Walworth County, Wisconsin - Chapter 13: Noteworthy Institutions, 1912

Chapter 13: Noteworthy Institutions

Three noteworthy institutions of wider than local interest are in the county, but neither founded nor sustained by the county or its citizens, namely : The Yerkes observatory, the State School for the Deaf and a State Normal School. The first is one of about two hundred and thirty observatories named, with their latitudes and longitudes, in each year's American Ephemeris and Nautical Almanac, and situated in nearly all the countries of the habitable or endurable earth. The second ranks among the highest in the states. The third is the second in order of establishment of eight such schools in the state.

Yerkes Observatory

A far-western institution of learning had ordered from Mantois, of Paris, two 42-inch glass disks to be combined and finished as an object glass by Alvan Clark & Sons, Cambridgeport. Mass., but found itself unable to go further in constructing and mounting a telescope. George E. Hale, of Kenwood Observatory (privately equipped), and the late President Harper, of the University of Chicago, thus found opportunity to buy these faultless disks and with them to build and mount the most powerful refracting telescope in the world. The means were soon supplied through the liberality of the late Charles T. Yerkes, and in [892 contracts were made with the Clarks for finishing the lenses and with a Cleveland firm for the mounting of this "Dreadnaught" of immeasurable space. The planning and general direct). hi of the work, as to buildings and instruments, was committed to Mr. Hale. From more than twenty places were offers of land for the purpose in hand. It was found requisite that the site chosen should be within one hundred miles of Chicago and readily accessible from city and university; that it should be sufficiently remote from the dust, smoke, glare of street lights, and jar of cities, and not too near the paths of earth-shaking freight trains. Too close neighborhood of many dwellings was also to be avoided. These conditions seemed best fulfilled b\ thai part of section 1. town of Walworth, which looks southwardly across the western end ni Geneva Lake. \ tract of fifty-three acres was given b) John Johnston, Jr., lying in the southwest quarter of the section.

In 1907 this area was increased to nearly seventy acres, which includes a part of the narrow strip of section 12 which lies between section 1 and the water's edge. The lake frontage is six hundred feet long, and a pier for steamers has been built there. The lake, at this end, is about one and a half miles wide, covering most of section 12 and about half of section 13, and the view from the observatory to the opposite shore is not in any way likely to become less fair or more shut in. The observatory stands within easy distance from the highway, one mile westward from Williams Bay, and from the highway leading southward to Fontana, about two miles away. By way of Fontana and Harvard to Chicago it is seventy-six miles. By way of Williams Bay and Lake Geneva it is about ninety-three miles. It is nearly equidistant from Lake Geneva, Delavan and Elkhorn, and its dome can be seen from the southwestern quarter of the last-named city. Its latitude is 420 34' 12.64"; its longitude 5I1. 54 m. 13.64 sec. or 88° ^y 18.6" from Greenwich observatory. The site of the building is one thousand and fifty feet above sea level and about one hundred and ninety feet above the level of Geneva Lake.

Mr. Hale visited the greater observatories of both hemispheres before determining his own plans and derived some especially useful suggestions from the buildings and equipments at Mount Hamilton and at Potsdam, Prussia. The form of the building is cross-shaped, with head to eastward, its longer dimension three hundred and twenty-six feet, ending, westward, in the great dome, ninety-two feet in diameter. The centers of the smaller domes, at the arm-ends, are one hundred and forty-four feet apart. The style is described as Romanesque. The outer walls are of brown Roman brick and terra cotta. The equipment is adapted to a wide range of astrophysical work, perhaps the whole range of astronomical investigation. Besides the great telescope of forty-inch aperture, there is one of twenty-four inch and one of twelve-inch aperture; there is, apparently, a full furnishing of apparatus for photographic, spectroscopic, spectroheliographic and whatever other processes men of this century may use for their prying into the visible and invisible contents of "nature's infinite book of secrecy." The cost of ground, buildings and apparatus is estimated at four hundred thousand dollars.

The first successful measurements of star heat were made at this institution in the summers of 1898 and T900, and a long and valuable record is already made of photographic observations of sun and stars. Results of these and other investigations are published in bonk form and as contributions to scientific journals. Among these publications arc "The Study of Stellar Evolution," bv Prof. Hale: "Researches in Stellar Photometry," bv Prof.

Parkhurst; "The Rotation Period of the Sun," by Profs. Hale and Fox; and two volumes entitled "Publications of the Yerkes Observatory"; Vol. I, pp. 296, "A General Catalogue of One Thousand Two Hundred and Ninety Double Stars Discovered from 1S71 to 1890," by Prof. Burnham; Vol. 2, pp. 413, papers by Profs. Barnard, Burnham, Frost, Hale, Parkhurst and others. The observatory contains more than three thousand volumes and about the same number of pamphlets, and receives eighty scientific magazines and journals.

