Jasper County, Missouri - Chapter 3: Pioneer Schools and Churches, 1912

First School Section Sold - Pioneer School Districts - First School Described - First County School Commissioner - School Fund Greatly Augmented - The Carthage Female Academy - Organization OP the First Church - Building of the First Church - First Church and Rev. Greenville Spencer - Old-Fashioned Camp-Meetings - Rev. Harris Joplin and Rev. Anthony Bewler - Peace Church of Galena Township.

The act of congress receiving Missouri into the Union provided among other things that for the purpose of creating a school fund in each county of the state, to be used exclusively for the payment of teachers in the public schools, the sixteenth section of land in each congressional township should be donated to the state, and all moneys received from the sale of such land were to be placed in the school fund of the several counties when organized and the same loaned out at interest which was to be annually apportioned to the districts according to their school population.

The first sixteenth section of school lands sold in Jasper county was paid for in May, 1842. The land sold for $1.25 an acre and netted the county school fund $800. During 1842 the school fund was swelled to $870.48 by the payment of fines, donations and interest on the $800, which was at once loaned out. The interest collected for the year 1842 was $38.

The first school district to be organized was in congressional township 28 and range 29, in the east-central part of the county. The formal organization occurred in November, 1844, when the county court appointed William Maxwell school commissioner for the township and ordered that the same be divided into three school districts. District No. 1 embraced all of the territory north of Spring river; No. 2 the west half of the territory south of Spring river and No. 3 the east half.

Judge Jeremiah Cravens was one of the first school directors for this district and Samuel Teas was the first teacher. We give herewith a description of this first school written by H. M. Boyd, formerly of Sarcoxie and a pupil in the school back in the 'forties : ' ' Samuel Teas taught the first school in the county. The house was built of rough logs unhewn and was covered with clapboards held down on the roof with poles, as nails could not be obtained at this early day. The house had but one door ; this was in the south side. In the west end one log was cut out the full length of the room for a window and this was left open summer and winter. Under this window there was a plank running the full length nailed to pins driven into the wall. This served as a writing desk. The fireplace was in the east end of the house and was wide enough to take a log a foot and a half thick and eight feet long.

''The jams on each side and the back were made of rough rock and the balance of the chimney was made of sticks daubed with red clay. The house was seated with split logs, the fiat side up and the ends resting on chunks.

*'In the side of the door a nail was driven into the wall and on this was suspended a little forked stick about six inches long, which every scholar took with him when he went out during the hours of study. No scholar was allowed to go out till this little fork was returned. This house stood on the east side of the road that ran from the Haskins house to the old ford on Center creek, known as the Boyd ford, and was about midway between the two. I attended this school and here I learned my ABC and received here my first flogging. The school was patronized by the Cravens, the Mills, the Brittons, the Boyds, the Haskins, Beasley and Prigmons.

**Mr. Teas was regarded as a successful teacher in that day and a fine scholar. He wrote a good hand and could cipher as far as the rule of three. The school was what might be called an old fashioned school; that is, all the students used the old blue back spelling book and studied it aloud.

**The school on each evening closed by the students standing in a line and spelling the words as they were given out by the teacher. Ten minutes were given to get the spelling lesson and as the announcement was made every boy and girl got his blue-back book and spelled aloud \*ith all his might and they could easily be heard a quarter of a mile away."

The order creating this district was made at the May term of the county court in 1845. Benjamin Turner was appointed the commissioner for the township and Samuel Bright and John R. Chenault, inspectors.

three members of the first county court participated in the organization of the school system, Judge Samuel B. Cooley, the first presiding judge, being a teacher, and Judges Bright and Cravens, members of the first school board in their respective districts.

This district was fortunate in having for its first teacher and leading spirit, Judge Cooley, for he was a man of great integrity and his infiuence on the rising generation was felt long after he had passed away.

The school was one of the pioneer log houses and at first, for the want of lumber, had no floor, the door and two openings for windows letting in the light. We are told by one of the old settlers that in winter time these windows were covered with gunny sacks, glass being a luxury known only to the most prosperous of the farmers and merchants.

