USA > Pennsylvania > Erie County > A twentieth century history of Erie County, Pennsylvania : a narrative account of its historic progress, its people, and its principal interests, Volume I > Part 85
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what was then a piece of noble forest, stop to break a twig from some wood-loving shrub, or to dig up the rhizome of some herbaceous plant that thrived in the soft black loam at the foot of the giant lirioden- drons or hemlock spruces.
And his tramps took him out into the thickets where the abun- dance of the alders and willows gave evidence of the constant pres- ence of water. There the rank growth of sedges and rushes of the sau- rurus and symplocarpus ; or if it were spring-time of the caltha and water avens, multiplied his acquaintances; while, nearer the woods, when the sunlight sifted through the foliage, the painted trilliums and the mitrewort, the dog violet and the baneberry, the goldthread and various cross-bearers seemed to give answering glances of intel- ligence to his look of inquiry.
Many a time have I come upon him seated in absolute silence, en- gaged in nothing but looking about him upon the forms of his friends, listening to the voices of the warblers and vireos in the branches above, or the woodthrush farther away in the mazes of the forest. And then it was a rare pleasure indeed to break in upon his reverie; to share with him in the story he was reading from the open page of the book of nature.
I was not unacquainted with his friends of the vegetable kingdom. As a systematist in the study of botany I knew them all by name and their relations one to another. But his was a wider knowledge, for he knew them as the friends of man, his help in time of sore need. The root of this one, he explained, was a remedy for a certain ill, and the leaves of that a specific for another trouble, while the berries of yet another yielded a valuable medicine. He knew the virtues of every plant and the varied qualities of everything that there grew.
And he an inmate of the almshouse? Who was he?
He was Dr. Peter Wilhelm Mosblech, and his name was rightly adorned with the supplementary letters M. D., Ph. D., M. S. A., for the titles these stand for had all been earned. It is an interesting history, that of Dr. Mosblech. Let me try to tell it.
Dr. Mosblech was a German, born in the Catholic church and educated for the priesthood. Though destined for the church by his parents and being prepared by education for the high office he was expected ultimately to fill, he did not himself favor such a career. His mind sought other channels, and his search after knowledge led him, when he had finished at Bonn University, to select a different career. He abandoned holy orders and removing to Paris studied medicine. Even that failed to completely satisfy him, and he deter- mined to devote himself to the science of philology. In this he made remarkable strides, soon attaining to uncommon proficiency in the oriental languages. He was widely known in literary France, and was made a member of the Society of Asiatics, having the title of
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Abbe bestowed upon him. He was upon familiar terms with all the literary lights of Paris, and enjoyed the personal friendship of Victor Hugo, Alexandre Dumas the elder, and their contemporaries.
But there was a shadow upon his life. Having abandoned the priesthood he became possessed of the idea that he had for that reason been marked for punishment, and was being pursued. It was his de- clared belief that the Jesuits had decreed his death, and neither re- monstrance nor argument on the part of his friends could prevail to dispel what had become an established belief.
To escape the shadow, Dr. Mosblech went to London. There he mingled with the leading scientists of the age. He spent much of his time at the British museum, and at the famous botanical gardens at Kew. During his residence in England he became well acquainted with Charles Darwin and with him discussed a forthcoming book. Prof. Darwin gave him an outline of this work, and Dr. Mosblech was free to criticise it and to declare against the theory it put forward and so ably supported. The book was destined to revolutionize the thought of the world. It was the Origin of Species.
After a time the dread of the Jesuits again became too great to permit him to remain in England. Again he determined to flee. He sought a position as surgeon on one of the trans-Atlantic steamships, but upon arriving at New York resigned his post. Following the route of German emigration he took up his residence in Cincinnati, where he engaged in the practice of medicine with success, and after a short time married. It was not long, however, before the shadow of misfortune overcame him. His wife was seized with a mental malady from which she at length died ; his practice fell away ; his property be- came dissipated ; he felt again the depression that suggested the pur- ยท suit of a relentless enemy.
