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The History of Education in North Carolina:
Electronic Edition.

Smith, Charles Lee, 1865-1951

Funding from the State Library of North Carolina supported the electronic publication of this title.

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University Library, UNC-Chapel Hill
University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill,
2005.

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Source Description:
(title page) The History of Education in North Carolina
(series title) Contributions to American Educational History No. 3
(series title) Circular (United States. Office of Education) ; 1888, no. 2
Charles Lee Smith
180 p., ill.
Washington
Government Printing Office
1888

Call number C370.9 S64 (North Carolina Collection, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill)


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[Title Page Image]

BUREAU OF EDUCATION
CIRCULAR OF INFORMATION NO. 2, 1888
CONTRIBUTIONS TO AMERICAN EDUCATIONAL HISTORY
EDITED BY HERBERT B. ADAMSNo. 3 THE
HISTORY OF EDUCATION
IN
NORTH CAROLINA

BY

CHARLES LEE SMITH
FELLOW IN HISTORY AND POLITICS
JOHNS HOPKINS UNIVERSITY

WASHINGTON
GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE
188817037--No. 2--1

Page 2

        "Here was a colony of men from civilized life, scattered among the forests, hermits with wives and children, resting on the bosom of nature, in perfect harmony with the wilderness of their gentle clime. With absolute freedom of conscience, benevolent reason was the simple rule of their conduct. * * * Are there any who doubt man's capacity for self-government, let them study the history of North Carolina; its inhabitants were restless and turbulent in their imperfect submission to a government imposed on them from abroad; the administration of the colony was firm, humane, and tranquil when they were left to take care of themselves. Any government but one of their own institution was oppressive." (George Bancroft.)

        "Almost invariably, as soon as a neighborhood was settled, preparations were made for the preaching of the Gospel by a regular stated pastor, and wherever a pastor was located, in that congregation there was a classical school." (Foote's Sketches of North Carolina.)

        "The progress of society and civilization depends upon the education and virtue of the people." (Hon. Bartlett Yancey, in 1810.)

         "In an ardent and increasing zeal for the establishment of schools and academies for several years past, we do not believe North Carolina has been outdone by a single State. * * * The number at present is nearly fifty, and is rapidly increasing." (North American Review, January, 1821.)

        "We can diffuse the blessings of education and become a virtuous if not a great people. I wish the State University were located in Raleigh, for I do not believe in that kind of education which is obtained in cloisters. The manners of boys should be attended to as well as their morals. The society of the city of Williamsburg, Virginia, is said to have been the most polished in America, and its college, William and Mary, has turned out more celebrated men than any other institution within my knowledge." (Nathaniel Macon, in North Carolina Constitutional Convention, 1835.)

        "The University does not lack the sanction either of the Constitution or of the people. Under the loving care of the people of the State, led by wise master-builders, much more than from the liberality of the General Assembly, the University grew in the lapse of nearly a century to be a great institution, the nursing mother of the ingenuous youth of the State without distinction of party or sect. Embracing all her children in her great catholic heart, she has always striven to allay sectional feeling, to moderate sectarian heat, to cultivate and encourage a broad, ardent love for the State, a veneration for her early history and traditions, an appreciation of the domestic virtues of her citizens, and a love of liberal learning." (Hon. John Manning, LL. D., professor of law, University of North Carolina.)

        "I remember in my young manhood the University of North Carolina was always spoken of with the greatest respect among men who knew anything about an American collegiate education. While the Universities of Virginia and Johns Hopkins have to some extent drawn attention away from it, I see no reason why its present Faculty should not give it a commanding position in the south-east of our Republic." (Hon. Andrew D. White, Ex-President of Cornell University.)

        

Page 3

CONTENTS.

CHAPTER I.--EDUCATION DURING THE PROPRIETARY GOVERNMENT--1663-1729.

CHAPTER II.--EDUCATION DURING THE PROVINCIAL AND STATE GOVERNMENTS BEFORE 1800.

Page 4

CHAPTER III.--THE UNIVERSITY OF NORTH CAROLINA.

CHAPTER IV.--LEADING DENOMINATIONAL COLLEGES.

CHAPTER V.--THE HIGHER FEMALE EDUCATION.

CHAPTER VI.--SECONDARY INSTRUCTION.

CHAPTER VII.--EDUCATIONAL EFFORTS OF THE FRIENDS.

CHAPTER VIII.--HISTORY AND STATUS OF EDUCATION AMONG THE COLORED PEOPLE.

CHAPTER IX.--THE PUBLIC SCHOOLS.

CHAPTER X.--THE NORTH CAROLINA TEACHERS' ASSEMBLY.

Page 7

ILLUSTRATIONS.

Page 9

LETTER.

DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR,
BUREAU OF EDUCATION,
Washington, D. C., December 9, 1887.

The Honorable the SECRETARY OF THE INTERIOR,
Washington, D. C.

        SIR: In pursuance of the plan already approved by you for a systematic inquiry by the Bureau of Education into the educational history of the United States, I beg to recommend for publication the second of the series of State monographs in this direction edited by Dr. Herbert B. Adams, whose studies upon the College of William and Mary, and Thomas Jefferson and the University of Virginia, with the monograph upon the Study of History in American Colleges and Universities, formed the introduction to this new line of inquiry.

        The subject of the present monograph is the history of education in North Carolina. It is an original and valuable contribution, and deserves to be widely read. In this monograph Mr. Charles Lee Smith, who has been trained in historical methods at the Johns Hopkins University and now holds a fellowship in history and politics at that institution, gives the results of a thorough and careful study of the educational history of his native State.

        For North Carolina this is pioneer work. The history of education in that State has hitherto remained unwritten. That the Old North State has failed to receive just recognition at the hands of some historians is due in great measure to the fact that many important phases of her early history have remained undeveloped by her own sons, to whom they were known, and who have allowed the prejudiced statements of early chroniclers, ignorant of the facts, to be accepted without contradiction as authoritative.

        The writer has traced the genesis and development of education in North Carolina from the first settlement of that State to the present time. For this purpose he is the first to exploit the colonial records, the publication of which was begun last year, and the early laws of the State. He has also utilized early newspaper files, and all the published biographical and historical works relating to his State to be found in the public libraries of Raleigh, Washington, and Baltimore, besides certain private collections and personal correspondence.

        In the study of education as a growth North Carolina affords peculiar advantages. The character of the early settlers, the objects of their

Page 10

coming, and the results achieved by them in their struggle against oppressive government give the history of that State unusual interest. Bancroft says, "North Carolina was settled by the freest of the free," and the records of the colony show that a constant warfare was waged against oppression until freedom was won. This fact was emphasized and is illustrated in the proceedings of that meeting of patriots at Mecklenburg in 1775, which, without doubt, is one of the most memorable events of our Revolutionary period. This struggle was for civil and religious liberty, and Mr. Smith demonstrates how intimate was the connection between the liberties and the educational history of the people. The government is, perhaps, to be censured that schools were not earlier provided. It is an error, however, to suppose, as has been stated by some writers, that there were no good schools in the State previous to the Revolution, for it is shown that there were many creditable institutions, several having a wide reputation.

        The higher education has been principally treated in this sketch, although the history of primary and secondary instruction has not been neglected. The influence of certain classes of immigration and of institutions outside the State, especially of Princeton, which previous to the establishment of the University of North Carolina was largely patronized by the young men of that State, is clearly shown. Many interesting facts concerning noted educators of the State are brought out. The sketch which is given of the University of North Carolina is the first full account of that institution which has ever been written. The writer thinks no institution of this country has a more honorable record, and it is claimed that in proportion to the number of its alumni it stands second to none in the number of the distinguished public men it has given to the State and nation.

        The account which is given of its "influence upon the South" makes an admirable showing. As indicative of its wide-spread influence upon the country, a President, a Vice-President, many Cabinet officers, ministers to foreign countries, Senators, Governors, and other distinguished men are mentioned among its alumni.

        President Andrew D. White said of this institution: "I remember in my young manhood the University of North Carolina was always spoken of with the greatest respect among men who knew anything about an American collegiate education. While the Universities of Virginia and Johns Hopkins have to some extent drawn attention away from it, I see no reason why its present Faculty should not give it a commanding position in the South-east of our Republic."

        The subjects taught in the institutions for the secondary and the higher education are noted from time to time, thus showing the general educational development. The present status of education in North Carolina is well-pictured. The work, while strictly historical, is both practical and suggestive. Hon. Henry Barnard, the first Commissioner of Education, once said that "no subject now interesting or important

Page 11

can be adequately understood or further investigated unless proper pains be first bestowed upon its history. * * * There is no department of human exertion, however, in which this preliminary historical knowledge is so necessary as in education. For this there is both a general and a special reason. The education of a people bears a constant and most pre-eminently influential relation to its attainments and excellencies--physical, mental, and moral. The national education is at once a cause and an effect of the national character; and, accordingly, the history of education affords the only ready and perfect key to the history of the human race and of each nation in it--an unfailing standard for estimating its advance or retreat upon the line of human progress.

        "But the special reason just alluded to is yet more in point at this time. It is, that there is no department of human exertion whose annals are more brilliant with displays of industry, talent, and genius, whether successful or unsuccessful, and consequently none in which a reference to the past will afford such abundant materials for improvement in the present."

        Urging, therefore, the publication of this monograph and the encouragement of this new line of educational inquiry to be continued by the Bureau of Education, not only in the South but in the North-west and South-west and beyond the Mississippi, where such inquiries are most needed,

I have the honor to be, very respectfully, your obedient servant,

N. H. R. DAWSON,
Commissioner.

Approved:

L. Q. C. LAMAR,
Secretary.

Page 13

EDUCATION IN NORTH CAROLINA.

CHAPTER I.

EDUCATION DURING THE PROPRIETARY GOVERNMENT--1663-1729.

INTRODUCTION.

        During the first sixty-five years of the colonial history of North Carolina there were but few schools, and these were ill-attended. Compared with the New England colonies, a great difference is observed in the attention given to education during this period, and historians, without considering all the facts in the case, have reproached North Carolina with want of zeal in this direction. For this difference there are several causes. New England was peopled by colonies, and the establishment of towns was coeval with the settlements. The people were forced by circumstances to live together, and this tended to strengthen the bonds of union between them and to unite them in all objects relating to the common welfare. Then, too, the people of each community were generally of the same religious faith, and their preachers were at the same time the teachers of their schools.