No time is found available for permitting visitors to look through the telescopes, but two or three hours are given each Saturday to visitors for seeing, under the instruction of a staff member, the instruments and their working. Each year several thousand visitors are received and go away wondering. The observatory staff is composed of the following named persons :

In [843 Increase V Lapham, of Milwaukee, whose various services to science are not yel ungratefull) forgotten, wrote to Moses McCure Strong, then president of the Territorial Council, asking him to lay before that body for its consideration and favorable action a draft of resolutions which, in effect, petitioned Congress for an appropriation of public land in aid of in- stitutions for the instruction of deaf and blind children, and for the care of the insane. The Legislature duly memorialized Congress, but w ithout result. Ebenezer Chesebro, an early settler of the town of Darien, had a daughter who was born deaf and thus "wisdom at one entrance quite shut out." Ariadne had received some instruction at a New York school for the deaf. Her father, in 1850, induced Miss Wealthy Hawes, then of Magnolia, in Rock county, to come to his house and continue the girl's education. A neighbor's son, James A. Dudley, then aged twelve years, found here, for him, a golden opportunity. These two continued their study, the next year, under John A. Mills, a graduate of the Xew York institution. Four years later these two pioneer teachers became man and wife, and both were employed at the state school, he as teacher, she as assistant matron. The little class at Mr. Chesebro's house increased to eight pupils, but was soon suspended for want of funds. The six later pupils were Clarissa B. Kingman, of Darien. Washington Farrer. of Summerville, Rock county, with Abraham, Betsey, Charles and Helen Hewes, of Eagle. Mr. Chesebro's feeling was too deep and strong and his mind too beneficently active to let the school drop and become one more matter fi ir sterile regret. About one hundred citizens of the county joined him in a petition to the Legislature of 1852 for the establishment of at least one school in Wisconsin for instruction of deaf children. Thanks to the merit of the proposition in itself and to Assemblyman Barlow's effective presentation of its justice and expediency. Governor Farwell's signature, April 19, 1S52, made the bill to incorporate the Wisconsin Institute for the Education of the Deaf and Dumb a law. The site was to be at or near the village of Delavan. Nine trustees were appointed, one-third of the board renewable each year. This number was reduced about 1870 to five, and in 1881 the board was abolished, its functions having been transferred to the state board of supervision. This body succeeded the older board of state charities and reform and is now known as the slate board of control. For ;i few years the trustees were chosen from the county; but, with increase of the school's importance to the state came representation of other parts <>\ the State. The trustees resident of the comity were:

Non-Resident Trustees

Some of these trustees of the county and <>i the state at large, at their ! visits, found more or less personal interest in the pupils, making them feel that the state, while performing its duty in instructing them, had also parental care for each one's comfort and happiness. President Chapin addressed them in their signs, wisely and profitably, and left them with a truer understanding of their relations with that larger world from which they had seemed so harshly cut off.

The state's appropriations in 1852 were one thousand dollars for building and five hundred dollars for a year's conduct of the school. Dr. Joseph R. Bradway, of Delavan, was appointed principal and John A. Mills teacher. Franklin K. Phoenix, the only son of the founder of Delavan, himself a youthful pioneer, gave nearly twelve acres of the highland beyond the outlet of Delavan Lake, now the west end of the city, lying north of the Tanesville road, an extension of Walworth avenue. About twenty-three acres were bought a few years later. The first building was of brick, two stories high, and was part of a larger plan. It gave room for thirty-five pupils. When finished, in 1857, the main building was of three stories, its cost about thirty thousand dollars. To this a sufficient workshop and a barn were added at some further cost. On the morning of September 16, 1879, tne main building was burned to the ground. For several months thereafter temporary quarters for the children were found in the remaining buildings and in one of the churches of Delavan. A change of site was proposed and urged by a few newspapers at Milwaukee and elsewhere - each as in duty and honor bound preferring its own city as the heaven-appointed though thus far manneglected home for the wards of the state. There was probably but one judgment or feeling among the men and women of Walworth and this was promptly and fairly well expressed two days after the fire by the newspaper at F.lkhom in the following editorial comment :

"It is believed and hoped that the location of the school will not be changed from Delavan. but that the new building will be located on the site of the old one. The school has passed through many ordeals, recently, but it was prosperous in a high degree when this calamity came upon it, and it is hoped that every citizen of Walworth county will feel an anxiety to have it re-established on its old foundations and under present management."

