Marshall County, Indiana - Chapter 16 (1 of 2 so headed), 1881

Chapter 16

EDUCATIONAL INTERESTS - SEARCH FOR I NFORMATION - NEWSPAPER COMMENTS - VPERSONAL RECOLLECTIONS - SCNOOLS OF 1836-3T - ScHoo.L Houses Forry YEARS AGO - SciHOOL CENSUS OF 1810 - SUBSCRIPTION SCHOOLS - AGITATION OF FREE SCHOOL QUESTION - Vorte In MARSHALL Country, For AND AGAINST - CONSTITUTIONAL PROVISION CREATING FREE ScHoots - Tne Scnoon Funp - Scnoon OFFICIALS - NUMBER AND VALUE OF SCHOOL Buitpines - ScnooL Boanps AND TEACHERS - ScHOOL STATISTICS. ERHAPS in no other department of the public service has there been a greater improvement than in the educational interests of Marshall County. In 1536-37, there was no publicschool system, and at that time, in accordance with the principles ennnciated by the immortal Dogberry, " edication eum by natur." Information respecting the schools anterior to 1569, must be obtained from one of three sources, viz.: the records of the State Educational Department, the newspaper comments, and personal recollections. A thorough research among the dusiy documents of State officials, and the reports of school officers, reveals the fact that, however valuable these statistics may have been to the State printer, in the footings of accounts current for stationery, or however satisfactory they may have appeared as specimens of mathematical skill, they are nearly worthless for giving any definite idea of the schools then in existence. Whether the omission of the very items which are desirable, or the gross inaccuracies of those given, are the more to be deplored, will ever be a matter of doubt with those who have occasion to use them. Reports which show the enrollment of the schools to be greater than the entire population, between the ages of six and twenty-one years, must be received with some suspicion. They either prove the falsity of the saying that "figures will not lie," or disclose a remarkable thirst for knowledge on the part of the adult and married portion of the community.

Newspaper comments of that day and generation display a notable unanimity in glorifying the common school system in theory, and condemning it in fact, thus leading a latter day inquirer to conclude that the " practical workings" of the schools the editorial comments were written in a Pickwickian sense. Besides, such statements as, " Miss A.'s school closed on Friday with exercises which were highly creditable to both pupils and teachers," after the lapse of years, do not give a most satisfactory view of the attendance, studies, methods and successes of the schools. Going back to the early days when there were no newspapers, and when no records were anywhere made of desirable

And the reader is aware that personal recollections, like personal opinions, are found to be somewhat discordant. No better evidence could be had that " our life isa dream," than the effort to detail the circumstances and events of a quarter of a century ago. Like the remembrance of a dream by one who wakens, are the visions in memory, specters of the living realities that once occupied the mind.

This somewhat lengthy review of the means of information, which, by the way, is intended for the relief of the writer rather than the edification of the reader, explains the impossibility of drawing a perfect comparison between the schools of the present and those of earlier times. All that can be done or expected in this article, is to give a hasty sketch of the former condition of affairs, showing that the advancement in educational matters has been commensurate with that in material interests.

During the winter of 1837-38, a school was taught about two miles west of Plymouth, by Dr. William N. Bailey. About this time, although it may have been a year afterward, a school was taught on or near the farm of Adam Snyder, in North Township, by Abraham Johnson. During the winter of 1836-37, Thomas McDonald taught a school in a log house, which had been oceupied as a temporary residence, on the farm owned by Vincent Brownlee, near Maxenkuckee Lake. Also later, Edward Thompson, H. B. Dickson and Hugh Brownlee, taught this school. There was also a school taught in the Roberts' neighborhood, one near the residence of Mr. Ousterhaut, two miles south of Plymouth, and also one near Argos, on the Michigan road, about the same time. These were taught by Miss Catharine Logan, afterward Mrs. John B. Dickson, and a man by the name of Erkskine. In German Township, the first school was taught in an old log cabin, situated about one mile north of the present town of Bremen, in the year 1837, by a man by the name of Bemas. The average pupils in attendance was from fifteen to sixteen.

Our schoolhouses forty years ago did not possess great attractions oxternally or internally. They were almost invariably small log buildings, cold, and very deficient in regard to windows; a fireplace at one end, a few rough benches without backs for seats, and a board or two which seryed for writing desks, were the sum total of the internal arrangements of the building. During the winter, those pupils who occupied seats in the back part of the house, would often suffer with the cold, while those who were near the fire, would suffer as much from the other extreme. Not unfrequently the smoke would drive both pupils and teacher out of the building for pure air. But pupils of studious habits would make rapid proficiency, even under these disadvantages. Many graduates of these unsightly and uncomfortable schoolhouses now sustain excellent reputations as teachers and business men and women in other walks of life.

In the year 1840, the census report says Marshall County had forty school children, twenty-five of whom attended school, and that there were but three schoolhouses in the county at that time. No records of any of the schools were then made, and it is impossible to arrive at anything definite in regard to them. Prior to 1848, there were no free schools in Indiana, and no general system of schools was in vogue. The schools that were taught up to this period were "subscription schools," that is, any one who thought himself competent, taught such pupils as would attend, for a stipulated amount per quarter. Reading, writing, and arithmetic up to and including the "rule of three," were all the branches thought necessary to be taught in those days. In 1848, the question of " Free Schools" was presented to the voters of the State, for adoption or rejection. The question was voted on in Marshall County, August 7, 1848, with the following result:

Towxehtp. For Free Acainst Free

The yote on this question taken throughout the State, was for the purpose of feeling the "educational pulse" of the people to be incorporated in the new constitution, to be adopted by a Constitutional Convention, to be held in 1850. Hon. A. L. Wheeler, of Plymouth, was a member of the convention. After mature deliberation the following was adopted, as Article VIII of the Contution, which has undergone no change since that time:

Sxction 1, Knowledge and learning, generally diffused throughout a community, being essential to the preservation of a free government, it shall be the duty of the General Assembly to encourage, by all suitable means, morul, intellectual, scientific and agricultural improvement; and to provide, by law, for a general and uniform system of common schools, wherein tuition shall be without charge, and equally open to all.