The fireplace was an immense affair, where great logs five or six feet long were thrown in, and here the fire sparkled and roared throughout the cold winter day. The furniture was all home-made and scant at that; the seats, like those at the Teas school, were made by cutting a large log in two and driving pegs in the rounded parts.

Other districts soon were organized and when the war came on twenty-three school houses had been built. Among the districts organized in the 'forties were the Franklin school, near Castle Rock on Turkey creek, with Charles Harris as its teacher ; Peace Church school, later called Enterprise ; Spring River school, Carthage ; the Black Jack in McDonald township; the Duval in the northwestern part of county and White Oak school, near Avilla.

The course of study was confined principally to the three R's, but as the county grew in population, wealth and importance, new branches were added and during the later 'fifties several of the schools included in their curriculum history, civil government, algebra and like studies.

In those days the rod was freely used and teachers were usually men, the school authorities holding to the old-fashioned theory of "no licking, no learning;*' and muscle was as much needed by the teacher as a good certificate, in securing employment.

The modus operandi of conducting the school was quite different from the law and usage of today. In each township there was appointed a commissioner who exercised a supervision over the school. He employed the teacher, mapped out the course of study, made the rules and regulations and, in short, performed the duties now exercised by the school board.

There were also appointed two inspectors whose duty it was to visit the schools (at least once during the term) and report on the proficiency of the teacher and the progress made by the pupils.

The First County School Commissioner On December 3, 1853, the county court appointed John R. Chenault county school commissioner and asked him to prescribe a suggested uni- form course of study for the county schools. Judge Chenault accepted the position but did not hold it long for two reasons - ^first, it interfered with his law practice, and secondly and principally, because its compensation was not enough.

On September 28, 1850, congress passed a law in the interest of popular education providing that where there were swamp or overflowed lands in a county, the same were to be condemned and sold for the benefit of the school fund. At the next session of the Missouri legislature laws were passed providing the manner that such lands in Missouri should be disposed of.

A bright idea now came to one of the members of the county court. During the spring rains Spring river and Center creek sometimes overflowed and left their banks. Why not call the lands adjacent to these two streams ''swamp or overflowed lands," and have them sold for the benefit of the school fund! The scheme savored a little of trickery, but the county officials figured that by doing so they would serve the future generations and accordingly on the third day of December, 1853, they entered into a contract with J. M. Richardson, ex-secretary of state, to act as agent for the county in taking the necessary steps to have the lands adjacent to these streams condemned. Mr. Richardson was to receive for his services as attorney one-fourth of the amount obtained from the sale of the lands less the expenses incurred ; in other words the County School fund would get three-fourths net and he the balance after the expenses had been paid.

Mr. Richardson secured the appointment of a commissioner to view and condemn the swamp and overflowed lands and agreed to give them twelve and a half cents for each acre condemned.

The commission condemned practically all of the government domain that was left unsold and the county came into possession of more than 300,000 acres of land, which was placed on the market the latter part of 1854 and sold at ninety cents an acre.

The land was at first offered on the following terms: - One seventh down and time on the balance. The interest however was paid annually. In 1856 the court ordered a payment of one-third of the purchase price.

About one-half of this land was disposed of during the 'fifties. To give an idea of the bigness of this coup d'etat we present the following figures. In 1854, the year the lands were placed on the market, the school apportionment was seven cents per child, but in 1856 the interest paid in on the sales that had been made the first year ran the school apportionment up to twenty-five cents per child. Jasper county people often refer with pride to our magnificent County School fund, but there are but few who know the inside history of how it was acquired.

it is $235,000 and the annual interest gives to the several school districts sixty-four cents per child of school age, in addition to the amount received from the state apportionment.

The coming on of the Civil war soon after the swamp lands were placed on the market stopped for a time the sale, but after the reorganization of the county the lands were again put on the market and rapidly sold.

As the county was completely disorganized during the war the schools were closed, and after the war new laws were passed governing the several school districts, so that with the coming of peace a new regime in school matters came on ; and we will therefore take up the subject later and treat it under the head of the ** Reorganized School System.''

In 1855 the citizens of the county began to plan for larger things in an educational way and the Carthage Female Academy was organized and chartered by the state. The following gentlemen constituted the first board of trustees : John R. Chenault, David Guthrie, A. M. Dawson, Archibald McCoy, Elwood B. James and William Chenault.

