History of Berks county in Pennsylvania, Part 135

Author: Montgomery, Morton L. (Morton Luther), b. 1846
Publication date: 1886
Publisher: Philadelphia : Everts, Peck & Richards
Number of Pages: 1418

USA > Pennsylvania > Berks County > History of Berks county in Pennsylvania > Part 135

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SCHOOL BUILDINGS .- The following state- ment is presented to show the time of erection of the school buildings in Reading, and their location :

1. Southwest corner Sixth and Walnut,1 1838.

2. Southeast corner Washington and Cedar, 1839.

3. Southwest corner Chestnut and Carpenter, 1839.

4. Northwest corner Tenth and Washington, 1842.

5. Northeast corner Franklin and Peach, 1842.

6. Northwest corner Washington and Rose,2 1849.

7. Southeast corner Second and Chestnut, 1850.

8. East side of Seventh, between Washington and Walnut, 1854.

9. Southwest corner Bingaman and Orange, 1854.

10. North Tenth, beyond Green (addition 1884), 1860.

11. Schuylkill Avenue and Hockley, 1864.

12. Southeast corner Ninth and Spruce, 1865.

13. Elm, between Ninth and Tenth, 1868.

14. Franklin, between Second and Third, 1868.

15. South Sixth, below Chestnut, 1868.

16. Northeast corner Ninth and Marion, 1870.

17. South Twelfth, below Chestnut (Richards), 1872.

18. North Tenth, beyond Washington (Eckert), 1873.

19. Southeast corner Fourth and Elm (Briner), 1873.

20. North Tenth, near Walnut (Phillippi), 1873.

21. Northeast corner Franklin and Peach (Hagen- man), 1875. Substituted for No. 5 in table.

1 Discontinued and property sold.

2 Demolished and rebuilt 1886.

22. Southeast corner Thirteenth and Cotton (Frees), 1875.

23. Seventh below Laurel (Severn), 1880.

24. Northeast corner Oley and Church (Mc- Knight), 1880. ·

25. Centre Avenue beyond Exeter (Jacobs), 1880.

26. Tenth and Centre (Ziegler), 1882 (addition 1885).

27. Boys' High School building, Eighth and Wash- ington, 1883-84.

28. Girls' High School building (conveyed by legis- lative grant).

Since 1880 the board has expended for new buildings, $154,000.

INFANT SCHOOL SOCIETY .- In 1832 a move- ment was encouraged towards the establish- ment of a society for the education of the infant children of Reading. A meeting was held on January 19, 1832,-Joseph Kendall having been chairman and Samuel Bell, secretary. A constitution was adopted, and a report was pre- sented, showing the success in this novel experi- ment. Over two hundred infants had enjoyed the benefits of a school which was being con- ducted for this purpose, notwithstanding various prejudices were manifested against it.

The highest number of scholars in the school at one time was 108 ; the average number, 50. The tuition for a whole term was $3.12}. Children of parents in good circumstances, $1 a quarter ; poor children, fifty cents a quarter ; destitute children, free.

The salary of the principal teacher was $150; and the assistant, $100.

The whole receipts were reported at $687.79 ; the expense, $682.73.

A resolution was passed encouraging the con- tinuance of the school ; and the following board of managers was elected to serve for the ensuing year : .

Mrs. N. O'Brien, Mrs. Bell, Mrs. Beard, Mrs. Dech- ert, Mrs. E. O'Brien, Mrs. Moers, Misses Baum, Shal- ter, Beard, Badger, Porter, Coleman, Mrs. Cumming, Mrs. Kendall, Mrs. Eckert and Mrs. M. S. Richards.

FEMALE SEMINARIES .- The first establish- ment of a separate institution at Reading for the education of young ladies was in 1835. A seminary was then begun by Mrs. M. E. Shaw, who came highly recommended. Her school wa in five departments ; and besides English and French, her course of education embraced music, drawing and needlc-work. Her terms

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were,-board aud washing, twelve weeks, thirty-two dollars and fifty cents ; music, French and drawing, each eight dollars; use for piano, one dollar ; pew-rent in church, fifty cents. She was succeeded by a Mrs. Clarke, of Lancaster, on October 13, 1835.

Reading Female Seminary .- In pursuance of an act passed April 16, 1838, a female school in Reading was erected into a seminary for the education of female youth in the arts, sciences and useful literature.

The trustees were Rev. Jacob Miller, Rev. William Pauli, Jacob Sallade, Alva . Kerper, Henry A. Muhlenberg, Geo. De B. Keim, W. Darling, John Miller and Peter Filbert.