At the legislative session of 1880 Assemblyman Barnes (a well-chosen member for the task in hand) looked effectively to the greater good of the institute and to the smaller interest of Delavan, and the sum of seventy thousand dollars was appropriated for re-building. Thus, one more phoenix arose from its own ashes with youth and vigor renewed. (Had the institute been burned and re-built otherwhere than at Delavan the cruelly over-worked Arabian bird need not have done service here.) Besides the administration

(main) building, a school house, chapel, dining hall and dormitory were provided for the growing needs. The establishment is sufficient for the full care of two hundred and fifty pupils. The yearly expense is from fifty thousand to sixty thousand dollars. The total expense since 1852 has been about two million one hundred thousand dollars.

A statute of 1858 required payment of seventy-five dollars for each pupil, but it so operated to restrict materially the usefulness of the school that it was soon repealed. A similar ill-advised statute was enacted in 1867, and this, too, was soon repealed. The Civil war seriously affected legislative liberality, and the teachers were the most direct sufferers. In June, 1861, a class of five pupils was graduated with the full formalities or ceremonies of such occasions at other institutions. Miss Emily Eddy, the first woman employed as teacher, in 1868 began her experiments in speech-teaching. As. early as 1861 she had observed some, to her, suggestive facts as to pupils who, from disease or accident, had become deaf, and she patiently and ingeniously evolved methods of her own by which to teach these children to speak with their lips and to hear with their eyes. In 1868 Miss Harriet B. Rogers, a teacher of this art in a Massachusetts institution, visited the school at Delavan. From her Miss Eddy received that summer a short couse of instruction by which she so profited that hundreds of pupils have since found reason to remember these two women with more than common gratitude. At a later time Miss Eddy brought some improvement of teachermethod from the institution at Jacksonville, Illinois. It is said that Wisconsin and Illinois were earliest of the states of the old Northwest to adopt this branch of mute-instruction.

The school year of forty weeks begins the first Wednesday of September T11 the usual instruction in writing, reading, composition, arithmetic, geography, natural science and drawing. with oral speech ami lip-reading to semi-mutes and capable congenita] mutes, is added manual training. Cabinet making began in i860, shoe-making in 1867, printing in [878 ami baking in 1 SS 1 . Girls are also taught housekeeping, baking ami sewing, U>ou1 [879 began the publication of the Deaf-Mute Press, a home organ of the teachers and pupils. About [882 it- name was changed to Deaf-Mute Times, ami aboul [896 il became the Wisconsin Titties. Its editorial work has always been from fair In excellent, and it- mechanical appearance creditable to foreman and printers. In [906 Prof. Warren Robinson took a bolder step, and put forth the American Industrial Journal, an illustrated : 1 year magazine, "in the interesl of the industrial departments "i schools For the deaf ami the deaf themselves throughout the world."

This is said to be the only such publication in the world. Its number for December, 1910, indicates its temporary, if not permanent discontinuance for want of sufficient support. The editor, who speaks, but does not hear, has acquired a mastery of the art of expression in pure, plain English words and clearly- formed sentences, seldom met in modern newspaper work, and at least one of his contributors has profited similarly from judicious teaching.

Miss Anna Johnson, a blind mute (one of three at this school), now about twenty- four years old, tells in simple, faultless phrases some of the incidents of her silent, darkened life. The short story is interesting and sufficiently moving, though in nowise an appeal for sympathy, and its style is for its purpose admirable. A school which does such work as this well deserves the state's, support and encouragement, even if its opportunities for such work were still less frequent. Miss Johnson's case is not that of Laura Bridgman. nor of Helen Keller, since she lost her sight at twelve and her hearing at fourteen. "For three years I lived in darkness and it was very much like a prison; for no one seemed to recognize me, and as I could not see or hear enough to help myself, everything around me was silent." In 19x14 she was sent to the school at Delavan, but sickness so far interrupted that but four years have been profitable for instruction. She had learned at home to sew and knit, and has since learned to use the Braille writer ( for the use of blind persons), and now finds it easy to use the Remington and other typewriters, and also the Singer sewing machine, with its various attachments - threading her needles and regulating her work with ease. She has read many books for the blind, but most enjoys the "Life of Helen Keller." A few of her own words may show this young woman'- unconquerable spirit :

"To be deprived of sight and hearing is not so great a misfortune to those who are so afflicted as it may seem. A blind-deal" person can be just as happy as one who has his perfect sight and hearing. No one can imagine how happy I have been since 1 learned to sew. I can sit alone in the dark or light with my sewing and be as happy as any queen. Low many happy thoughts 1 have now when 1 am making something for a friend or for my sisters or mother. * * * When I can be among the flowers and Irees 1 am perfectly happy. * There is always something which can

The average attendance at the school is now aboul two hundred pupils. The whole number, since t*5_\ is about eighteen hundred. Until r88o the head of the school was designated as the principal. Since that year he is

No subordinate at this school may hope to reach its superintendency. Time has shown the usefulness of this limit to promotion. But from its teachers have been drawn chief officers for similar schools of other states.