The fund to be derived from the sale of county seminaries, and the moneys and property heretofore held for such seminaries ; from the fines assessed for breaches of the penal laws of the State, and from all forfeitures which may accrue ;

All lands that have been, or may hereafter be granted to the State, where no special purpose is expressed in the grant, and the proceeds of the sales thereof, including the proceeds of the sales of the swamp lands granted to the State of Indiana by the act of Congress of the 28th of September, 1850, after deducting the expense of selecting and draining the Same ;

Src. 3. The principal of the common-school fund shall remain a perpetual fund, which may be increased but shall never be diminished ; and the income thereof shall be inviolably appropriated to the support of common schools, and to no other purpose whatever.

Sec. 4. The General Assembly shall invest, in some safe and profitable manner, all such portions of the common-school fund as have not heretofore been intrusted to the several counties ; and shall make provision by law for the distribution among the several counties of the interest thereof.

Sec. 5. If any county shall fail to demand its proportion of such interest for common-school purposes, the same shall be re-invested for the benefit of such county.

Sec. 6. The several counties shall be held liable for the preservation of so much of the said fund as may be intrusted to them, and for the payment of the annual interest thereon.

Sec. 7. All trust funds held by the State shall remain inviolate, and be faithfully and exclusively applied to the purposes for which the trust was created.

Sec. 8. The General Assembly shall provide for the election, by the voters of the State, of a State Superintendent of Public Instruction, who shall hold his office for two years, and whose duties and compensation shall be prescribed by law,

Until 1851, the schools were under the jurisdiction of the Township Trustees, althongh by the school law, at that time in force, their jurisdiction was almost or entirely nominal, their school duties being little more than to make a donation to the teacher of the morsel of interest coming from the school fund. The usual custom seems to have been to apply the public fund to the benefit of any teacher who chose to start a school, he making up the deficiency by tuitions from the pupils. The first agitation of school questions appears to have taken place about 1853.

In the Plymonth Banner of March 24, 1853, appeared an article signed "S. M. E.," calling attention to the need of a school, stating, in most forcible language, the evils and inefficiency of the private school system, and proposing a plan for the future. The article is especially noticeable from the fact that it describes the graded school system as it now exists in all cities and towns of any educational repute. There was not, then, such a school in the State, and very few in the Union. If the writer is living, he has the satisfaction of knowing that the plan suggested, and which, undoubtedly, was viewed by the few who read it, as chimerical and visionary, has been universally adopted as the only feasible method of public instruction. During the session of the Legislature of 1871-72, an act was passed authorizing the appointment by the Board of Commissioners of a County Superintendent, whose duty it should be to visit the schools, make examinations, and issue certificates to teachers, examine the public records and enforce the payment of all fines and forfeitures belonging to the school fund, into the treasury, and report the condition of the public schools once in each year, to the Superintendent of Public Instruction.

The duties of the County Superintendent, had, until the act of 1871-72, been performed by a school examiner whose duties were to examine applicants, make and report the condition of the schools annually to the State Superintendent, and perform such other duties as were thought for the best interests of the schools. Cummings was the first regularly appointed examiner under the revised school law of 1851-52, who served as such until his death, in 1868, when A. C. Capron was appointed to fill the unexpired term. At the opinion "t term of tho Genuine? Court, in 1868, Thomas McDonald received the appointment, and served until the revision of the school law, in 1871-72. He was then made County Superintendent under the revised law, which position he held unti) his death, March 28, 1875, when W. E. Bailey was appointed, and is serving as such at the present time.

The following statistical tables will suffice to show the comparative development and growth of the county in educational matters since the year 1856

Statement showing the enumeration for school purposes, number admitted into the schools, average daily attendance, total number of districts, average length of school in months, number of teachers ite and average daily compensation of aes:

Statement showing the amount of the common school revenue, paid by the county for the purpose of apportioning to each county, and the amount paid by this county for the above years:

There was, in 1856, a large amount of unsold Congressional land in this county, which has all been disposed of, and the proceeds loaned on interest, which materially helps to increase the figures for 1868 and 1874.

The whole number of teachers licensed in 1861 was 60; number refused, 5. Number licensed in 1875, 188; refused, 60, Number licensed in 1879, 189; refused, 89.

School Boards

The County School Board is composed of the County Superintendent of Schools and the Trustees of the several townships. The Board is now constituted as follows:

Tippecanoe Township - James M. Stewart, Guy D. Murphy, G. A. Senour, Charles H. Cooper, George A. Netherton, Mark T. Stonehill, George W. Tipton, Jacob Martin, Albert Borton and Ellie Wann.

German Township - A. Yockey, Jacob Whitewather, L. W. Sunderland, A. J. Dumph, George Feldman, A. B. Ransford, C. W. Miller, Philip Schlosser, David Berger, John W. Casper, Jacob H. Hess, Sarah Baird and E. J. Baird.

West Township - Daniel S. Grube, Henry Hamilton, Jonathan Holm, I. C. Ames, John J. Oberlin, Ida M. Dill, H. C. Beiler, 8. C, Norris, George Miller, Henry Grube, Miss F. A. Norris and Julia A. Rust.