He moved to Wheeling, where he engaged in medicine again, but being offered a position in the faculty of the College at Bethany, Va., (now West Virginia) he became teacher of Greek and Hebrew. This place he filled until the breaking out of the War of the Rebellion closed the college. Meanwhile he had not neglected his philological re- searches. He became proficient in the language of the Hawaiian Islands, wrote a dictionary of that language, which was in use and an authority until recently (and may still be), and also translated a portion of the Bible into the language of the Sandwich Islands.
When the war closed Bethany College Dr. Mosblech came north, and settled at Warren, where he again opened a doctor's office. For a few years everything went well, but one night his house was burned over his head. There was no other explanation to him but that the enemies who, he believed were pursuing him, had done this evil thing. Again he moved, and his last flitting took him to Erie.
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He opened an office in Marvintown and hung out his doctor's sign. But he was now become an old man. Practice came but slowly, and what came he could not hold, for the infirmities of age forbade his attending to night calls and even the ordinary calls could not be responded to with the expedition that was necessary. He found that he could not secure partnership with a young man, as he was una- ble to bear his full share of the burdens. He was alone in the world ; in a strange city, he was haunted by a perpetual fear. What was there left for him? He could see no other course open; so turning over his effects to the county authorities he sought an asylum in the poorhouse.
For about 10 years he was a member of the county's family -- not so much of a charge as most of the inmates, for he rendered him- self useful as a doctor. During a portion of the time he lived there Dr. A. S. Lovett was physician at the almshouse, and, recognizing the claims of a fellow-practitioner, made him, informally, an assistant ; and he won, as well, the fullest confidence of Captain Brown, the stew- ard, both professionally and personally.
Dr. Mosblech was a cultured gentleman. No courtier ever pos- sessed manners more suave or could more gracefully turn a compli- ment to the ladies. He could step from his quarters in the poorhouse into any drawing room and be as to the manner born. There was scarcely any subject that he could not intelligently converse upon. Graceful as a writer, he was a powerful debater, especially upon any scientific subject. Although he had abandoned the career in the church for which he had been intended, he was yet deeply religious, and as a scientist was never ready to accept any theory that seemed in any manner to controvert the Bible. It was that which impelled him to dispute with Darwin; it was that which prompted him to repudiate the igneous theory of the origin of this world, as he did upon more than one occasion in forcible manner.
Dr. Mosblech had in the late Rev. A. L. Benze, pastor of St. John's Lutheran church, an attached friend at whose home he was a frequent and welcome visitor, and when he died in 1886, Dr. Mos- blech was buried in Erie cemetery and his grave is now marked by a modest monument of marble erected by the good minister of St. John's, now also at rest in the same Godsacre. To some it may seem unfit or a pity that one who had filled so high a place in the intellec- tual world in his life should now rest in that portion of the cemetery called the Potters Field. But let not foolish prejudice miscall a sa- cred place or give it an evil name. The resting place of God's poor is hallowed ground. When the pauper is laid beneath the sod, he has attained to the same level as the most mighty; and no matter how proud the monument that may mark the grave of the great, he is but
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a handful of dust, and his soul is with Him who is no respecter of per- sons.
But the resting place of Dr. Mosblech is especially happy, asso- ciating his memory as it does with what his life had been. Under the giant trees, relics of the primeval forest, he sleeps while the flowers he loved bloom over him each recurring spring, and the choristers of the wood continue to sing the songs he loved while he was in this life. Quiet and retired, more than the better known portions of the ceme- tery, it is such a place as he would have chosen.
Dr. Mosblech, doctor of medicine, doctor of philosophy, member of the Society of Asiatics, was master of fifteen different languages ; he was eminent as a scientist ; he was cultured in all that is scholarly, was known the world over, although he died in the Erie County Alms- house. He was a man of no evil habits: a genial gentleman, a loyal friend, and a good, but unfortunate citizen.
CHAPTER XVI .- THE CITY SCHOOLS.
THE LITTLE LOG HOUSE .- PRIVATE SCHOOLS .- ERIE ACADEMY .- PUBLIC SCHOOL DEVELOPMENT .- HIGH SCHOOL .- LIBRARY.