The seminary was eudowed from the State, according to the number of teachers and pupils, from three hundred dollars to five hundred dol- lars. Sallade was elected first president; Kerper, treasurer and Filbert, secretary.

Eighty shares of stock were anthorized to be issued at twenty-five dollars, and ouly two shares were allowed to one person. An adver- tisement was made on June 16, 1838.

It was opened on September 3, 1838, with three teachers and sixty pupils, and successfully conducted for some years afterward.

In 1850 three female seminaries were carried on,-one by Mrs. Dechert and daughters, on Penn, above Sixth Street; a second by Mrs. Orrick and Mrs. Young, at corner of Fifth and Walnut Streets ; and a third by Miss M. Jack- son, on Fifth, between Franklin and Chesnut Streets, whose course embraced English educa- tion, wax, worsted, and zephyr-work, and Polish and silk embroidery.

A " Winchester Female Academy " was car- ried on for some years on Penn above Eighth, in the building now used as Union Hotel. It was an incorporated body, created in 1867.

PRIVATE SCHOOLS OF READING.

THE ACADEMY OF THE IMMACULATE HEART is a Roman Catholic School, established by St. Peter's congregation in 1859. It is devoted to the education of young ladies. At the same time and place there were established a parochial school and a boarding-school, the former beiug still continued. The latter was

removed to West Chester in 1872 where it is now kept up by the church. The academy was first in charge of Mother Superior Magda- lena, but the present Mother Superior is Mary Ambrosia. About a hundred students are in daily attendance. The parochial school has about two hundred and seventy-five pu- pils of both sexes, who are taught by five Sisters of the Immaculate Heart. Both schools are supervised by the Rev. Father Gerald P. Coghlan. The buildings at 225.South Fifth Street were erected for a residence some years before 1859, but were enlarged and changed to adapt them to the wants of the school.

THE READING SCIENTIFIC ACADEMY .- In the fall of 1862 Prof. D. B. Brunner located in Reading after a thorough preparation for educational work and became the owner of S. A. K. Francis' Classical Academy, which he continued with great success for ten years. In 1872 he was elected county superintendent of public schools, and then he suspended teaching till the expiration of his term, in 1875, when he revived it with the present name, conducting it in connection with Mr. Farr's business school one year. In 1876 the academy became a separate institution and was largely attended for the next four years. Prof. Brunner is a scientist of acknowledged ability. He has con- structed a superior set of philosophical apparatus to illustrate frequent lectures on natural philosophy to his scholars. In 1880 he sold out his interest in one branch of the school to E. L. Horning, and under the principalship of the latter the academy was conducted till 1886. In 1885 a commercial department was opened by Prof. Brunner in the Scientific Academy. A night-school has also been conducted for some years. Both sexes are admitted in the course of instruction.

READING BUSINESS COLLEGE .- The first business college in Reading was opened about 1864, by Clark & Nelson, and was well patronized. In the course of a few years there were several changes of management which affected the attendance so that the school was closed. About 1868 a Mr. Folmer attempted to carry on another business school, but aban-

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HISTORY OF BERKS COUNTY, PENNSYLVANIA.

doned the project at the end of the year. In 1872 C. N. Farr established a new business college, which he carried on with much success until 1876, when he disposed of his interest to E. E. Post, to become private secretary to the Gover- nor of the State. Mr. Post continued the school until 1879, when it was finally closed. In 1881 Prof. D. B. Brunner revived the college, with the present name, and has succeeded in founding it upon a permanent basis. Under his principalship the college has become very popular, having an annual attendance of nearly two hundred students.

SELWYN HALL is the name of the diocesan school of the Protestant Episcopal Church of Central Pennsylvania, and is situated near the northern city limits, in the building commonly known as the " Deininger Mansion." It was founded in 1875 as a boarding and day-school for boys. The property comprises about four and a half acres of land at the foot of Penn's Mount. The building is large and commodious, well ventilated, warmed by the most improved hot-air furnaces and in particular equipped with a view to the health and comfort of the ca- dets.

The gymnasium-a handsome brick build- ing, eighty by thirty-five feet-has been fitted up with a view to encouraging athletic sports, and contains all the necessary apparatus.

The course of instruction is similar to that of kindred institutions, having in addition the influences and advantages of special instruction in the doctrines of the Episcopal Church.

The school is under the immediate direction of the Rev. Bishop M. A. De Wolfe Howe, D.D., and has as its head master Lot Clarke Bishop. In 1885 the cadets on the roll nuin- bered twenty-five.