        Let us now see how it was with North Carolina. This province was occupied by individual families, and although the first permanent settlement was made about 1660, there was no town until Bath was located in 1704. The population was chiefly confined to the territory north of Albemarle Sound, west of the Chowan River, and the territory between the two sounds, Albemarle and Currituck. The people were scattered sparsely here and there along the shores of the sounds and on the banks of the water-courses. Bancroft says: "Here was a colony of men from civilized life, scattered among the forests, hermits with wives and children, resting on the bosom of nature, in perfect harmony with the wilderness of their gentle clime. With absolute freedom of conscience, benevolent reason was the simple rule of their conduct."1


        1 Bancroft's United States (1843), Vol. II, p. 154.

        As late as 1709 the Rev. William Gordon, writing to the secretary of the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in Foreign Parts, referring

Page 14

to the settlement on the Pamlico River, has this to say of the only town in the province: "Here is no church, though they have begun to build a town called Bath. It consists of about twelve houses, being the only town in the whole province. They have a small collection of books for a library, which were carried over by the Rev. Dr. Bray, and some land is laid out for a glebe."1

        1 North Carolina Colonial Records, Vol. I, p. 717.


 About this time Beaufort was laid out for a town, and a little later Newbern was settled by the Swiss. There were many differences in religious belief among the people, and sectarian disputes often led to serious difficulties. "The population of the colony in 1703," says Martin, "was composed of individuals of different nations, and consequently of various sects: Scotch Presbyterians, Dutch Lutherans, French Calvinists, Irish Catholics, English Churchmen, Quakers, and Dissenters; emigrants from Bermuda and the West Indies, which, from their late settlements, could not be places remarkable for the education of young people in Christianity and morality."2


        2 Martin's North Carolina, Vol. I, p. 218.

        North Carolina's best known historian says: "Under these circumstances, with families far removed from each other, with religious disputes flagrant, and indeed all the politics of the colony turning on religious dissensions, it is easy to see why there was but little progress made in establishing schools."3

        3 Wheeler's Reminiscences, p. 258.


 We thus see from the very nature of things that the village schools of New England were an impossibility here.

        Schools were for a long time neglected, no provision for their maintenance being made by the Government. But it must not be understood that the inhabitants were in dense ignorance and wholly devoid of educational facilities. We are told that "there were many highly educated citizens scattered throughout the province, who lived with considerable style and refinement. Sturdy, honest, and hospitable agriculturists gathered around themselves elements of large future development, and their premises showed wealth, industry, and care."4

        4 Vass's Eastern North Carolina, p. 21.


 Yet, notwithstanding this, it must be confessed that among the poorer classes there was a vast amount of ignorance. Wheeler says that there were not only men of learning, culture, and refinement in the colony, but also "men of means who contributed to found libraries, to erect churches, and to promote the welfare of the people. Moseley, Hyde, Swann, Porter, Lillington, Harvey, Sanderson, Pollock, Lowe, the son-in-law of Governor Archdale, and others too numerous to mention, were men who were not indifferent to education. If the facts could be unearthed, it would probably appear that there were many good schools in the province."5


        5 Wheeler's Reminiscences, p. 259.

        Dr. Brickell, in his account of the Present State of North Carolina, written about 1730, after giving an account of the government, courts,

Page 15

and the speedy manner of securing justice, enumerates some of the laws, and adds: "These, and many other good laws that are to be met with in this province, make it one of the best and mildest governments to live under in all America."1


        1 Brickell's North Carolina, p. 29.

        The inhabitants are characterized as "good economists, remarkably kind to strangers and those in distress." Such a people could not have constituted the lawless, irreligious, apathetic, and ignorant community described by Mr. John Fiske in Harper's Magazine for February, 1883, in an article entitled "Maryland and the Far South in the Colonial Period,"2 and by Lodge in his History of the English Colonies in America.

        2 For reply to this article see the Introduction to Part III of Wheeler's Reminiscences: "North Carolina in the Colonial Period," by Daniel R. Goodloe, to which the writer is indebted for valuable suggestions.


 Professor Fiske, in the article referred to, shows an ignorance of his subject which is inexcusable, and after other misrepresentations adds that, "Until just before the war for Independence there was not a single school, good or bad, in the whole colony. It need not be added that the people were densely ignorant." Lodge says: "There was scarcely any means of education, and no literature whatever. Printing was not introduced until 1764,3 and at the time of the Revolution there were only two schools, lately incorporated at Newbern and Edenton, in the whole province.

        3 The first printing press was brought to the province in 1749, and the laws were printed at Newbern in 1752.


 An act of the year 1770, to endow Queen's College at Charlotte, was repealed by proclamation, and even after the war for Independence, with the exception of a feeble academy at Hillsborough, in all relating to education North Carolina was far behind the other States." In this connection he adds that "The people were very lawless, and averse to order and government, although they had a keen perception of their own rights, as is shown by the passage of an act to secure the habeas corpus as early as the year 1715. They fell in eagerly with the movement against England, etc. * * * But it is a strong proof of the vigor and soundness of the English race that this lawless, apathetic people finally raised themselves in the scale of civilization, and built up a strong and prosperous State."4


        4 Lodge's English Colonies, p. 157.

        To see how a greater historian views this same period of the history of North Carolina it is only necessary to add the following quotation from Bancroft: "Are there any who doubt man's capacity for self-government, let them study the history of North Carolina; its inhabitants were restless and turbulent in their imperfect submission to a government imposed on them from abroad; the administration of the colony was firm, humane, and tranquil when they were left to take care of themselves. Any government but one of their own institution was oppressive."5


        5 Bancroft's United States (1843), Vol. II, p. 158.
Page 16

        A careful reading of the following pages will prove conclusively that the above statements of Fiske and Lodge are not warranted by the facts, and that North Carolina in her educational as in her Revolutionary history has reason to be proud of her record.

EDUCATIONAL BEGINNINGS--THE FIRST SCHOOLS.

        In 1692 Dr. Compton, Bishop of London, determined to know more of the church in the colonies, and appointed Dr. Bray to be his commissary in Maryland. Dr. Bray gave North Carolina her first public library, established at Bath. On receiving the report of Dr. Bray, Bishop Compton went to the King and obtained from him a bounty of twenty pounds to every minister who would go over to America; but Carolina profited but little from this.1


        1 Hawks's North Carolina, Vol. XI, p. 338; North Carolina Colonial Records, Vol. I, p. 571 et seq.

        The earliest account that we have of teachers in North Carolina is the report of Dr. John Blair, who came as a missionary to the colony in 1704. He states that the settlers had built small churches in three precincts, and had appointed a lay reader in each, who were supplied by him with sermons.2

        2 North Carolina Colonial Records, Vol. I, p. 601.


 We know that these lay readers were school-masters, from the evidence of Dr. John Brickell, a naturalist of note who had travelled through the settlements in North Carolina in the early part of the eighteenth century, and published in Dublin, in 1737, the Natural History of North Carolina, with an Account of the Trade, Manners, and Customs of the Christian and Indian Inhabitants. He says: "The religion by law established is the Protestant, as it is professed in England, and though they seldom have orthodox clergymen [he means those of the Church of England] among them, yet there are not only glebe lands laid out for that use commodious to each town, but likewise for building churches. The want of these Protestant clergy is generally supplied by some school-masters who read the Liturgy, and then a sermon out of Dr. Tillotson or some good practical divine every Sunday. These are the most numerous and are dispersed through the whole province."3


        3 Brickell's North Carolina, p. 35.

        About 1705 Mr. Charles Griffin came from some part of the West Indies to Pasquotank, and opened a school which was patronized by all classes. Rev. William Gordon, who came from England as a missionary in 1708, in a letter to the secretary of the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel, written in 1709, alludes to the fact that the Quakers in Pasquotank were sending their children to the school of a lay reader of the church, named Griffin.4


        4 North Carolina Colonial Records, Vol. I, p. 716.

        Rev. Mr. Gordon established a church in Chowan Precinct, at the head of Albemarle Sound, in the settlement which afterwards became

Page 17

Edenton. Rev. James Adams having settled in Pasquotank, the school in that settlement was transferred to him, and Mr. Griffin, at the instance of Mr. Gordon, was elected lay-reader of the church and clerk of the Chowan vestry, and opened a school in that parish, text-books for the pupils being furnished by the rector, Mr. Gordon.1


        1 North Carolina Colonial Records, Vol. I, pp. 684, 714, 716.

        In a letter to John Chamberlaine, Esq., of the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel, dated "Chowan, in North Carolina, July 25, 1712," the Rev. G. Rainsford, a missionary to the colony, says: "I had several conferences with one Thomas Hoyle, king of the Chowan Indians, who seems very inclinable to embrace Christianity and proposes to send his son to school to Sarum to have him taught to read and write by way of foundation in order to a farther proficiency for the reception of Christianity. I readily offered my service to instruct him myself, and having the opportunity of sending him to Mr. Garratt's, where I lodge, being but three miles distance from his town. But he modestly declined it for the present till a general peace was concluded between the Indians and Christians. I found he had some notion of Noah's flood, which he came to the knowledge of and expressed himself after this manner, 'My father told me, I tell my son.' But I hope in a little time to give the society a better account of him as well as of those peaceable Indians under his command. There's one Mr. Washburn who keeps a school at Sarum, on the frontiers of Virginia, between the two governments, and neighboring upon two Indian towns who, I find by him, highly deserve encouragement, and could heartily wish the society would take it into consideration and be pleased to allow him a salary for the good services he has done and may do for the future. What children he has under his care can both write and read very distinctly and gave before me such an account of the grounds and principles of the Christian religion that strangely surprised me to hear it. The man upon a small income would teach the Indian children gratis (whose parents are willing to send them could they but pay for their schooling) as he would those of our English families had he but a fixed dependency for so doing, and what advantage would this be to private families in particular and the whole colony in general is easy to determine."2


        2 Ibid., p. 859.

        The above account represents the state of education under the rule of the Lords Proprietors. It is probable that there were other schools, but certainly none of higher grade. We are told by the Rev. Francis L. Hawks, D. D., in his excellent history of this period, that among the higher classes many were educated in England. Governors, judges, councillors, lawyers, and clergy furnish evidence from their letters and other documents that there was no deficiency of education among the higher classes. Libraries at Bath and Edenton possessed many valuable books, showing that those who read them had cultivated minds. Gale, Little, Moseley, and Swann were fit associates for the most intelligent

Page 18

men in any of the English provinces of their day. In determining the boundary between North Carolina and Virginia, Swann and Moseley proved themselves better mathematicians than the members of the commission from Virginia. The only author in the colony during this period, so far as is known, was the Surveyor-General Lawson, who wrote a history of the colony, which was published after his death in 1714.1


        1 Hawks's North Carolina, Vol. II, p. 370.

        A careful examination of the records of the colony while under proprietary government shows only one instance in which help was afforded to literature. This was an act2 for the preservation of the library given by Dr. Bray, to which reference has been made. This act provided that a librarian should be appointed, that catalogues should be prepared, and that, under certain conditions, books might be taken from the library. It was provided that if the books were not returned within a specified time fines should be paid. No further thought seems to have been given by the Government for the promotion of education.


