an additional breach in the old village system which they impatiently wished to see broken up more rapidly, such fears were needless, for all that was important in the relation between church and school remained under the arrange- ments of those first years. Bible instruction, general religious instruction and distinctly Moravian Church instruction by the pas- tors continued as before. Even such features of a Parochial School as the regular attendance of the scholars, in a body, at the public service on Sunday and at the various special services in which they were in the habit of participating, did not disappear. Nothing in the school laws interfered, at that early stage, with things like these, and, as the village was yet so exclusively one of Moravians that no other element weighed, the continuance of such local features was taken for granted by common consent. The other kind of opposition was
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