There has been no good record preserved of the beginning of ed- ucation in Erie. No doubt there were teachers and some sort of school facilities available as early in Erie as in any other part of the county ; that among the first settlers there were not a few who desired to have their children given a schooling and that there were also teachers ready to impart instruction who opened their houses and converted them into schools in order that the rising generation might obtain a start. But there is no record that this was so, nor any traditions with regard to it. It is a matter of record, however, that a school building was erected in 1808. It was made of hewn logs and stood at the corner of Seventh and Holland streets, and that piece of ground dedicated to the cause of education at that time has, for the full measure of a century been the site of a school, part of the time occupied by the building in which was imparted to Erie students the highest education the state pro- vides. Today the site is occupied by public school No. 2, one of the most modern of the school buildings of Erie.
The lot upon which the first school was built was orginally pur- chased from the state by James Baird for twenty-five dollars. That purchase was in 1804. It was sold for school purposes in 1808, Capt. Daniel Dobbins having raised sufficient money by subscription, and when bought it was patented in the name of the Presque Isle Acad- emy. It was a rural school, built of logs and situated in the forest away from the village, which was then all north of Fourth street, with German street about the center of the little town. It was a roomy building, and remarkably well attended. In 1812 it was taught by Dr. Nathaniel Eastman, when it had an enrolment of seventy scholars, thirty girls and forty boys, and that roll is still preserved as a valuable record of the olden time, when education in Erie was just begun. Dr. Eastman afterwards accepted the place of teacher in a school two miles south in Millcreek, when there came to the borough school-for the name of Presque Isle Academy did not figure outside the deed of patent to any extent-John J. Swan, whose teaching experience began two or three years earlier at Girard. He was a mere boy when he
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began to teach. He was not yet man grown when he came to the borough school, but his reputation quickly attained to full stature, for he came to be rated among the best of Erie's early teachers, and more than one of the men who afterwards became prominent in af- fairs in the borough and city proudly acknowledged their indebted- ness to John J. Swan.
The Presque Isle Academy continued for a number of years to be the only school in Erie, indeed, until steps were taken to organize the Erie Academy, provision for which had been made by the State Legislature at the time Erie county was laid out. Erie Academy was intended to be for the education of the public, but the free school idea had not yet taken root in the legislative mind, or if it had, was far from the time of fruit. All education at that time was at the expense of the patrons for tuition, books and the necessary supplies. So that while such public institutions as the Erie Academy offered splendid fa- cilities for the acquisition of learning, there yet existed a wide field for tillage by the private or select schools. For a long period these thrived, in many instances drawing their patronage not alone from the village of Erie in which they were located, but from considerable distances. Before a review of the history of the Acade- my is undertaken it may be profitable to take a glance at passing of the schools of a private character that thrived before the public schools exclusively occupied the ground. This is possible by the aid of the retentive memory of Mrs. Isaac Moorhead, who recounts no small measure of her experience in these institutions of learning.
First was the little school in the Old Yellow Meeting House. This stood at what is now 618 Sassafras street, and was taught by a young law student named Mott, who in the capacity of teacher con- trived to eke out enough of the needful to support himself while fitting himself for the legal profession. The next school to which the youth- ful student graduated from Mr. Mott was Miss Lowry's, in the vestry of St. Paul's, a small frame building back of the church, used as a chapel and Sunday school. Miss Lowry drew her scholars chiefly from families of the church-the Hamots, the Grays, the Babbits, the Jacksons and others. Then came the school of Miss Wight, promi- nent in the Old First Church. The prestige of the First Presbyterian Church was a powerful aid and her school thrived. It occupied a building on Seventh street near the little stream that used to flow past. a charming locality in those days. Miss Wight was a New England maid of undetermined age, was devoted to the church as well as to her profession, and her school endured for many years.
Jane Wilson, who taught school was a daughter of Thomas Wil- son, member of Congress from the Erie district from 1813 to 1816- the same who had been the first prisoner for debt in the little old jail on Second street. In Miss Wilson's case teaching had become a ne-
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cessity, but she was an admirable instructress. Her school was held in the basement of the Babbitt residence on Peach street, and that residence too was hard by that beautiful little stream. Miss Polly Coover taught school for several years in the second story of a block on the east side of State street between Fourth and Fifth streets. She was a spinster, but at length astounded the populace by announc- ing her secret marriage to her cousin Michael C. Kerr. They moved to Indiana, where he, getting into politics, attained to the position of Speaker of the Congressional House of Representatives.