        2 Laws of North Carolina, Davis's Revisal (Newbern, 1752), p. 203.

EDENTON PUBLIC LIBRARY.

        As an evidence of the culture of some of the inhabitants, a catalogue of books presented to the public library at Edenton about 1725 is given. Their character, and it is to be supposed that they were suited to the comprehension of at least a portion of the inhabitants, is an evidence of higher education.

        [From North Carolina Letter-Book of the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel.3]


        3 North Carolina Colonial Records, Vol. II, pp. 583, 584. The list has been copied as it appears in the records, though many mistakes may be noticed in the spelling of the names of titles and authors.

        "A catalogue of books humbly presented by Edward Mosely, Esq., to the Honorable and most August Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in Foreign Parts, towards a Provincial Library to be kept in Edenton, the Metropolis of North Carolina."

    FOLIOS.

  • Pool's Synopsis Criticorum, 5 vols.
  • T. Augustine Opera, 10 vols., Col. Agrip., 1616.
  • Tanti in quartour Libros Regum, etc.
  • Tanti in Jeremiam.
  • Tanti in Ezechuelem.
  • Tyntagma Theologia Christianæ.
  • Leigh's Body of Divinity.
  • Deodati's Annotations on the Holy Bible.
  • Ancient Histories of Eusebius, Socrates, and Evagrius.
  • Jimson's History of the Church.

    QUARTOS.

  • Answer to a Challenge made by a Jesuite.
  • Buridani Questione in 8to. Libe Col. Aristolelis.
  • Prideaux's Fascioulus Controv. Theologicarum.
  • Cartwright's Harmonica Evangelica.
  • Notations in Totam. Scrip. Sacram.
  • History of the Church of Great Britain.
  • Billson's True Difference between Christian Subjection, etc.
  • Ball's Answer to Canns's two Treatises.
  • Brickluck's Protestant Evidence.
    Page 19

  • Rainoldi De. Rome: Ecclesia Idolotatria.
  • Pieres Sunier Impleaded.
  • Hemsy, Sac Exercitad. Novo Testamentum.
  • Cartwright's Comment in Prov. Solomonis.
  • Usher's Brittanicarum Eccles. Antiquitates.
  • Ball's Friendly Trial of the grounds of Separation.

    OCTAVOS.

  • Francisco Le Rees Cursus Philos., 2 parts.
  • Tertia pars Sum Philos and quarta.
  • Piccolominco Univeras Philos de Moribus.
  • Da Parci Exercital Philosophicarum.
  • Da Parci Systima Logica.
  • Lensden's Clavis Greeca novo Testamenti.
  • Baronij Metaphysica Generalis.
  • Dounams Comment Rami Dialect.
  • Iah. Regio Comment ac disput sojicarum.
  • Salij Ethica.
  • Buxtoy's Lexicon.
  • Dialogue in Answer to a Papish Catechism.
  • Augustini de Civitate Dei, 2 vols.
  • Greek Grammar.
  • Itimedonci De Scripts Dei Verbo, etc.
  • Itummis Comment in Evang--Secmat.
  • Eustachio a Sancto Paulo Sum Philos. quadripærtitæ.
  • Scheiblus Libeo Comment Tapicorum.
  • Schickard's Hist. Hebreum.
  • Melanchoris Cronicon Curionis.
  • Calvin's Institutio Christ. Religionis.
  • Davidis Pares Corpus Doct. Christiana.
  • Aristotle's Organon.
  • Heckerman's Systima S. S. Theologia.
  • Buxtoyi Epit. Grammat. Hebrae.
  • Hyselbein's Thearia Logica.
  • Amesius de Divina Predestinatione.
  • Baronius Annales Ecclesiastico.
  • Hugo Gertius Defensio fidei Catholicae.
  • Augustini Confessionum.
  • Amesij medulla Theologica.
  • Amesij Rescript Scolastica ad pic Grevinchorij.
  • Amesij Tech no matria.
  • Wendelini Christianae Thedogia.
  • Lactantij Divinarum Institutionem.
  • Pch Cunai de Reb. Hebraorum.
  • Hebrew Psalter.

Page 20

CHAPTER II.

EDUCATION DURING THE PROVINCIAL AND STATE GOVERNMENTS
BEFORE 1800.

GENERAL SURVEY.

        At the date of the transfer of authority from the Lords Proprietors to the Crown the white population is estimated by Martin at about 13,000. During the first twenty years of royal rule the educational condition of the masses was but little changed. Throughout the colonial period it was the custom of gentlemen of means living in the country to maintain tutors for their children. In the Cape Fear section it seems to have been the custom from 1740 to the Revolution to send the young men to Harvard to be educated.1

        1 Wheeler's Reminiscences, p. 257.


 It will be remembered that this section was the seat of the New England colony which came to North Carolina about 1660. A writer in the Raleigh (N. C.) News and Observer says, "We remember to have heard that Mr. William Hill, the father of Hon. William Hill, came from Boston to the Cape Fear to attend the wedding of one of his classmates."

        Wheeler says that the William Hill here referred to was graduated at Harvard in 1716, and came to North Carolina on account of his health, and settled at Brunswick, where he taught school. He became the ancestor of the distinguished Hill family on Cape Fear. His son, the Hon. William Hill, married a daughter of General John Ashe, and represented the Wilmington District in Congress from 1799 to 1803. The Hill and Ashe families were for many years patrons of Harvard. He adds, "It would seem that while the Cape Fear region largely patronized Boston, the north-eastern section sent her sons to England, and the Presbyterians of the interior sought higher education at Princeton."2

        2 Ibid., p. 258.


 The early Governors of the province had little desire to promote popular education, and as a rule it was the people, and not the Government, who promoted it to the extent to which it was carried. It is a pleasure to note an exception to this general rule.

FIRST EFFORTS FOR GOVERNMENTAL AID.

        It is said that "Gabriel Johnston, who was appointed Governor in 1734, was the first who urged on the Assembly the importance of making

Page 21

some provision for schools. He was a native of Scotland and a literary man. Having been educated in the University of St. Andrews and afterwards professor of Oriental languages in that institution, he knew the value of learning and wished to see it promoted; but when appropriations were made for it, they were either wasted or taken to meet some other demands of the treasury."1


        1 Caruthers's Life of Caldwell, p. 77.

        In 1736 Governor Johnston, in his address to the Legislature, said: "In all civilized Societys of men, it has always been looked upon as a matter of the greatest consequence to their Peace and happiness, to pollish the minds of young Persons with some degree of learning, and early to instill into them the Principles of virtue and religion, and that the Legislature has never yet taken the least care to erect one school which deserves the name, in this wide extended country, must in the judgment of all thinking men, be reckoned one of our greatest misfortunes. To what purpose, Gentlemen, is all your toil and labour, all your pains and endeavors for the advantage and enriching your families and Posterity, if within ourselves you cannot afford them such an education as may qualify them to be useful to their Country and to enjoy what you leave them with decency." He further asked them, among other things, to consider a country "where no care has been taken to inspire the youth with generous sentiments, worthy Principles, or the least tincture of literature," and then added, "lay your hands upon your hearts and consider how you can answer it to God and your own consciences, how you can answer it to your country or your Posterity, if you either neglect this opportunity of pursuing such valuable ends, or are diverted from it by the trifling arts of designing men."2


        2 North Carolina Colonial Records, Vol. IV, pp. 227, 228.

        The General Assembly in their reply to the address of the Governor said: "We lament very much the want of Divine Publick worship (a crying scandal in any, but more especially in a Christian community) as well as the general neglect in point of education, the main sources of all disorders and corruptions, which we should rejoice to see removed and remedyed, and are ready to do our parts towards the reformation of such flagrant and prolifick evils."3

        3 Ibid., p. 231.


 Although so much was said about the encouragement of education and the establishing of schools, no provision was made nor bill introduced looking to that end at this session of the Assembly.

FIRST SCHOOL LEGISLATION.

        The first account we have of legislative enactment for the promotion of schools is to be found in the legislative journals of the General Assembly held in Newbern, April 8-20, 1745. On April 15th, "Mr. Craven brought in a Bill for an act to Impower the Commissioners for the town

Page 22

of Edenton to keep in repair the Town fence, & to erect and build a Pound Bridges Public Wherf & to erect and build a school house in the said Town and other purposes, which he read in his place." On April 19th this bill had passed its several readings, and was sent to the Council for approval, receiving the Governor's assent the following day.1


        1 North Carolina Colonial Records, Vol. IV, pp. 783, 788, 790.

        The first act establishing a free school by the Government was passed in 1749.2

        2 Ibid., p. 977.


 This would seem to discredit the statement made by various historians of the State that the first school of any kind established by the Government was at Newbern, in 1764.

SCOTCH-IRISH IMMIGRATION--MARKED EDUCATIONAL ADVANCEMENT.