CARROLL INSTITUTE situated on Fourth Street, near Walnut, was established in 1880 by Edward Carroll, the present principal, to pre- pare boys for college. The number of students is limited to thirty-five, and so generous has been the patronage of this community that the average annual attendance has been thirty-four. Of the twenty students who were prepared for college under Prof. Carroll, eight were admitted to the Lehigh University, one to University of Penn-

sylvania, ten to Lafayette College and one to Princeton.

SCHUYLKILL SEMINARY was established by, and is under the patronage of, the East Penn- sylvania Conference of the Evangelical Asso- ciation, which decided to maintain such an institution at its annual meeting in 1881. The committee to whom was assigned the work of es- tablishing a seminary held its first meeting at Reading May 9, 1881, when an organization was effected; subsequently the appointment of the Rev. S. S. Chubb as general manager and the Rev. W. E. Walz as principal was made. The seminary was formally opened on the evening of August 16, 1881, in the -Salem Evangelical Church in Reading ; and the fol- lowing day the exercises of the school began in the building on the northwest corner of Sixth and Walnut Streets, where it has since been continued. The Rev. W. E. Walz, becoming a missionary to Japan, Prof. John F. Crowell was elected principal and Miss Lizzie F. Baker preceptress. Prof. Crowell is now in Europe completing his studies in the old universities, and Thomas S. Stein, A.M., is serving as prin- cipal de facto. The seminary having become permanently established and outgrowing its present quarters, it will be removed to Freder- icksburg, Lebanon County, in August, 1886, where one of the most complete college build- ings in the State has been erected for its use through a generous donation by Col. John H. Lick.

STEWART ACADEMY is an English classical and mathematical school for both sexes. It is conducted in the fine three-story sandstone mansion, late the residence of Henry A. Sey- fert, situated on the corner of Fifth and Cherry Streets. Its ample and elegant rooms have been well furnished for school purposes by the present proprietor. The academy was estab- lished September 12, 1881, by Prof. and Mrs. John A. Stewart, both long identified with the educational work of the city. The former was an assistant in the High School twelve years, and served fourteen years more as principal, having been then assisted by Mrs. Stewart (née Greth). Their large experience as educators and recognized popularity have been fully ap-

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preciated by the public iu the patronage they have received in their new enterprise. The academy was opened with eighty-six pupils, and it has since had a yearly attendance of one hundred and seventy-five students. The num- ber attending this year shows an increase over the preceding year.

It has primary, intermediate and academic departments, thus enabling children of the same family to be educated under the same system, from the first elements to the training for busi- ness or the admission into college. Besides the principals, the corps of teachers includes six as- sistants. All the necessary apparatus has been supplied to illustrate the course of instruction. The first class, of six scholars, graduated June 26, 1884, the exercises upon that occasion hav- ing been conducted in the Academy of Music, in the presence of a large number of persons. The graduating class of 1886 numbers ten scholars. Under the direction of Prof. and Mrs. Stewart the academy has been a great suc- cess ; it is now one of the principal educational institutions of the city, and has aided materially in awakening a stronger interest in the higher branches of learning afforded by local enter- prise.

READING SEMINARY FOR YOUNG LADIES was opened in convenient rooms, on the corner of Fourth and Penn Streets, September, 1884. The first principal was Mrs. S. I. B. Wisener, who had charge of the school one year, when she removed to the South. In September, 1885, Miss C. J. Brown became the principal of the seminary, and it has since prospered under her direction. It has now four teachers and thirty scholars. Special attention is paid to the study of the fine arts and painting.

INTER-STATE COMMERCIAL COLLEGE was established September 1, 1885, by the present principal, Prof. H. Y. Stoner. It occupies commodious and well-arranged rooms on the corner of Sixth and Washington Streets, and, though not quite a year old, has been remarka- bly prosperous. More than fifty students, of both sexes, have been admitted and twelve have completed the course of study. Prof. Stoner is a native of Exeter township. For eight years he was connected with the foremost business

colleges of the country. In addition to the studies usually pursued in business colleges, English branches and short-hand are taught, so that a thoroughly practical education may be obtained in his college.

Among the select schools of the city continued for a term of years, that of the Misses Cooper is worthy of notice. It was established in 1874, and had a regular attendance of twenty-five girls till recently. The common English branches, French and German were tanght. Other select schools have been successfully con- ducted for a time, the most prominent, by reason of its continuance till now, being that of Miss Esther Benade.