In Mrs. Moorhead's recollection there were, at this time three public schools, one on Ninth street on what is now the Downing lot ; one on East Seventh street, which is now No. 2, and one on Second street between State and Peach, and in the third of these the late John R. Cochran was a teacher. The first seminary was located on French street between Third and Fourth streets, conducted by the Misses Field from New England, and many of the leading society women of old Erie were educated under the Misses Field. The Erie In- stitute conducted by Asa Emerson Foster and his amiable wife, origin- ally from Worcester, Mass., was kept for many years in the house that until recently formed part of the Kimberly hotel, and it became a pop- ular and useful educational institution. In those days it was acquir- ing an education to learn Latin, and this was the principal study, with some attention to mathematics and accomplishments. Among those who attended were Paymaster George A. Lyon, U. S. N., Geo. P. Colt, Julius Hoskinson and William L. Scott.
Madame Soznoski, a foreigner, made a sudden advent and, at- tached to the school for young ladies conducted by Rev. and Mrs. Ful- ler in the old United States Hotel on the bluff at the foot of French street, drew a large patronage. She taught music, French and draw- ing in the excellent school of the Fullers.
Louisa and Calista Ingersoll came introduced by Rev. Henry Tulledge, rector of St. Paul's. Their school was opened in the marble house on State street, part of the old United States Bank establish- ment. They surrounded themselves with theretofore unheard-of ele- gancies, and taught besides the solids of education, painting and draw- ing ; music on the piano, harp and guitar ; French, Spanish and danc- ing. The school proved immediately popular and was largely patron- ized. The Ingersolls taught many years and were very successful. Calista became the wife of Isaac B. Gara, long prominent in Erie as an editor and politician.
Probably the last venture into select educational work was the Bowman Academy, which, in 1857, advertised itself. It was an insti- tution devoted, as its announcement stated, to education, literature, science and the fine arts. It was accommodated in the upper floors of Moore & Austin's block on North Park row, and the patrons of the
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school were C. M. Reid, Dr. A. Beebe, J. \V. Douglas, James C. Mar- shal, I. B. Gara, John A. Tracy, G. A. Elliott, Wm. S. Lane, Dr. T. H. Stuart, S. A. Davenport, Benjamin Grant and A. McD. Lyon. Its lease of life was not long, however. The Academy and the rapidly ad- vancing public schools had narrowed the field in Erie.
The Erie Academy was the first school to make a start with a promise or prospect of permanence before it. The movement to es- tablish the Erie Academy began in 1816, delayed, no doubt, by the conditions existing in Erie during the period of the war of 1812, but, once the matter was taken up, there were no unnecessary delays. An organization was effected and an application made to the Legislature for a charter of incorporation. This charter was granted and ap- proved by the Governor March 25, 1817. Now there had been pro- vision made for just such a movement as the organization of an acad- emy years before. The State Legislature in an act passed in 1799. laying out the county of Erie had provided that in the sales of land, 500 acres were to be held back out of each reserve tract at Erie and Waterford for the use of such schools and academies as may hereafter be established by law, and subsequently fifteen lots in the square bounded by Fourth, Fifth, Myrtle and Chestnut streets were added as a site for the proposed academy at Erie. This was the endowment of the proposed school. The act passed in 1817, provided for "An Academy or Public School for the education of youth in the English and other languages, in the useful arts, sciences and literature, to be under the care, direction and government of nine trustees, namely : Rev. Robert Reid, Rufus S. Reed, Robert Brown, Thomas Forster, Thomas Wilson, John C. Wallace, Judah Colt, Thomas H. Sill and Giles Sanford." These men represented the best there was in Erie at that time. Years afterward, at an academy reunion, a speaker char- acterized these first trustees thus: "We find the learned and devoted Rev. Robert Reid, a native of Ireland, who had come to Erie in 1811; the energetic Rufus Seth Reed of Massachusetts, one of the first set- tlers in the town in 1795 ; Judah Colt, who had come in 1796 from New England ; Robert Brown, who arrived the same year from Virginia as a surveyor ; the public spirited Col. Forster, who came in 1796 from Dauphin county, and Thomas Wilson, who chose Erie for his home in 1800. United with these were Dr. John C. Wallace, an accomplished physician, a pupil of Dr. Rush and a surgeon in the Wayne expedition of 1794; also Giles Sanford, the merchant, since 1810 a resident of Erie ; and Thomas H. Sill, the first resident lawyer, who, since 1813. had made Erie his home." No better board could have been selected from Erie at the time. The act of incorporation granted to the trustees named in the charter the tract of land reserved for school purposes.