        There was no marked educational advancement manifested till the arrival of the Scotch-Irish, who began to settle in the State in large numbers about 1736; this immigration continued till 1776, the new comers bringing with them in a great measure the same spirit and the same principles that prompted the establishing of Icolumkill and Lindisfarne.

        The history of the introduction of this people into North Carolina is concisely stated by the Rev. J. Rumple, D. D., in the Home Magazine of March, 1881, as follows: "In June, 1736, Henry McCulloch, from the province of Ulster, Ireland, secured a grant from George II of 64,000 acres in the present county of Duplin, and introduced into it between three and four thousand emigrants from his native county. These were the Scotch-Irish descendants of the Scotch settlers whom James I had induced to move to Ireland and occupy the immense domains that escheated to the Crown after the conspiracy of the Earls of Tyrconnel and Tyrone in 1604. About the same time (1730-1740) the Scotch began to occupy the lower Cape Fear, and after the fatal battle of Culloden Moor, in 1746, great numbers of Highlanders implicated in the rebellion of 'Prince Charlie' emigrated to America, and occupied the counties of Bladen, Cumberland, Robeson, Moore, Richmond, Harnett, and parts of Chatham and Anson. Thus it happened that the Scotch obtained the ascendency in the region of the upper Cape Fear, and have retained it till this day.

        "In the meantime thousands of Scotch-Irish from the province of Ulster, Ireland, laboring under disabilities in consequence of their religion, began to seek homes in America. Most of them landed at Philadelphia and a few at Charleston. The northern stream first flowed westward to Lancaster County, Pa., and the Alleghany Mountains, and as the French and Indian War, about the time of Braddock's defeat (1755), rendered frontier life dangerous in Pennsylvania, multitudes changed their course and moved down parallel to the Blue Ridge through Virginia and North Carolina, till they met the other stream of their countrymen that was moving upward from Charleston along the

Page 23

banks of the Santee, Wateree, Broad, Pacolet, Ennoree, and Saluda Rivers. And this was the way the Scotch-Irish came into this region, beginning to arrive about 1736 and continuing to the opening of the Revolution in 1776, during forty years."

        From the arrival of these immigrants dates the impulse for the establishment of schools throughout the State. It is to the Presbyterian Church that North Carolina owes the establishment of her first classical schools, and during the second half of the eighteenth century the history of education in this State is inseparably connected with that of this denomination. Rev. Dr. Rumple, in writing of this period, says: "And so the Presbyterian Church of this age has regarded it as indispensable to her welfare to maintain schools where her sons should learn to read the Latin tongue, the language of western Christianity, and the Greek, in which the New Testament was written, as well as the mathematics and the liberal sciences--the 'Trivium' and the 'Quadrivium.'"

        About 1745 the New York and Pennsylvania Synods of the Presbyterian Church began to send missionaries to North Carolina. Numerous churches were established, and in nearly every instance a school was planted by the church. "Almost invariably," says Foote, "as soon as a neighborhood was settled, preparations were made for the preaching of the Gospel by a regular stated pastor, and wherever a pastor was located, in that congregation there was a classical school,--as in Sugar Creek, Poplar Tent, Centre, Bethany, Buffalo, Thyatira, Grove [Duplin County], Wilmington, and the churches occupied by Patillo in Orange and Granville [Counties]."1


        1 Foote's Sketches of North Carolina, p. 513.

THE INFLUENCE OF THE COLLEGE OF NEW JERSEY.

        In North Carolina, as in several other States, the higher education owes its first impulse to the Presbyterian Church and Princeton College.

        Presbyterian missionaries, graduates of Princeton, sent to this State in the first half of the eighteenth century by the Pennsylvania and New York Synods, gathered the scattered families of their faith into churches, and by the side of the church was planted a classical school.

        For more than half a century Princeton influence was predominant in North Carolina. Many of the leading divines, teachers, and politicians were alumni of that institution, as is demonstrated by the following list of native and adopted sons of the State who were graduated by that institution in the eighteenth century. The first of these to make his home in North Carolina was the Rev. Hugh McAden, class of 1753, a native of Pennsylvania, who came as a missionary in 1755. His biographer says he was one of the chief founders of the Presbyterian Church in the Southern States.

Page 24

        One of the most prominent public men of this period was Alexander Martin, class of 1756, whose father came from New Jersey to this State. He was a colonel in the Revolutionary War. In 1782, and again in 1789, he was elected Governor of the State. From 1793 to 1799 he was in the United States Senate. His alma mater conferred the degree of LL. D. upon him in 1793.

        Among the ablest of those who came from New Jersey was the Rev. Alexander McWhorter, class of 1757, who organized several churches and rendered valuable service to the cause of education. In later life he returned to his native State.

        In 1777 Samuel Spencer, class of 1759, a native North Carolinian, was elected one of the judges of the superior court at the first election under the Constitution.

        The services of Joseph Alexander, class of 1760, and Rev. David Caldwell, class of 1761, as pioneer promoters of education in the State, are referred to in the sketches of Queen's College and Caldwell's School.

        The Rev. John Close, class of 1763, is remembered as an earnest promoter of religion and education.

        A well-known name in the history of the State is that of Waightstill Avery, class of 1766, a native of Connecticut. In 1769 he began the practice of law in Charlotte, where he did much to advance the cause of education and literature. He was the first attorney-general of the State, being elected to that position in 1777.

        Ephraim Brevard, class of 1768, was a leading spirit of the Revolution, and one of the signers of the Mecklenburg Declaration of Independence.

        The class of 1768 had two representatives from North Carolina--Adlai Osborne and Thomas Reese. The former was one of the original trustees of the State University and a man of wide influence. The latter won distinction in another State.

        Isaac Alexander, class of 1772, was at one time president of Liberty Hall Academy. The Alexander family has furnished several noted educators to the State, and has at this time a representative in the Faculty of the University.

        The Rev. James Templeton, class of 1772, labored for several years in this State.

        A native Carolinian, Andrew King, class of 1773, after graduating, made his home in New York, where he became prominent.

        North Carolina is interested in four members of the class of 1774--the Rev. Stephen Bloomer Balch, a native of Maryland, who came to this State in early life; Rev. James Hall, a Pennsylvanian, an account of whom is given in the sketch of Clio's Nursery; David Witherspoon, a son of President Witherspoon, of Princeton, who became prominent as a member of the bar in Newbern; and John Ewing Calhoun, who entered college from North Carolina, but afterwards won distinction in South Carolina.

Page 25

        The Rev. Thomas B. Craighead, class of 1775, was a native of North Carolina, but about 1781 he made Tennessee his home. He was one of the founders of Davidson Academy, which afterwards became Nashville University, and was its first president.

        In 1790 Spruce McCay, class of 1775, was appointed a judge of the superior court. The Rev. James McRee, D. D., of the same class, was an earnest friend of education and did much for its promotion.

        The class of 1776 gave two Governors to the State,--Nathaniel Alexander and William Richardson Davie. The latter was a native of England. He was a prominent soldier of the Revolution, and a member of the convention that framed the Constitution of the United States, though his absence at the time it was signed prevented his name being affixed to it. In 1799 he was elected Governor, and soon after that was appointed by the President envoy from this country to France. In the sketch of the University, reference is made to his efforts in behalf of education.

        Edward Graham, class of 1786, was a successful lawyer.

        Evan Alexander, class of 1787, was a member of the State Legislature from 1797 to 1803, and of Congress from 1805 to 1809.

        For twenty-five years David Stone, class of 1788, was prominent in the political affairs of the State. He was an able champion of the University, and was at different times a member of the Legislature, judge of the supreme court, Governor, member of Congress, and United States Senator.

        The Rev. Thomas Pitt Irving, class of 1789, was principal of the Newbern Academy from 1790 to 1812. He was an Episcopal clergyman, and was regarded as one of the best Greek scholars of his day.

        Sketches of Robert Hett Chapman, class of 1789, and Joseph Caldwell, class of 1791, early presidents of the University, are given in the history of that institution.

        In the class of 1792 were graduated John McKnitt Alexander, M. D., one of the signers of the Mecklenburg Declaration of Independence, and Charles Wilson Harris, one of the first professors of the University.

        One of North Carolina's most distinguished sons, William Gaston was graduated in 1796. He represented his district in Congress from 1813 to 1817. Daniel Webster, when asked "Who was the greatest of the great men of the 'War Congress?'" is said to have replied, "The greatest man was William Gaston." In 1834 he was elected one of the judges of the supreme court of North Carolina, which position he held till his death, in 1841. The opinions which he rendered while on the bench "are not only monuments of legal learning, but models of elegant literature." The degree of doctor of laws was conferred on him by the University of Pennsylvania, 1819; Harvard, 1826; University of New York, 1834; and Princeton, 1835.

        Frederick Beasley, class of 1797, was a distinguished Episcopal clergyman, and was at one time provost of the University of Pennsylvania.

Page 26

James W. Clark, of the same class, was prominent in State politics. In 1815 he was elected a member of Congress, and in 1828 was appointed chief clerk in the Navy Department.

        The last North Carolinian to graduate at Princeton in the eighteenth century was Frederick Nash, class of 1799, who became a distinguished lawyer and chief-justice of the supreme court of the State. Prominent among those who studied at Princeton but did not graduate was Nathaniel Macon, member of the National Congress from 1791 to 1828, and several times speaker of the House and president pro tem. of the Senate. Many Carolinians of note have studied there during the present century, but since the establishment of Davidson College by the Presbyterians the student attendance from this State to that institution has almost ceased.

        The first two presidents of the University were graduates of Princeton, and as far as practicable they copied the curriculum of their alma mater. The first president of Davidson College was graduated at the University during the Caldwell administration, so it is evident that early collegiate education in North Carolina was greatly influenced by the College of New Jersey.

EARLY CLASSICAL SCHOOLS--TATE'S ACADEMY AND CROWFIELD
ACADEMY.

        The Rev. James Tate, a Presbyterian minister from Ireland, was among the first to establish a classical school in the State. Foote says that he established his school in the city of Wilmington about 1760.1

        1 Foote's Sketches of North Carolina, p. 178.


 At that time this place could have had but a few hundred inhabitants. This school was maintained by Mr. Tate for about eighteen years, but so pronounced and violent were his Whig principles, that the proximity of British power rendered it unsafe for him, so he removed into the interior, making Hawfields, in Orange County, his home.