The county court sold to the seminary a building site for the consideration of one dollar and also donated to the trustees a forty-acre tract of land from the ''school lands.'' This tract of land was sold and the proceeds added to a $1,000 loan which was obtained from the county out of the school fund and was used for the construction of the building.

The academy was patronized by the best families of the county and a good course of study was mapped out, and had the war not come just then as the school began to flourish it no doubt would have been a power in an educational way. The war brought the career of the institution to an end, and after the public schools were reorganized the building and site were sold to the school district of Carthage for one dollar.

The first organized religious work done in this county was by the Cumberland Presbyterians in 1834, when the Center Creek Presbyterian church was organized at the Sarcoxie Springs by the Rev. Andrew Buckhanon. Among those who assisted in its organization were B. L. Pearson, J. Blair and A. A. Young.

Mr. Young, who was at this time a licentiate afterward became a minister of the gospel, and not only labored hard for the evangelization of the Sarcoxie neighborhood but assisted in the organization of the work in southwest Missouri.

The organization, during the pioneer period, had no church home, but worshipped at the homes of its members and annually conducted a camp-meeting where most of its effective work was done.

At the time of its organization the nearest church to Sarcoxie was at Mt. Pleasaut, eighteen miles away, and the Center Creek church included on its roll members for ten miles around, being the pioneer Presbyterian church in southwest Missouri.

Out of the Center Creek congregation grew the following Presbyterian churches: Clear Creek, Pierce City, Richey, Mt. Comfort, Newtonia, Bethel, Spring River, New Salem (now Neosho), and the reorganized Sarcoxie church (after the war).

For nuiny years the Rev. Young conducted the camp-meetings of the Center Creek church and is said to have converted hundreds of the pioneers. During the war, in the fall of 1864, Mr. Young conducted a camp-meeting at Sarcoxie which was attended by the Union soldiers then encamped at that point, and during his two weeks' meeting - which, by the way, was one of his most successful - some sixty of the soldiers professed Christ and during their temporary sojourn were members of the Center Creek congregation.

As mentioned in the preceding article, the first church organized in Jasper county was the Centerville Presbyterian church, which carried on its work at the home of some good brother or at its annual camp- meeting held at the old Sarcoxie Spring. Thus the work of the Master went on until 1841 when the Rev. Greenville Spencer, a Baptist minister, came to the community and commenced labor in the southeastem part of the county, then the most thickly settled and most important part of the new settlement. He was a man of action and an indefatigable worker and at once set about to 6rganize a church and build a house of worship.

The church was called the Freedom Baptist and was built on Jones creek in what is now Union township. As will be seen from the picture of the old church which we here present, this first house of worship was built of logs and furnished with the home-made furniture then in use by the pioneers.

The building of the church was a great event in the early history of the county and was the occasion of one of the old-fashioned log raisings so popular in those days. The logs were cut and hewed on the farms of the members and hauled to the spot chosen for the church home, and on the day appointed put in form by the pastor and his followers. The church was thirty-four by twenty-four feet and the height to the top of the roof twenty feet. The ceiling was eight feet high ; the floor was made of oak and ash planks and the door, which swung on the old strap hinges was fastened with wooden buttons.

When the church was first built it was among the giant forest trees so plentiful in those days, but now, with the thousands of feet used for mining timbers, railroad ties, etc., they have almost disappeared.

Back of the church is an old cemetery and the stones, now crumbling with age, tell the story of a pioneer people who came and blazed the way for a splendid civilization which their children and their posterity should enjoy.

The following are the names of some of the men who helped to build this church and thus erected the first temple of worship in the third county of the state : The pastor, Rev. Greenville Spencer, Samuel Spence. Daniel Spence, Jerry Oillstrap, Ephraim Jenkins, Jacob Hanmier, Lewis Jones, John Jones, James Jones, William Cloud and Woodson Angel.

For more than forty years services were held in this old log church and many a man and woman, like John Bunyan, first saw the new light there and felt the burden of their sins fall away to trouble them no more. The church has not been used since the early 'eighties and is now almost a ruin, the roof having fallen in and nothing being left to tell the story of the early religious activities in the county except the four walls which have been left as a sacred relic to mark the spot where the white banner of the Prince of Peace was first planted.