HERMAN STRECKER, of Reading, is one of the most eminent specialists in the department of science in America. He was born in Phila- delphia March 24, 1836. At a very early age he evinced a fondness for the study of natural history, and at the age of nineteen centered his attention and diligent study during leisure hours on the Lepidoptera, a division of the fas- cinating science of entomology devoted to but- terflies and moths. He is one of the best authorities on this subject in the world, and is a faithful illustration of what wonders may be accomplished by one who devotes his leisure hours to patient and diligent study on one particular department of science. His val- uable and truly magnificent collection of but- terflies is not excelled by any other collec- tion of the same kind in the world. It con- tains over seventy thousand specimens, gathered from every corner of the globe. Among the great rarities is a specimen of Colias Boothii, taken by the second Ross expedition in search of a northwest passage, in 1827-29. This is the only example of that species in any Ameri- can collection. There are also three of the great Papilio Antimachus, from equatorial Af- rica, of which only about a dozen are known. Then there is the argus moth (Eustera Argus), with enormously long, slender, tail-like attaclı- ments to the hind wings; whole suites of the splendid golden Croesus and Lydius butterflies, from Halmeheira ; the curious dead-leaf butter- fly, from China and India; the wonderful Par- nassius butterflies, from fifteen to eighteen thou-

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HISTORY OF BERKS COUNTY, PENNSYLVANIA.

sand feet elevation in the Himalayas and other great mountain ranges ; enormous Cossus, from Australia, which are eaten by the natives; the owl moth of Brazil, measuring a foot across the wings ; the resplendent Rhipheus flies, from Madagascar, which have no rival in nature to their beauty-the brilliancy of the humming- bird, the glitter of gems fading in comparison with them. There are also monsters, half male and half female, or those with one wing partly of one sex and the rest of the other ; there are albinos, melanos, hybrids, monsters with an extra wing-every imaginable variety or freak. There are butterflies that look like wasps, like bees, like lichens ; moths with peculiar mark- ings resembling skulls, anchors and the figures 88. There are examples collected by trained collectors in every quarter of the world, by In- dians, by Esquimaux, by explorers and travel- ers, by Jesuit missionaries, by any one whose services could be enlisted. This truly wonder- ful collection is the result of more than thirty years of study and systematic collecting. For some specimens he has paid as much as fifty dollars each. Being endowed with great artistic talent, he has published many valuable works describing new species, etc., illustrated by finely- executed lithographs engraved by himself, and in many cases colored in a life-like manner by his own hands. He also published a work containing a catalogue of North American butterflies.

Mr. Strecker is an architect, designer and sculptor by profession. He located at Reading nearly forty years ago, having then accompa- nied his father, who was the prominent dealer in marble and marble-worker of Reading at that time. He has since followed the pursuit of his father. As a sculptor he gained an enviable reputation, and he has produced. many praise- worthy works of art, among which are the large crucifix in the burial lot of the DeLong family in Charles Evans Cemetery, cut from solid marble and weighing fourteen tons ; the monument erected for the family of Judge Don- aldson, of Pottstown ; a monument erected to the memory of James Nolan, Esq.,-a beautiful design; the "angel boy," erected on the grave of Sammy Kutz. The above are a few of the

designs from his master hand. Joseph Drexel, of New York, has in his palatial residence a superb alto relievo from the chisel of Mr. Strecker. It is a grand conception of the alle- gory of Poe's " Raven."

ARTISTS.

Art and artists can be appropriately mentioned in this connection. Art was taught here for a time in the ladies' seminaries, especially be- tween 1830 and 1850.

The first artist of distinction at Reading (of whom any definite information was obtainable) was Genorino Persico. He came here about 1820, married a danghter of John McKnight, banker, and after remaining several years, re- moved to Richmond, Va. He was particularly expert in crayon drawing. His brother was a famous artist, having painted one of the prom- inent scenes in the Capitol building at Wash- ington, and was befriended there by Hon. George M. Keim, a great patron of art and artists.

JACOB B. SCHOENER, son of William Schoe- ner, Esq., for many years a justice of the peace at Reading, was a superior painter of miniature portraits before 1845. He was born at Read- ing in 1805, and when still a boy took some lessons in drawing under Persico; subsequently he entered the Academy of Fine Arts at Phila- delphia and there devoted himself especially to miniature painting, in which he became profi- cient. He was successful at Reading till 1845; when he removed to Boston, where he died sev- eral years afterward.