        In 1760 Crowfield Academy was opened in Mecklenburg County, in the bounds of Centre Presbyterian Church congregation, about two miles from where Davidson College now stands, of which institution this school may be considered the germ, and on that account is worthy of note. Many of the leading spirits of the Revolution, the Davidsons, Osbornes, and others, got part of their classical training in this academy.2

        2 Rumple's Rowan County, pp. 84-85.


 Mr. Leazar, in a recent address at Davidson College, said that this was the first classical school in the State, and that it was conducted by some of the most learned men of the time,--"the Rev. David Kerr, graduate of the University of Dublin, and afterwards professor in the University of North Carolina; Dr. Charles Caldwell, later a distinguished professor in a medical school in Philadelphia, and others of like character." Among those who studied here he mentions "Dr. McKee, the scholarly divine; Dr. James Hall, the learned and military parson; Dr. Samuel E. McCorkle, one of the foremost educators of his generation;
Page 27

Col. Adlai Osborne, the wise counsellor and able defender of the people's rights; Dr. Ephraim Brevard, author of the Mecklenburg Declaration of Independence; and, probably, Hugh Lawson White, the most distinguished citizen of our daughter, Tennessee, during the first part of this century." Some young men from the West Indies studied at this school.

DR. DAVID CALDWELL'S SCHOOL--ITS INFLUENCE UPON NORTH CAROLINA AND THE SOUTH.

        The most illustrious name in the educational history of North Carolina is that of the Rev. David Caldwell, D. D. For many years "his log cabin served for North Carolina as an academy, a college, and a theological seminary."1

        1 The early classical schools of the Presbyterian Church in North Carolina, Virginia, and New Jersey were called "log colleges."


 An able Presbyterian divine, the Rev. E. B. Currie, says that "Dr. Caldwell as a teacher, was probably more useful to the church than any one man in the United States." In 1766 or '67 Dr. Caldwell established his classical school in Guilford County, at that time the north-eastern part of Rowan County, about three miles from where Greensborough now stands.2

        2 Rumple's Rowan County, p. 84.


 It soon became one of the most noted schools of the South, and we are told that to have passed through the course of study given here, with the approbation of the teacher, was a sufficient recommendation for scholarship in any section of the South.

        Dr. Caldwell was a full graduate of Princeton, and such was his reputation as an instructor and disciplinarian, that in his school were students from all of the States south of the Potomac. It is claimed that he was instrumental in bringing more men into the learned professions than any other man of his day, certainly in the Southern States. While many of his students continued their studies at Princeton, and at the University of North Carolina after the establishment of that institution, the larger number, and several of those who became the most distinguished in after-life, never went anywhere else for instruction, nor enjoyed other advantages for higher education than those afforded at his school. His biographer says: "Five of his scholars became Governors of different States; many more members of Congress, some of whom occupied a high standing, and still (1842) occupy it; and a much greater number became lawyers, judges, physicians, and ministers of the gospel. It would be a credit to any man to have been the instructor of such men as Judge Murphey, Judge McCoy, and many others who, in the same road to honor and usefulness, fell very little, if any, behind them; and to one who knew the value and importance of religion as he did, it must have been a matter of very pleasant reflection that he had been instrumental in bringing into the gospel ministry such men as the Rev. Samuel E. McCorkle, D. D., and the Rev. John Anderson, D. D., who died a few years since in Washington

Page 28

County, Pa., and many others who were burning and shining lights in the world."1


        1 Caruthers's Caldwell, p. 31.

DAVID CALDWELL--HIS LIFE AND HIS WORK.

        Dr. Caldwell's life presents many valuable lessons, and a short sketch of this patriot and scholar can but prove interesting. David Caldwell, the son of a sturdy Scotch-Irish farmer, was born in Lancaster County, Pa., March 22, 1725. In early youth, after receiving the rudiments of an English education, he was apprenticed to a carpenter, and until his twenty-sixth year he worked at the bench. He then decided to enter the ministry, and his first steps were to obtain a classical education. For some time he studied in eastern Pennsylvania at the school of Rev. Robert Smith, the father of John B. Smith, so favorably known in Virginia as president of Hampden-Sidney College, and of the Rev. Samuel Stanhope Smith, D. D., at one time president of Princeton College.2

        2 Foote's Sketches of North Carolina, p. 232.


 Before entering college he taught school for one or more years.

        It is not certainly known what year he entered Princeton, though he was graduated in 1761. At the time he became a student the requirements for admission were as follows: "Candidates for admission into the lowest or Freshman class must be capable of composing grammatical Latin, translating Virgil, Cicero's Orations, and the four Evangelists in Greek; and by a late order (made in Mr. Davies's administration) must understand the principal rules of vulgar arithmetic. Candidates for any of the higher classes are not only previously examined, but recite a fortnight upon trial, in that particular class for which they offer themselves; and are then fixed in that, or a lower, as they happen to be judged qualified. But, unless in very singular and extraordinary cases, none are received after the Junior year."3


        3 Maclean's History of the College of New Jersey, Vol. I, p. 272.

        His assiduity as a student may be gathered from the following incident related by Dr. Caruthers: "An elderly gentleman of good standing in one of his (Caldwell's) congregations stated to me a few weeks since that when he was a young man Dr. Caldwell was spending a night at his father's one summer about harvest, and while they were all sitting out in the open porch after supper, a remark was after some time made about the impropriety of sitting so long in the night air, when he (Dr. Caldwell) observed that, so far as his own experience had gone, there was nothing unwholesome in the night air; for while he was in college, he usually studied in it and slept in it, during the warm weather, as it was his practice to study at a table by the window, with the sash raised, until a late hour, then cross his arms on the table, lay his head on them, and sleep in that position till morning. This was not very far behind the most inveterate students of the seventeenth century, whether in Europe or America, and a man who had strength of constitution to

Page 29

pursue such a course of application, though of moderate abilities, could hardly fail to become a scholar."1


        1 Caruthers's Caldwell's p. 20.

        The character of the instruction given at Princeton is shown by the following extract from an account of the college by President Finley, published in 1764; and as Dr. Caldwell was graduated in 1761, it is to be supposed that the courses are substantially the same as while he was a student. After taking his degree in 1761 he taught for a year at Cape May, when he again returned and took a graduate course and at the same time acted as tutor in languages, so it is certain that he had the system of instruction as it was under Dr. Finley's administration. In his account of the courses and methods President Finley says: "As to the branches of literature taught here, they are the same with those which are made parts of education in the European colleges, save only such as may be occasioned by the infancy of this institution. The students are divided into four distinct classes, which are called the Freshman, the Sophomore, the Junior, and the Senior. In each of these they continue one year, giving and receiving in their turns those tokens of respect and subjection which belong to their standings, in order to preserve a due subordination. The Freshman year is spent in Latin and Greek languages, particularly in reading Horace, Cicero's Orations, the Greek Testament, Lucian's Dialogues, and Xenophon's Cyropedia. In the Sophomore year they still prosecute the study of the languages, particularly Homer, Longinus, etc., and enter upon the sciences, geography, rhetoric, logic, and the mathematics. They continue their mathematical studies throughout the Junior year, and also pass through a course of natural and moral philosophy, metaphysics, chronology, etc.; and the greater number, especially such as are educating for the service of the church, are initiated into the Hebrew. * * * The Senior year is entirely employed in reviews and composition. They now revise the most improving parts of Latin and Greek classics, part of the Hebrew Bible, and all the arts and sciences. The weekly course of disputation is continued, which was also carried on through the preceding year. They discuss two or three theses in a week, some in the syllogistic and others in the forensic manner, alternately, the forensic being always performed in the English tongue." Besides the above there were public disputations on Sundays on theological questions, and once each month the Seniors delivered original orations before a public audience. Members of the Senior and lower classes were also required from time to time to declaim.2


        2 Maclean's History of the College of New Jersey, Vol. I, p. 266.

        Such was the course of instruction taken by Dr. Caldwell, and such the educational system which prevailed in the first institutions for higher education established in North Carolina.

        At a meeting of the Presbytery held at Princeton in September, 1762, David Caldwell was received as a candidate for the ministry. He was licensed to preach in 1763. In 1764 he labored as a missionary in North

Page 30

Carolina, returning to New Jersey in 1765, being ordained to the full work of the ministry at the Presbytery held at Trenton in July of that year. He immediately returned to North Carolina, where he labored as missionary, until on March 3, 1768, he was installed as pastor of the Buffalo and Alamance congregations.

        At this time there were but few Presbyterian ministers in North Carolina, and Dr. Caldwell was one of the very first to make the State his permanent home. His history is more identified with the moral and educational history of North Carolina than is that of any other one man of the eighteenth century. In 1766 he married the daughter of the Rev. Alexander Craighead, and as the salary from his churches was not sufficient for the support of a family, it became necessary for him to supplement it by teaching a school. At this time schools for primary education existed in various parts of the colony, but to him is due the honor of having established the first institution for the higher education that achieved more than local fame. Mention has already been made of the reputation which this school acquired. The average attendance of students was from fifty to sixty, which was a large number for the time and the circumstances of the country. The exercises of the school were not interrupted by the war till 1781, at that time nearly all his students having taken service in the American Army. The exercises of the school were resumed as soon as circumstances permitted, "though the number of students was small until peace, and with it incipient prosperity, were restored to the country." Dr. Caldwell continued his labors as a teacher till about 1722, when he was forced by the infirmities of age to retire from active work.

