Paulding County, Ohio - Public Schools, 1892

PUBLIC SCHOOLS oe COUNTY is abreast with the times in her educational interests. The general spirit of enterprise manifested in business circles,and the rapid progress in other public improvements, have demanded a corresponding development in the system of education. To this demand the citizens have ably and generously responded. The log cabin of pioneer days, with its puncheon floor, clap-board roof and greased paper for windows, has rotted away, and been supplanted by good substantial frame or brick structures. Large public school buildings have been and are being erected in all the towns of any considerable size, which are modeled after the latest and best styles of architecture,and furnished with all the modern appliances. In a few instances uniform courses of study have been adopted, which are admirably adapted to the wants of the pupils who are preparing to enter college, and are especially suited to the practical needs of the masses. The Paulding, Antwerp and Payne schools are foremost in this particular, being thoroughly graded with a view to having a systematic course of study and a conferring of degrees upon graduates. There are marked signs of progress in the intellectual and practical knowledge of the teachers throughout the county. Annual institutes have been held for the the past twenty-five years,and quarterly institutes for the past four or five years. The examiners of the county have generally been, and are, men of true moral and intellectual worth, and have sought by rigid and thorough examinations of teachers to secure a genuine system and high standard of education. The first board of examiners was J.O. Shannon, S. N. Webb and H. A. Brown; and the following are the names of persons who have since served in that official capacity: John D. Carlton, Russell Cushman, A. J. Champion, Samuel Means, Andrew Durfey, W. C. Means, Kelsey Vanderhoof, A. M. Russell, I. N. Glover, C. W. Prettyman, J. H. McCague, H. M. Ayres, T. H. B. Bashore, F. B. DeWitt, W. H. Snook, John D. Lamb, C. B. May, W. B. Jackson, J. J. Clark, W. H. Mustard, Lewis Snyder, W. B. Brown, A. D. Male, J. M. Birkhold and L. J. Shafer. John D. Carlton was the first person who commenced the vocation of teaching in the county. The writer remembers

The stanza was probably the spontaneous outburst of some poetically inclined student of the pioneer pedagogue, and if not fraught with rhymthic beauty, contains, at least, an historical fact worthy of being preserved. Further mention of pioneer teachers and of schools in general is made elsewhere in this historical sketch, and therefore unnecessary here.

The following is a list of youth, of school age, taken at the June enrollment of 1891, in the several special districts and townships in the county: