Grundy County, Missouri - Chapter 9, 1908

Chapter 9

EDUCATIONAL^The First Schools - Description of the Old Log School House - The Teacher - The Course of Study - District Organized - Early Enumerations - Teachers Wages - ^Llst of Teachers in 1881 - County School Commissioners - The Jewett Norris Library - Grand River College - Its First Course of Study - A New Building - Period of Prosperity - The Men at the Head - Avalon College - Its Establishment The Vrooman Co-operative Scheme - The Trenton High School Proper - Growth of the School - List of Superintendents - The Trenton School of Today.

"If we work upon marble, it will perish; if we work upon brass, time will efface it; if we rear temples, they will crumble into dust; but if we work upon immortal minds * * *we engrave on those tablets something which will brighten to all eternity." - Daniel Webster.

CHOOLS were established within a very short time after the county was first settled, the first one on record being taught by Miss Louisa Berry in Madison township in the winter of 1835 and 1836. It was located about a mile north of the present site of Edinburg. An Englishman named Moore taught school in Trenton in 1838. The very first schools were as a rule taught in private houses. It was but a few years, however, until school houses were comparatively common.

The school house of the forties was built of logs, generally hewn, and was in size perhaps sixteen feet square. A fireplace took a large part of one end of the house. The chimney was made of sticks and clay, as were the chimneys of all other cabins. The roof was made of clapboards, and at first these were kept in place by weight poles. The seats were split logs supported on sticks which were fitted into holes bored into the ends of the logs. Such a thing as an individual desk was unheard of. A long board, fastened against the wall slantwise and held in place by pegs, was the writing desk, and the pupils would line up to this desk in a row for instruction in penmanship. The ordinary school house had two small windows in which oiled paper was used for panes, l)ut sometimes light was furnished by leaving out a log from the side of the house. Log school houses were not uncommon so late as 1880.

The first schools were conducted on the subscription plan, the teacher, who was generally a man, making from fifteen to eighteen dollars a month. His mental and educational equipment was often very meager, and as in later times, some teachers were more successful in making impressions on the back than on the mind. Now and then, however, an ambitious young man of culture who was seeking his fortune in the new country would start by teaching a few terms of school. Reading, writing, spelling and arithmetic constituted the course of study. Any unreasonable desire for more learning was gratified by going farther in the arithmetic; but the teacher who had been through fractions was a very learned man.

The first school district in Grundy County was organized in Trenton township in 1840. Within the course of a few years a number of others were organized in various parts of the county. Public schools were at first controlled by the townships in which they were, the chairman of the school's board of trustees being a member of the township school board, which had general supervision over educational affairs of the township. This system gave way to the present system of giving each district full control of its own school. By 1850 schools w^ere organized in all parts of the county.

An enumeration of the children of school age in the county in 1853 shows a total of 1,781. Trenton had four districts, with 294 children; Madison township, two districts, 314 children; Jefferson, one district, 176; Franklin, four districts, 244; Clarion, four districts, 246; Liberty, five districts, 259; Washington, four districts, 240. In all, twentyfour schools in the county. The state school money for that year amounted to 42 cents per capita. In 1854 the enumeration had increased to 2,010. In 1886 it was 5,526, and the county had eight3^-five school districts and one hundred and twenty-five teachers.

For many years teachers' wages here, as elsewhere, were ridiculously low^ As a natural consequence incompetent teachers were not uncommon. Yet low as wages w^ere, it was an ordinary thing for the ambitious young man in moderate circumstances to teach a few terms as a stepping stone to something better. A surprising number of our best citizens have begun their business life in this way.

The office of county school commissioner or superintendent has been on the whole exceptionally well filled, and has been singularly free from politics. Grundy County's superintendents and commissioners are as follows :

County school supervision being adopted in 1908 by an overwhelming majority, the county commissioner, Miss Brainerd, became county superintendent by virtue of her office. "

The Jewett Norris Library is an institution of which Trenton is justly proud. Jewett Norris, the old pioneer statesman, soldier and business man, who in his reclining years left Trenton for a home in the north, retained a big heart full of love for the town and the people among whom the prime of his life had been spent. In 1890 he made a formal offer of $50,000 to the Trenton school board for the erection of a free public library, which offer was promptly and gratefully accepted. Chauncey Hall was given the contract for erecting the building in May 1890, and it was completed and formally opened October 13, 189 1. It is one of the most beautiful and artistic buildings in the city, and, next to the public schools, the most useful educational institution. Following is the proposition made by Mr. Norris to the Trenton school board.