        Judge Archibald D. Murphey, in an address before the literary societies of the University of North Carolina in 1827, referring to the facilities for higher education before the opening of the State University in 1795, has this to say about the Caldwell school: "The most prominent and useful of these schools was kept by Dr. David Caldwell, of Guilford County. He instituted it shortly after the close of the War, and continued it for more than thirty years. The usefulness of Dr. Caldwell to the literature of North Carolina will never be sufficiently appreciated, but the opportunities for instruction in his school were very limited. There was no library attached to it; his students were supplied with a few of the Greek and Latin classics, Euclid's Elements of Mathematics, and Martin's Natural Philosophy. Moral philosophy was taught from a syllabus of lectures delivered by Dr. Witherspoon, in Princeton College. The students had no books on history or miscellaneous literature. There were indeed very few in the State, except in the libraries of lawyers who lived in the commercial towns. I well remember that after completing my course of studies under Dr. Caldwell I spent nearly two years without finding any books to read, except some old works on theological subjects. At length I accidentally met with Voltaire's History of Charles XII, of Sweden, an odd volume of

Page 31

Smollett's Roderick Random, and an abridgment of Don Quixote. These books gave me a taste for reading, which I had no opportunity of gratifying until I became a student in this University in the year 1796. Few of Dr. Caldwell's students had better opportunities of getting books than myself; and with these slender opportunities of instruction it is not surprising that so few became eminent in the liberal professions. At this day [1827], when libraries are established in all our towns, when every professional man and every respectable gentleman has a collection of books, it is difficult to conceive the inconveniences under which young men labored thirty or forty years ago."

        The Rev. Dr. Caruthers says: "But the most important service he (Dr. Caldwell) rendered as a teacher was to the church or to the cause of religion, for nearly all the young men who came into the ministry of the Presbyterian Church for many years, not only in North Carolina but in the States south and west of it, were trained in his school, many of whom are still living (1842); and while some are superannuated, others are still useful men, either as preachers or as teachers in different institutions of learning."1


        1 Caruthers's Caldwell, p. 36.

        It is said that his mode of discipline was peculiar to himself, and while it did not admit of imitation, yet it was so successful that it could not be surpassed. His students were bound to him with bonds of affection, and an approving word from their "Dominie" was eagerly sought for. If the course of instruction at his school was not very extended it was thorough, as is testified by those who were prepared by him for future usefulness. Governor John M. Morehead, one of North Carolina's most distinguished sons, who studied under Dr. Caldwell and was prepared by him for the Junior class half advanced in the University of North Carolina, gave him the highest praise as a teacher, though at the time he was under his instruction Dr. Caldwell was between eighty-five and ninety years old.

        Dr. Caldwell's services to his country in the hour that "tried men's souls" deserve to be mentioned here. He had his full share of the troubles of the times. It was the delight of both the Tories and the British to persecute him. He was driven from his home, and to keep from falling into the hands of his enemies was forced to spend many nights in the forest. His library and the many valuable papers which he had prepared were destroyed with great wantonness. An effort was made to seduce him with British gold, but neither money nor persecution could shake his loyalty to the cause he had espoused.

        Alexander says: "The first bloodshed of the Revolution was not at Lexington, but on the Alamance, in North Carolina, May 16, 1771, in an engagement between Governor Tryon's troops and the Regulators, as they were called. These Regulators were not adventurers, but the sturdy, patriotic members of three Presbyterian congregations, all of them having as their pastors graduates of Princeton. Mr. Caldwell was

Page 32

one of them, and on the morning of the battle was on the ground, going from one side to the other, endeavoring to prevent the catastrophe."1


        1 Alexander's Princeton College during the Eighteenth Century, p. 70.

        Dr. Caldwell was a member of the State convention of 1776, which drew up the "Bill of Rights" and framed the Constitution. He was also a member of the convention to consider the Constitution of the United States in 1778, where he took a decided stand as an advocate of States' rights; but in the party conflicts preceding the second war with Great Britain he was on the side of the Federalists.

        Such was the esteem in which he was held by his State, and such his reputation for scholarship, that on the establishment of the State University the presidency was tendered him. On account of his years the honor was declined. In 1810 this institution conferred on him the honorary degree of doctor of divinity.

        This great and good man died August 25, 1824. It is a fit testimonial of his many virtues that "time-worn veterans in the service of their country, men who have stood firm against the intrigues of ambition and the assaults of power, men who have fought the battles of freedom and maintained the rights of the people in the halls of our National Legislature, year after year, until they have grown gray in the service, have been known to shed tears at the mention of his name when passing in public-conveyance by the place where his remains lie buried, and by the church in which he preached and they were hearers from Sabbath to Sabbath, while preparing under his instruction for future distinction and usefulness in the world."2


        2 Caruthers's Caldwell, p. 36.

QUEEN'S COLLEGE.

        The most celebrated institution for higher education in North Carolina during the colonial period was Queen's College, also known as Queen's Museum, located at Charlotte, and its history is interesting to the friends of literature as a bold and vigorous effort made for its promotion under the most discouraging circumstances.

        The beginnings of this institution are found in the classical school established in 1767, by the Rev. Joseph Alexander,3 a graduate of Princeton of the class of 1760, and a Mr. Benedict, at the Sugar Creek Presbyterian church, near Charlotte.4

        3 After a few years Dr. Alexander removed to South Carolina, where he was as active in the cause of education as he had been in his native State. In 1797 the South Carolina Legislature bestowed a charter upon Alexandria College, named in his honor.

        4 Foote's Sketches of North Carolina, pp. 194, 513.


 The community in which this school was located was noted for its intelligence. The school flourished, and to meet the demands of a growing and prosperous community it was decided to enlarge its scope. Queen's College became the successor of Alexander's school. An act entitled "An act for founding,
Page 33

establishing, and endowing of Queen's College, in the town of Charlotte, in Mecklenburg County," was passed by the Assembly which met in Newbern on December 5, 1770.1

        1 Davis's Second Revisal of Laws of North Carolina (Newbern, 1773).


 It was twice chartered by the Legislature, and twice repealed by royal proclamation. It has been truly said that "No compliments to his Queen could render Whigs in politics and Presbyterians in religion acceptable to George III. A college under such auspices was too well calculated to insure the growth of the numerous democracy." The royal Government, as a rule, favored no institutions not under the control of the Church of England. To this the Presbyterians of this section would not assent. It is said that the notorious Col. David Fanning offered to secure a charter with himself as chancellor and the Rev. Joseph Alexander as head teacher. But the people of Mecklenburg, whose capital city, Charlotte, was termed by Lord Cornwallis the "hornet's nest of the Revolution," were as much opposed to such a chancellor as was the King to an institution that would not receive his minions. But, notwithstanding royal disfavor, Queen's College continued to flourish. Dr. Caruthers, referring to the people of Mecklenburg, says: "Man might as well attempt to lay his interdict upon the coming forth of vegetation, when the powers of nature are warmed and refreshed by genial influences from above, as to arrest the progress of such a people in knowledge and improvement."2


        2 Caruthers's Caldwell, p. 193.

        We are told by Vass that "the King's fears that the college would become the fountain of republicanism were, perhaps, quickened into reality by his repeated rejection of the charter, for Queen's Museum became the rallying point for literary societies and political clubs preceding the Revolution; and in its halls were held the significant and decisive debates preceding the adoption of the Mecklenburg Declaration of Independence," on May 20, 1775.3


        3 Vass's Eastern North Carolina, p. 46; see also Foote's Sketches of North Carolina, p. 514.

        It is probable that the name of the institution was changed from Queen's College to Liberty Hall Academy in 1775.4

        4 Wheeler's Reminiscences, p. 230.


 It is not probable that the trustees cared to have a royal name upon an institution to which the British authority had refused a charter. The coveted charter came at last, but it was under the blessing of liberty, and was conferred by the Legislature of North Carolina as the representatives of the sovereign authority of a free and independent State. On May 9, 1777, the first year of American independence, an act was passed incorporating Isaac Alexander, president, Col. Thomas Polk, Col. Thomas Neal, Abraham Alexander, Waightstill Avery, Adlai Osborne, John McKnitt Alexander, Dr. Ephraim Brevard, Rev. David Caldwell, Rev. James Hall, Rev. James Edmonds, Rev. John Simpson, Rev. Thomas Reese, Samuel McCorkle, and Rev. Thomas H. McCaule, as president and trustees of Liberty Hall Academy. All the trustees were Presbyterians, and the school
Page 34

was under the supervision of Orange Presbytery, at that time covering the whole State. The preamble of the act of incorporation reads as follows: "Whereas, The proper education of youth in this infant country is highly necessary, and would answer the most valuable and beneficial purposes to this State and the good people thereof; and whereas, a very promising experiment hath been made at a seminary in the county of Mecklenburg, and a number of youths there taught have made great advancements in the knowledge of the learned languages and in the rudiments of the arts and sciences, in the course of a regular and finished education, which they have since completed at various colleges in distant parts of America; and whereas, the seminary aforesaid, and the several teachers who have successfully taught and presided therein, have hitherto been almost wholly supported by private subscriptions; in order, therefore, that said subscriptions and other gratuities may be legally possessed and duly applied, and the said seminary, by the name of 'Liberty Hall,' may become more extensive and generally useful for the encouragement of liberal knowledge in languages, arts, and sciences, and for diffusing the great advantages of education upon more liberal, easy, and general terms, be it enacted by the General Assembly of the State of North Carolina, etc."1


        1 Laws of North Carolina, p. 35 (James Davis, Newbern, 1777).

        The only authoritative account of this institution to be found is in a manuscript volume, written by Adlai Osborne, and deposited in the library of the University of North Carolina, from which the following extracts (quoted in Caruthers's Caldwell) are taken:

        "The regulations respecting the steward and boarding were singularly excellent and calculated to give general satisfaction. In April, 1778, the laws formed by Dr. Isaac Alexander, Dr. Ephraim Brevard, and Rev. Thomas H. McCaule, the committee chosen at the last meeting, were adopted without any material alteration. The course of studies and the distinction of classes were nearly the same as those pointed out by the trustees of the University of North Carolina, but more limited, and the honors conferred were the same, except that instead of degrees of Bachelors and Masters the trustees had only the right of giving a certificate of their studies and improvements. At this meeting overtures were made to Dr. Alexander McWhorter, of New Jersey, to accept the presidency, but he could not comply with their request owing to the derangement of his affairs from a long absence during the Revolutionary War, having been appointed by Congress to preach up liberty and independence to the inhabitants of the Southern States. Mr. Robert Brownfield was then appointed to the office, and he agreed to accept for one year, as Dr. Alexander had thought proper to resign. Several gentlemen of great literary talents were successively invited without success. Dr. Ephraim Brevard and the Rev. Samuel E. McCorkle were then sent to New Jersey with a second invitation to Dr. McWhorter, with instructions, if he should think proper again to decline, to solicit

Page 35

the advice of Dr. Witherspoon and Mr. Houston, of Princeton, in the choice of some other gentleman of eminence in the republic of letters. Dr. McWhorter, after settling his affairs, removed to Charlotte, and was about to take charge of Liberty Hall when the whole business relating to it was suspended, never to be resumed. This took place about the 15th of February, 1780."