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All the preliminaries having been attended to the trustees pro- ceeded to organize the school. It was opened October 5, 1819, in a house owned by Col. Forster on French street, opposite the Reed House and Rev. Robert Reid was engaged as principal, with John Kelley as assistant. At a meeting in October, 1819, the trustees de- cided not to build upon the lots on Fourth and Fifth streets, which were not readily accessible from the village at that time, but to pur- chase a site at Ninth and Peach from Enoch Marvin, and on May 25, 1820, the Legislature granted $2,000 to the trustees with which to erect a building. A contract was made for the new school soon after the purchase of the lot, and it was completed in 1822. The school was sup- ported in part by the tuition fees, and in part by the rentals of the farm property, the city lots having been sold to pay for the land on Peach street. The original academy was a two-story building, rectan- gular in form, the broad side fronting on Ninth street. It was con- structed of the blue stone of this vicinity and surmounted by a belfry that occupied the middle of the roof. Its cost was $2,500.
During the first few years the English branches only were taught, among the principals being Rev. Dr. Reid, John Kelley, E. D. Gunni- son and A. W. Brewster. In 1827 Asa E. Foster was elected principal, when the Academy became a classical school. Mr. Foster continued as principal for nine years, and it may be said that the reputation of the Academy had become established during his administration. The period during which it flourished most was that of the administration of Reid T. Stewart, the enrolment in 1844 having reached 207, includ- . ing many pupils from a distance, but for long the Academy continued to hold high rank among educational institutions, and for many years it was through its doors that the men and women of prominence in bus- iness and society in Erie made their entrance upon the stage of active life. Among the most successful of the principals of the Academy during the ninety years of its existence, were James Park, Reid T. Stewart, J. C. Reid, J. W. Wetmore, Rev. J. Henry Black, Fayette Durlin, Rev. Geo. W. Gunnison, Rev. Lemuel G. Olmstead, Albion W. Tourgee, C. W. Stone, Andrew H. Caughey, H. A. Strong and Alaric Stone.
In 1868 an effort was begun by the board of school directors to obtain control of the Academy property. under an act of the Legisla- ture which authorized such a transfer. But it failed, there being a tie vote of the trustees when the matter came up for decision. It was not the end. In 1875 the matter again came up, when by a two-thirds vote it was decided to transfer the property to the school board. It required the approval of the court, however, to make the transfer legal and bind- ing. This was refused by the court. But the board was permitted to occupy the Academy building with the High School for about two years. This action of the trustees produced a sensation among the
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friends of the Academy and brought about a reunion of teachers and alumni in the fall of 1875, that was a notable affair. The addresses were as many of them protests against the proposed change as they were reviews of the former days, and a profound effect was caused by the announcement that J. Frank Tracy had offered to endow the Acad- emy with $500,000 provided it be raised to a college, and that the Ma- rine Hospital property be secured. The result of the reunion was that the attempts to divert the Academy property to the school board were thwarted for the time being. The offer of Frank Tracy was never taken seriously.
In 1848 the Academy building was remodeled in an attempt to im- prove and modernize it, but architecturally it suffered severely. It was not an improvement in appearance, whatever may have been the gain in room or conveniences. In 1895 an act of the Legislature was approved which provided that the trustees of an academy chartered by an act of the Assembly might select and appoint 30 qualified electors as corporators. The corporators may fill vacancies in their ranks, and appoint from among their members nine trustees. The first board of trustees under the new deal -- for there was a reorgani- zation under the act in 1896-were M. Griswold, Walter Scott, W. T. Farrar, John P. Vincent, H. A. Clark, J. C. Sturgeon, M. H. Taylor, H. F. Watson, J. W. Wetmore. In 1909 the school is under the principal- ship of Travers J. Edmonds, a graduate of Yale.
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