State Normal School

The board of regents in May, 1866. chose a site at Whitewater for the second of the state normal schools, this, after having exacted from the village a bonus of twenty-five thousand dollars. Two members of the building committee were Newton M. Littlejohn and Samuel A. White, the first then a state senator and the other a regent. The school was opened and dedicated April 21, 1868, and enlarged in 1870, 1881 and 1897. The area of its ground is ten acres, rising eight hundred and seventy-six feet above sea level and sixty-six feet above the ground at the railway station. It has been planted with more than a hundred species and varieties of trees and shrubs, largely under direction of the late President Salisbury. Thus Normal Hill, as seen from its foot and from afar, has become as fair to look upon as a vice-regal country seat.

This institution, one of eight such parts of the system of public instruction, has. like them, the full equipment of similar schools in other states. It employs twenty-six teachers including those in the training schools. Its valuable library has more than fifteen thousand volumes. Since 1870 the school has graduated one thousand six hundred and twenty pupils, of whom aboul ninety seven per rent, have since done teachers' work.

The men whose influence upon their fellow citizens secured this school for their village builded no better than they knew, for they acted in the full light of observation, experience, sound judgment, and true public spirit, and thus kept step in the march of American civilization. Greater benefit has thus come to Whitewater than the profits to retail dealers and boarding-house keepers. The whole county, too, and the adjacent towns in Jefferson and Rock have some appreciable share in this greater gain, as many a poor man and his child well knows.

The presidents of the school have been: Oliver Arey, 1868-77; William F. Phelps, 1877-9; J°hn William Stearns, 1879 to January, 1885; Theron B. Pray, January to June, 1885; Albert Salisbury, July, 1885, to his last sickness and death in 191 1.

Mr. Arey died at Brooklyn, N. Y., December 13, 1907. Mr. Stearns passed to a chair in the State University, that of theory and art of teaching.

Albert Salisbury was born at Lima, Rock county, January 24, 1843; died at Milwaukee June 2. 1911. His early life throws some light on his later career. He was bred to farm work ; served in war time in a regiment that never rested; finished his college course at Milton in 1870; conducted * teachers' institutes from 1873 ; superintended and inspected schools in the Cotton states, for the American Missionary Association from 1882; and began his presidency at Whitewater in 1885. All that he was by natural endowment and by acquisition, the total sum of which was enough to warrant at least a moderately high-aiming ambition, he gave wholly to the plain duty before him. Most of the graduates of Whitewater passed under his mastership and guidance, and to most of them those brief years were the most profitbearing of their lives. He had much of that collateral know ledge which gives its own value to every man's work, but he cared more to know a few things and understand them thoroughly and comprehensively. He could admire a superficially brilliant man without envying him. In or out of school, honest endeavor and modest worth were unlikely to escape his notice and surely enlisted his sympathy. He took ground early, with tongue and pen, for free text books for township high schools, for free carriage of pupils to and from their district schools, for everything that in theory was desirable and by wisely considered and carefully conducted experiment had been shown elsewhere practical and beneficial. His feeling was deeply moved in behalf of children whom poverty deprives of their share in public instruction, and he talked often and well of the state's duty to see that their right be not taken from them without their fault. To have known him as a friend was a goodly thing and is now a pleasant memory. To have known him as a teacher was great good fortune. He helped to make histor) for the county, lie has become rightly a part of tin- county's history..

Military Academy

A fourth institution, of great importance to American parents and sons, but not of Walworth's creation or maintenance, is likely to come within a year or two. It is proposed to transfer the Northwestern Military Academy from Highland Park, Illinois, to the shore of Geneva lake, at the place long known as Kaye's Park, in the town of Linn. The managers have secured the option of buying forty acres of land, having one thousand feet of lake frontage. This situation is very convenient for such instruction in naval exercises as is useful for soldiers; and, if found expedient, for a department of the more general naval instruction. The Legislature of 1911, by appropriate enactment, authorized prohibition of the sale of intoxicant beverages within a circle of five miles radius, measured from this site as its center.

The object of this institution is not only to train citizen-soldiers, but also to form Christian character and develop manliness ; and to such ends the discipline and instruction are directed. Major R. Davidson, commandant, with his officers and one hundred or more of his pupils, came to this place on' Memorial Sunday, 191 1. He had invited attendance from all the neighboring posts of the Grand Army of the Republic to take part in the program of prayer, band music, singing and speaking, and be gave these survivors of a half century the place of honor in the order of marching. Colonel Jerome A. Watrous, a soldier of two wars, and Major Davidson explained the general purpose of the school, and the cadets closed the day, at retreat call, with a few evolutions on the parade ground. All this will become familiar here for the needful work of building is (in 1012) about to begin.