        The following is a copy of the diploma received by Dr. John Graham, who was prominent in the early history of the State, and afterwards president of a college in South Carolina:

"STATE OF NORTH CAROLINA,
"Mecklenburg County:

        "This is to certify that Mr. John Graham hath been a student in the Academy at Liberty Hall, in the State and county above mentioned, the space of four years preceding the date hereof; that his whole deportment during his residence there was perfectly regular; that he prosecuted his studies with diligence, and made such acquisitions both in the languages and scientific learning as gave entire satisfaction to his teachers.

        "And he is hereby recommended to the friendly notice and regard of all lovers of religion and literature wherever he may come.

        "In testimony of which this is given at Liberty Hall this 22d day of November, 1778.

"ISC. ALEXANDER,
"President.

"EPH. BREVARD,
"ABR'M ALEXANDER,
"Trustees."


        It is said that this institution was the most celebrated seminary of learning, except William and Mary, south of Princeton. Its able presidents, Rev. Dr. McWhorter and Dr. Ephraim Brevard, were both graduates of Princeton. The Revolutionary War closed its halls, and they were desecrated by Cornwallis's troops, who burned them when his retreat upon Wilmington commenced.1


        1 Wheeler's Reminiscences, p. 256. Foote says that Liberty Hall was used by Cornwallis as a hospital, and was greatly defaced and injured, but does not say that it was burned.--Sketches of North Carolina, p. 516.

        In October, 1784, by an act of the Legislature, Liberty Hall Academy was transferred to Salisbury, the name being changed to Salisbury Academy.2


        2 Martin's Collection of Private Acts, p. 142 (Newbern, 1794).

        Rev. S. C. Caldwell, after the closing of Liberty Hall Academy, maintained for many years a classical school of high grade at Sugar Creek, near Charlotte, where young men from the neighboring counties were prepared for the University of North Carolina and Princeton.3


        3 Rev. J. Rumple, D. D., in North Carolina Presbyterian.
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        After peace was declared between this country and Great Britain, Dr. Thomas Henderson, a physician of note, who had been educated at Liberty Hall Academy, opened a high school, which he carried on with great reputation for a number of years.1

        1 Foote's Sketches of North Carolina, pp. 477, 517.


 Since that time excellent institutions for both males and females have been maintained at Charlotte.

REV. HENRY PATILLO'S SCHOOL.

        Rev. Henry Patillo, a contemporary of Rev. Dr. Caldwell, for many years maintained a classical school in Orange County. Although this school is mentioned by writers as one of the best schools in the province, no detailed information concerning it can be obtained. Mr. Patillo studied at Princeton during the presidency of the Rev. Samuel Davies, so noted in the religious controversies in Virginia during the first half of the eighteenth century, and who afterwards did so much to establish the reputation of Princeton and put it on a firm financial basis. Such was Mr. Patillo's reputation as a scholar that in 1789 the degree of A. M. was conferred on him causa honoris by Hampden-Sidney College, of Virginia.

        Like many of the other Presbyterian ministers of his day, he took a prominent part in the political questions in which the colony was involved. In 1775 he was a member of the Provincial Congress of North Carolina, being at the same time chaplain of the body. He had the honor of being the chairman of this Congress in committee of the whole in considering the arrangements for confederation. The reputation made by some of the students of his school during the first years of the history of the State after independence had been achieved evidences that "he was a faithful and successful teacher," and his services to his country during the war of the Revolution will entitle him to a high place in the history of North Carolina when it is written as it deserves to be, and the records of her patriotic sons are made known and become a part of the history of our whole country.2


        2 For an interesting sketch of the life of Rev. Henry Patillo, see Foote's Sketches of North Carolina, pp. 213-230.

GRANVILLE HALL.

        In October, 1779, "Granville Hall," Granville County, was incorporated. This school was liberally supported, and for many years was one of the leading educational institutions in the State.

        The preamble to the act of incorporation reads as follows: "Whereas, The proper education of youth in this State is highly necessary and would answer the most valuable and beneficial purposes to the good people thereof; and whereas, the county of Granville, from its situation both pleasant and healthy, well watered and abounding with provisions, is a fit and proper place to erect buildings for a seminary of learning;

Page 37

and whereas, large sums of money have already been subscribed to promote and encourage such a laudable and beneficial establishment, which together with such other sums as may be given in donations and otherwise will answer all the expense attending the same, Resolved, etc."

        The following trustees were appointed: Governor Richard Caswell; Abner Nash, Speaker of the Senate; Thomas Benbury, Speaker of the House of Commons; John Penn, Rev. George Micklejohn, Rev. Henry Patillo, Thomas Person, Edmund Taylor, John Taylor, Memucan Hunt, Philemon Hawkins, Jr., Howell Lewis, Robert Lewis, Charles Rust Eaton, John Young, and Samuel Smith. They were instructed to purchase five hundred acres of land and erect suitable buildings.1


        1 Martin's Collection of Private Acts, p. 93.

        For several years the Rev. Henry Patillo was principal of this institution.

CLIO'S NURSERY AND THE ACADEMY OF THE SCIENCES.

        Clio's Nursery, located on Snow Creek, Iredell County, was opened about the beginning of the Revolutionary War. For many years the Rev. James Hall, D. D., a patriot, scholar, and divine of western North Carolina, was the superintendent of this institution, where so many whose memory North Carolina now delights to honor studied. But the school is remembered chiefly on account of the history of its superintendent, James Hall, who was born at Carlisle, Pa., August 22, 1744, but in early youth made North Carolina his home. In 1774 he was graduated from Princeton, where he stood first in his classes. As a student he especially distinguished himself in the exact sciences, and such was the reputation he made in those studies that soon after his graduation President Witherspoon proposed to have him appointed teacher of mathematics in Princeton. Mr. Hall declined this honor, feeling that duty called him to labor in North Carolina. The Orange Presbytery licensed him to preach in 1776, and two years later he became pastor of churches within the bounds of that presbytery.

        He was an earnest advocate of the cause of liberty, and the following tribute to his memory is worthily bestowed: "A full account of the actions of Mr. Hall during the Revolutionary War would fill a volume. His active, enterprising spirit would not let him be neuter; his principles, drawn from the Word of God and the doctrines of his church, and cultivated by Dr. Witherspoon, carried him with all his heart to the defence of his country. To that he gave his powers of mind, body, and estate."2

        2 Alexander's Princeton College during the Eighteenth Century, p. 176.


 His appeals during the opening years of the war did much to fire the hearts of North Carolinians for the cause of liberty. When Cornwallis was devastating South Carolina Mr. Hall called the people of his section together and addressed them with great fervor. A cavalry company was immediately organized, and by general consent he was demanded for their leader, which post he accepted. He was at the
Page 38

same time the captain of a company and the chaplain of a regiment. General Greene tendered him a commission as general, which he declined on the grounds that there were others who could fill the position with ability equal at least to his, while he had pledged his life to the work of the ministry.1


        1 Alexander's Princeton College, pp. 175, 176.

        After the war Doctor Hall again resumed his duties in the "log college" mentioned above. In connection with his duties as principal of Clio's Nursery, he opened at his residence an "academy of the sciences," which was supplied by him with some philosophical apparatus, and of which he was the sole professor. This was the first scientific school in the State. A large number of men who afterwards became distinguished received their scientific education there while pursuing their classical studies at Clio's Nursery. Besides a number of ministers who studied under his direction, there were President Waddell, of Athens College, and Judge Lowrie, of Georgia; Andrew Pickens and Governor Israel Pickens, of Alabama; and George W. Campbell, Secretary of the Treasury in 1841 and afterwards minister to Russia, and Judge Williams, of Tennessee. Many of the students of these institutions came from Tennessee, Georgia, South Carolina, Alabama, and other States.

        The great want of the schools of this time was elementary text-books. To meet this need he wrote a treatise of English grammar, which was copied and circulated in manuscript, and afterwards printed and largely used in the schools of North Carolina and neighboring States.

        Doctor Hall died July 25, 1826, but the school of which he was the principal survived him many years, and finally gave place to Davidson College, founded by and under the direction of the Presbyterians of North and South Carolina.2


        2 Foote's Sketches of North Carolina, pp. 330, 331.

SCIENCE HALL.

        In 1779 Science Hall, at Hillsborough, Orange County, was incorporated, with William Hooper, Alexander Martin, and others as trustees. They were given the same privileges as the trustees of Liberty Hall Academy.

        The Legislature in 1784 accorded this institution the privilege to raise money by means of a lottery, and also gave the school the old Episcopal church, built in colonial times by taxation, for recitation halls, reserving the right of holding sessions of the Legislature in it when the General Assembly should convene in Hillsborough.3


        3 Martin's Collection of Private Acts, p. 87.

ZION PARNASSUS.

        Zion Parnassus, a classical school established by the Rev. Samuel Eusebius McCorkle, a native of Pennsylvania, at Thyatira, on the road between

Page 39

Salisbury and Statesville, in 1785, is noted as the first institution, certainly in North Carolina (and President Battle, of the University of North Carolina, thinks in America), having a distinct normal school attachment. At this school worthy young men needing assistance were given their tuition and furnished with the necessary text-books. Dr. McCorkle was a graduate of Princeton, class of 1772, and his course of instruction was modelled after the course of that college. We are told that a high standard of scholarship was maintained in Zion Parnassus, and that the idle and vicious were excluded. That so large a proportion of his students became useful in the liberal professions is due to the fact that he only encouraged those to pursue advanced courses who manifested decided talent. It is said that forty-five of his pupils became ministers of the Gospel. Six of the seven first graduates of the University of North Carolina were prepared for that institution by Dr. McCorkle. At the establishment of the State University Dr. McCorkle was elected first professor, and given the chair of moral and political philosophy, which was declined. Alexander says: "He was a thorough scholar, and kept up his acquaintance, not only with the Latin and Greek classics, but with mathematics, philosophy, and every important branch of learning." The degree of D.D. was conferred on Dr. McCorkle by Dartmouth College in 1792. He was a man of fine conversational powers, of noble physique, and is said to have much resembled Thomas Jefferson in appearance and gait.1

        1 Alexander's Princeton College, p. 156; Foote's Sketches of North Carolina, p. 361.


 After Dr. McCorkle's death, in 1811, the school which he had so successfully conducted was suspended, but was soon re-opened in Salisbury, and with few intermissions has continued till the present as the Salisbury High School.