Gentlemen : I herewith offer to give to the public schools of the city of Trenton, fifty thousand dollars in trust, for the purpose of estal)lishing and maintaining a free public library and reading rooms in your city. I make this donation on the followingconditions, to-wit :

That your board procure a suitable site for a library building, to be deeded to your board for that purpose, (and be equipped with furniture, pictures, books, and literature), a suitable building for the purpose aforesaid, and that the library and reading rooms so established shall be forever maintained as a free public library and reading rooms in the city of Trenton, under such rules and regulations as your board may from time to time adopt for its successful maintenance and support, having in view the use of the said library and reading rooms, free to the people of Trenton and Grundy County forever, and that the same shall be kept open to the public every day, from nine a. m. until nine p. m. Sunday and legal holidays excepted, and on such other days and hours as you see fit, and that the said building shall be kept in good repair by your board, and that a competent librarian and necessary assistants shall be employed to take charge of the property and serve the public, and that your school board shall annually provide for the defraying of all necessary expenses, for the support of the aforesaid institution ; and I further stipulate that your board shall never sell or convey the building, or land on which it is situated, but forever retain it for the use of the people of Grundy County.

If the above conditions are accepted by your board, I will place the sum of thirty thousand dollars in the Union bank, subject to your order, as fast as it is required for the erection for the building, and whatever amount of the said sum is not required for the building, may be used for the ec^uipment of said library and reading rooms with furniture, books and literature.

When the library building is completed and furnished with furniture, books and literature, as far as the funds at your disposal will admit, and the institution is in successful use and operation, I propose to furnish twenty thousand dollars more, five thousand of which shall be made available for its further equipment if your board think it necessary, and the balance as a permanent endowment fund to be invested in the same manner and under the same restrictions as the common school fund is now required to be invested by the school law of your state, the annual income from which is to be used in the support of said institution.

Should your board approve of all the above conditions, you will please give me your formal acceptance of the same and have it recorded with the proceedings of your board.

Jewett Norris

Grand River College, Grundy County's pioneer institution for higher education, was organized in 1850. I. B. Allen was its founder and John O. Martin its first teacher. Attaining great success and a wide influence through many years, it was a strictly private institution, depending on tuition fees for its support. Its course of study is interesting compared with that given by a first class high school today. The first contract read as follows :

"The undersigned agrees and promises to have taught in the Grand River Academy any of the following branches of study for five months, at the following prices per scholar ; to-wit : Orthography, reading, writing, arithmetic commenced, at six dollars; English grammar, modern and ancient geography and arithmetic completed, at eight dollars; logic, rhetoric, natural, ancient and modern history, natural, mental and modern philosophy, at ten dollars; chemistry, botany, astronomy, geometry.

Its first board of trustees were W. H. Lyda, Benjamin Fulkerson, and Evans Perry. John Ordway of Massachusetts was principal of the college from 1 85 1 to 1853, when the building burned. Grand River Academy, as it was called, was at this time the only institution of its kind in North Missouri, and the only school which made even a pretense of teaching higher than rudimentary branches. A boarding house was run in connection with the school, and its students were furnished board for $1.50 per week.

After the burning of the building in 1853 the college W'as closed temporarily. A company headed by John T. Witten and Wm. Perry was organized and incorporated in 1858, and put up a new building, at a cost of $6,000, meeting the expense by a sale of scholarships. With the exception of a suspension during the Civil War, the college was successfully operated as a private institution until 1876, when it was turned over to the North Grand River, West Fork, Gentry and Mount Moriah Baptist associations. Under their control the high reputation the school had acquired was well maintained until recent years, and man}^ of our best citizens are proud to claim Grand River College as their alma mater. The school was finally closed and moved to Gallatin in 1893. It is now an auxiliary of Wm. Jewell College of Liberty, Mo.

Avalon College, an educational institution under control of the U. B. church, changed its location from the village of Avalon, in Livingston County, to Trenton in 1891. F. A. Z. Kumler was the leading spirit in getting the institution established in this city. Money for the establishment of a school was raised by buying a farm adjoining the cit}^ on the east, dividing it into town lots, and selling those lots to public spirited citizens at high prices. Buildings were erected on most of these lots, and a handsome college building was placed in the central part of the addition. The farm thus bought and divided now constitutes College Addition.

After a struggle of over a half dozen years, during the course of which some very able educators were enrolled in the faculty, the college closed and the building was turned over to a band of socialists under the lead of Walter Vrooman, who rechristened it Ruskin College. They undertook to run not only the school but the town as well on socialistic principles, and got possession of a number of business institutions of the city which they ran on a co-operative plan. Their doctrines did not take with Grundy County people, and the school broke up, some of its leaders attempting to establish another in the suburbs of Chicago. The college building was bought for the public high school in 1905.

Trenton's school history dates back to 1838, when an Englishman named Moore taught in a cabin on the present site of the old cemetery. He was followed by Jarvis Boyce in 1839. he by Geo. H. Hubbell in 1842. A regular school system was adopted in 1844 and a school board chosen. Col. Jacob Tindall was the first teacher chosen by this board. In 1853 D. T. Wright built a school house in Trenton at his own expense, and became a teacher therein. In 1855 a school house was built at public expense, and Joseph Ficklin, afterwards teacher of mathematics in the state university, was chosen teacher. He was shortly followed by T. Bradley. Mr. Bradley held his position until i860, when he died and his wife taught out the remainder of that school term. Messrs. CoUey and Luther Collier followed Mrs. Bradley, Mr. Collier beingsucceeded in 1863 by R- ^- Norton, a young man from Ohio. A separate department, devoted to music, was established during the incumbency of Mr. Bradley and was filled by his wife. In 1865 the high school proper was organized by Mr. Norton. The number of pupils it contained in that year was twenty-three. In 1866 the enrollment had increased to one hundred. Mr. Norton bought an old building for school use, and rented it to the district for $48 a year until 1870 when a high school building was erected at a cost of $17,000. The number of pupils in 1868 was 150, and the total expense of conducting the school $1,480. In 1869 a school was organized for the colored children. In 1870, the

Professor Norton remained superintendent from 1865 to I ^^75' when he resigned his position to accept a better one with the Warrensburg State Normal, and was succeeded by W. D. Dobson. The Grand River Republican in the early fall of 1869 contained a display advertisement for the high school, signed by H. J. Her rick, secretary of the board, soliciting attendance of students living outside the district. Tuition for the high school was cjuoted at $2 and for the grammar school at $1.50 per month. The school at that time employed four teachers, R. C. Norton, teaching the high school; B. F. Thomas, the grammar department; Miss Bell Rozell, the primary, and Mrs. Hattie Robertson, painting and drawing. In 1874 Professor Norton's salary was raised from $800 to $1,000.

Professor Dobson remained superintendent from 1875 until 1880, when he was succeeded by Jno. E. Vertrees, who taught one year. G. A. Smith w^as elected in 1881. In 1882 a contract was let for the erection of a new building, for a price, in round numbers of $20,000.

The Trenton high school not only articulates with the state university with twenty-three and a half units of approved work, now ranking second in the state, but is one of thirteen Missouri high schools that are approved by the Northern Federation of Colleges and Secondary Schools. This permits our high school graduates to enter any college or university without taking entrance examinations in any one of the following states : Missouri, Kansas, Colorado, Nebraska, North Dakota, South Dakota, Minnesota, Iowa, Wisconsin, Illinois, Michigan, Indiana and Ohio.

There are three courses offered the pupils in the high school, any one of which when completed will enable the pupil to enter any higher institution of learning in any of the states before mentioned.

The English course is designed for those pupils who do not expect to pursue their studies beyond the high school, thus giving them a very thorough and practical education.

The scientific course is intended to prepare the pupil for entering any of the engineering courses at the university. The classical course is intended to fit those students who complete it to enter the arts and science department of the university.