Here, too, under the protecting branches of the monster forest trees near the church, were held some of the greatest camp-meetings and the people for miles around came to these gatherings.

It might not be out of place here to give for the younger generation, not acquainted with those wonderful gatherings, a description of the old fashioned camp-meetings which were held not only here, but all over the county, in the pioneer period. The last one of the great campmeetings having a county-wide influence was held in 1883 on the site of beautiful Lakeside Park.

The old camp-meeting was an out-of-door revival where the people gathered to stay for several days and camped out while attending the meetings, which were sometimes continued for several weeks. The pulpit or preacher's stand was built under some monster tree whose widespreading branches made a canopy for the shelter of the speaker and those who came to the mourner's bench.

Each family usually brought several chairs which were carried back and forth from the meeting to the camping place, and sometimes improvised benches were made by cutting down a few trees and using the logs for seats.

The campers' wagons were scattered around in all directions from the meeting place and at night served as a shelter. In summer-time beds were made up under the wagons and trees and if, perchance, the meeting was held in the fall, around the camp fires which were kept burning through the night.

At meal time and between services the children frolicked and the people made new acquaintances and renewed old friendships. The good house-wife, before coming to this meeting, cooked a great quantity of food and brought it along, together with a few cooking utensils which would be needed for quick service on the ground.

There were usually three services during the day, morning, afternoon and twilight. Darkness put an end to the services, because in those days only candles were used and these, of course, would not go far in lighting up a quarter of a mile of forest.

These meetings were of great importance in the early day - ^first, because the Gospel was preached ; secondly, because they had a tendency to better the morals of the community, and, thirdly, because they served as a means of bringing the people together and thus making them better acquainted; and as friendships were made and the bonds of sympathy became greater, the people became interested in each other's welfare and were neighbors in every sense of the word.

Contemporaneous with the Rev. Spencer was the Rev. Harris Joplin, who located in the western part of the county on the banks of the creek which was named for him and where afterwards was commenced the mining activities of the future metropolis of southwest Missouri.

Mr. Joplin was the pioneer Methodist and labored among the people of West Jasper from 1840 until about 1845, when he moved to Greene county where he died in 1847. During his sojourn here he organized a Methodist church which worshiped at his cabin, but after his departure meetings were discontinued and the church rolls and other evidence of its existence was lost.

ler assigned to the charge. At that time there was no church building save the Freedom Baptist and Mr. Bewler was commissioned as a traveling minister to preach the Qospel, organize churches and urge them to build a church home.

The first church organized by the Rev. Bewler was at Cave Springs, in the extreme eastern part of the county. He was what was known in the early days of Methodism as a circuit rider. He rose to the high position of presiding elder of the Springfield district in 1850 and completed his ministerial labors in Texas in 1860. He met with an untimely death while on the way home to join his family in Missouri.

The Methodist church, as is well known, divided on the slavery question, and the Rev. Bewler cast his lot with the Anti-slavery party and boldly expressed his views here and in Texas on the great question which a few months lat^r brought on the War between the States. His Texas congregation became enraged at his speech and an anonymous letter was sent to him giving him a certaiu number of hours in which to leave the state. Feeling was so high, however, that he was siezed while returning home and hanged at Fort Worth, on September 6, 1860.

The following are the Methodist ministers who labored in Jasper county before the war : Rev. Mark Robinson, Rev. W. J. Markham, Rev. J. K. Alderman; Rev. S. H. Carlisle, who organized the work in Carthage ; Rev. J. M. Pape, Rev. D. W. Wise, Rev. J. Doughty, Rev. C. C. Arrington, Rev. James Hahan, Rev. Bery Hall and the Rev. Henry Hubbard.

Among the historic old churches of Jasper county was the Peace church in Galena township southwest of the Snapp farm. It was organized by the Rev. Greenville Spencer, the same minister who founded the Freedom church and like it, was built by the congregation, each man furnishing a certain number of logs. The church building served for a time also as a schoolhouse, when the old Enterprise school district was organized. The old church was torn down in 1909 and all that now remains of that once famous church is the old cemetery and the memory of the good that it has done.