JAMES A. BENADE was doubtless the first artist at Reading who acquired more than a local reputation by his brilliant productions. He was the son of Dr. Andrew Benade, a dis- tinguished Moravian bishop of Bethlehem, where he was born in 1823, and educated in the superior schools which that place afforded. Having a natural inclination to art, he studied painting for a time under a noted Moravian artist named Grünewald, and afterward prosecuted his studies at Philadelphia. When seventeen years old he settled at Reading. His mind was active and his brush was busy, and he soon won a high place in the esteem of this community

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by his wonderful talent. He was rapidly on the way to a national reputation as a landscape painter, but in the very midst of his bright and encouraging prospects he was stricken with. paralysis, from which he died shortly afterward (February 2, 1853) in the thirty-first year of his age. Upon that occasion the Berks and Schuylkill Journal contained the following highly complimentary obituary notice :

" As a landscape painter Benade had no superior who were natives of this country, and his constant im- provement afforded high ground for believing that in the course of a few years he would stand at the very head of painters in his peculiar branch of art."

A number of his larger paintings are highly valued by certain persons of this community, on account of their artistic excellence, prominent pieces among them being with his family and the families of Dr. H. H. Muhlenberg, William H. Clymer and William H. Strickland. His productions indicate a master as well as a genius, for he was able to execute what he conceived. His sketches include superior views of Reading and of picturesque localities round about the place.

He was married to Sarah Nagle Moers, of Reading, by whom he had four children,- James, Henry, Esther and Sarah.

F. D. DEVLAN, a distinguished artist, who succeeded Benade in the order of prominence, was born in Paterson, N. J., on the 15th of December, 1835, but shortly after his birth his family moved to Lambertville, in the same State, where they engaged in the iron business.

In a few years one of those panics which periodically seem to paralyze the business world, affected them, and they came and settled in Reading, Pa. At that time the subject of this sketch could not have been more than four years old. Subsequently he attended the public schools until he was abont fifteen years old. This story is told of the school-boy, " Dan," as he was familiarly called then and through his after-life. He occupied the same desk with George S-, now a prominent Democratic politician of Berks County. One day the prin- cipal of the school, or rather his assistant, caught- " Dan" drawing in George's atlas, while he did "Dan's" arithmetical examples. This the teacher

threatened to tell the principal, when George raised his slate (without a frame) and said : " If you do, I'll cut your head off." After school hours the warehouse in the rear of the store kept by his father and his brother, at the south- east corner of Fifth and Chestnut Streets, was crowded every day by boys watching the em- bryo artist covering sheets of pasteboard and shingles with pictures done in house-paints, furnished by a friend and admirer in the house- painting business. " Dan's" father thought lie was wasting time and neglecting his studies " for the painting craze," as pater familias char- acterized his son's love for painting ; so he sent him to a classical school in order to divert his mind from a continuance in the work for which he had such a marked propensity. His mother and elder brother, however, encouraged him in his painting, and when he was about seventeen years of age he was sent as a pupil to Mr. James A. Benade, an artist at Reading at that time. Boy as he was, his preceptor always got him to paint the animals in his pictures. It was in this branch of art that Mr. Devlan excelled. He had a poetic feeling, and could impart to a landscape most charming effects. His first picture created quite an excitement in the art circles of Philadelphia. It was placed on ex- hibition in a window of one of the prominent art galleries on Chestnut Street, and people went in throngs to see the " picture painted by a boy up in the mountains." His best pictures are in possession of the following individuals: Mr. Clark, architect of the National Capitol, Wash- ington, D. C .; Mrs. Dr. Chas. H. Hunter, Mrs. Harry Hunter, Nathaniel Ferguson, Theodore I. Heizmann, Mrs. John McManus, Wm. McIlvain, Jr., Horatio Trexler, all of Reading, and Mr. Geo. Brooke, of Birdsboro'. The picture owned by Mrs. John McManus was finished only a few days before he died. It is said of him that he was so much in love with his art that he had a strong inclination to join a monastic order, so as to afford an opportunity for pursning his studies to " his heart's content." From this he was, however, dissuaded by dear friends. Mr. Devlan was one of the most genial companions, of unruffled sweetness of temper, and although full of humor, there was a deep religious feeling

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History of Berks county in Pennsylvania, Part 135

Author: Montgomery, Morton L. (Morton Luther), b. 1846 Publication date: 1886 Publisher: Philadelphia : Everts, Peck & Richards Number of Pages: 1418

Author: Montgomery, Morton L. (Morton Luther), b. 1846
Publication date: 1886
Publisher: Philadelphia : Everts, Peck & Richards
Number of Pages: 1418