OTHER PRESBYTERIAN SCHOOLS.

        In 1791 the Rev. David Kerr, pastor of the Presbyterian church in Fayetteville, opened a classical school under the direction of a board of trustees in that town. Mr. Kerr was a graduate of Trinity College, Dublin, and in his day was considered one of the best scholars in the State. In July, 1794, he was elected a professor in the University of North Carolina, and some incidents in his life will be noted in the sketch of that institution.2

        2 Foote's Sketches of North Carolina, p. 490.


 From that time to this the people of Fayetteville have, with but few interruptions, maintained an excellent classical school.

        The last of the Presbyterian schools of the eighteenth century in North Carolina, whose names are known to the writer, of sufficient importance to deserve mention here, were the Providence Academy, about twelve miles from Charlotte, established by the Rev. James Wallis in 1792, and the Poplar Tent Academy, in Cabarrus County, established about 17783 by the Rev. Robert Archibald, who was graduated at Princeton in 1772.

         [illegible] Ibid. pp. 442, 482.


 "Mr. Archibald," says Alexander, "was a man
Page 40

of talent, of an amiable disposition, and considered a good classical scholar."1


        1 Alexander's Princeton College, p. 148.

        These schools were continued through nearly the first half of this century, but finally gave place to other institutions, the last principal of Providence Academy becoming the first president of Davidson College, and the last principal of Poplar Tent being made president of the board of trustees of that institution.

APPROPRIATIONS FOR EDUCATION.

        In 1760 Governor Dobbs recommended the subject of education to the Legislature, and proposed that the vestry in each parish should raise a limited sum to pay a parish clerk and register, who should be qualified to act as school-master and, in the absence of the clergyman, as reader. The sum so raised was afterwards borrowed for military purposes, to be paid back by a direct tax upon the people. This tax was never laid, and consequently the school money was never refunded.

        In his address to the General Assembly, which met in Wilmington in 1764, Governor Dobbs deplored the great want of clergymen. In their reply, the Lower House admitted the "want of clergymen," but added, "sufficient provision was already made in proportion to the ability of the people, and there were large sums appropriated for the establishment of schools and for the purchase of glebes, under a suspending clause, until the King's pleasure was known, which had been borrowed for the service of the late war, and since in part for contingencies."2


        2 Martin's North Carolina, Vol. II, p. 180.

        It was at this session of the Legislature that an act was passed for the erection of a school-house and a residence for the master in the town of Newbern, which was the first effectual aid given by the Government for the encouragement of literature. Half of two lots which had been appropriated to the church in 1740 was set apart for these purposes.3


        3 Davis's First Revisal, Laws of North Carolina, p. 351.

INCORPORATED SCHOOLS--NEWBERN ACADEMY.

        The Newbern school was incorporated in 1766, being the first incorporated academy in the State.

        The act is entitled "An act for establishing a school-house in the town of Newbern," the preamble reading as follows: "Whereas, a number of well-disposed persons, taking into consideration the great necessity of having a proper school or public seminary of learning established, whereby the rising generation may be brought up and instructed in the principles of the Christian religion and fitted for the several offices and purposes of life, have at great expense erected and built, in the town of Newbern, a convenient house for the purposes aforesaid; and being

Page 41

desirous that the same may be established by law on a permanent footing, so as to answer the good purposes by the said persons intended: Be it enacted by the Governor, council, and Assembly, and by the authority of the same, etc." It was then provided that trustees should be elected, the same being incorporated into a body politic and corporate by the name of the "Incorporated society for promoting and establishing the public school in Newbern," and by that name to have perpetual succession and corporate seal.

        It was furthermore provided "That no person shall be admitted to be master of the said school but who is of the Established Church of England, and who, at the recommendation of the trustees or directors, or the majority of them, shall be duly licensed by the Governor, or Commander-in-chief for the time being."

        In addition to taking the several oaths of government and subscribing to the Test, the trustees had to take the following oath: "I, A. B., do solemnly swear that I will duly and faithfully, to the best of my skill and ability, execute and discharge the several powers and authorities given me by an act of Assembly for establishing a school-house in the town of Newbern; and that in all things for the well-ordering and good government thereof, I will do equal and impartial justice to the extent of my understanding. So help me God."

        It was also enacted "That a duty of one penny per gallon on all rum, or other spirituous liquors imported into (?) the river Neuse, be paid, for and during the space of seven years, from and after the passing of this act, by the importers thereof, for and towards raising a fund for the education of ten poor children in the said school (to be chosen by the trustees), whose parents may be unable to pay for the same; and that the said duty be part of the common stock of the said school, and to be appropriated as aforesaid, and towards giving a salary of twenty pounds per year to the master of said school, towards enabling him to keep an assistant, which said duty shall be collected, accounted for, and paid to the treasurer of the said school, in the same manner, and under the same penalties and restrictions as the duty of four pence per gallon on spirituous liquors is now paid and collected."1


        1 Davis's Sec. Revisal (Newbern, 1773), p. 359.

        Owing to the fact that prior to the Revolutionary War this school was under the control of the Established Church, it was not favorably regarded by dissenters, many of them sending their sons to the Presbyterian schools of piedmont Carolina, to be educated.2


        2 Caruthers's Caldwell, p. 30.

        In his account of this school Vass says: "The first large and commodious building, erected at great expense, was burned down accidentally in 1795, when, by an act of Assembly, a room in the Palace was used for the school-room. The present old brick academy was erected in 1806; the corner-stone of the additional elegant graded school building was laid in 1884, just one hundred and twenty years after the first act

Page 42

of the Legislature already mentioned. In that older building Gaston, Stanly, Badger, Spaight, Hawks, and many other distinguished sons of Carolina were educated for future careers of honor and usefulness."1


        1 Vass's Eastern North Carolina, p. 75.

        The North Carolina Gazette of July 24, 1778, contains the following advertisements, which show that even during the Revolution education was not wholly neglected in Newbern:

        "Mr. Joseph Blyth has opened school in the public school-house, and will teach Latin, English, arithmetic, geography, geometry, trigonometry, and several other of the most useful branches of the mathematics, according to the best and most approved methods. Gentlemen and ladies who favor him with their children may depend he will be diligent and pay proper attention to their education.

"NEWBERN, July 24."

        In the same paper Mr. George Harrison advertises a school for instruction in the English and French languages.2


        2 Ibid., p. 44.

EDENTON ACADEMY.

        In 1770 an act was passed "for vesting the school-house in Edenton in trustees." The preamble is as follows: "Whereas, the inhabitants of the town of Edenton, for the promoting the education of youth and encouragement of learning, have, by voluntary subscription, purchased two lots and erected a convenient school-house thereon in an agreeable and healthy situation in the said town: Therefore, etc." The charter provides, like that of the Newbern Academy, that the principal must be a member of the Established Church.3


        3 Laws of North Carolina, Davis's Sec. Revisal (Newbern, 1773), p. 478.

INNIS ACADEMY.

        Of the academy founded in Wilmington by James Innis and incorporated by the Legislature in 1783, not much is to be learned. Wheeler, in referring to Mr. Innis, says: "Much interest is connected with this name, since from his will, duly proved in 1759 before Governor Dobbs, the 'Innis Academy' had its origin. In April of that year the Legislature passed an act incorporating the academy, with Samuel Ashe, A. McLain, William Hill, and others as trustees. Before the academy building was completed, a theatrical corps had been organized in Wilmington, and an arrangement was made between them and the trustees that the lower part of the building should be fitted up and used exclusively for a theatre. This arrangement was carried out by a perpetual lease made to the 'Thalian Association.'

        "The name of Colonel Innis is frequently met with in the history of the State. He was born in Scotland, and lived at Point Pleasant, on the north-east branch of the Cape Fear River, about seven miles from

Page 43

Wilmington. He had been an officer of rank in the British army, and was distinguished in the expedition against Carthagena, in South America. He was considered a man of mark, and possessed of considerable estate."1


        1 Wheeler's Reminiscences, p. 308.

        Mr. Wheeler is evidently mistaken as to the date of the establishment and incorporation of this school. In Martin's Collection of the Private Acts of the General Assembly of the State of North Carolina, published at Newbern in 1794, we find that the Innis Academy, for the establishment of which Colonel Innis had bequeathed his home, known as Point Pleasant, and other plantations, and his negro slaves, was incorporated by the Legislature in April, 1783. It was provided in the act of incorporation that "the rector, professors, and tutors of this academy, and all other academies and public schools in this State established by law, shall be exempt from military duty during their continuance in those offices, provided the number of teachers in any of the said academies or public schools shall not exceed three; provided, also, that all scholars and students entering into said academy, or any other public school and being of the age of fifteen years or under at the time of entering, shall, during their continuance thereat, be exempt from all military duties."

MARTIN ACADEMY--NOW WASHINGTON COLLEGE, TENNESSEE.

        In 1783 the Legislature of North Carolina incorporated Martin Academy, in Washington County, N. C. (now Washington County, Tenn.), which was the first literary institution that was established in the great valley of the Mississippi. John Canson, president, and Hezekiah Balch, Samuel Doak, William Heuston, James Heuston, Thomas Stewart, Daniel Kenady, Landon Carter, and Robert Irwin were incorporated into a body politic and corporate as president and trustees of Martin Academy, "with the same powers, authorities, and privileges" as were accorded the president and trustees of Liberty Hall Academy, in Charlotte.2

        2 Martin's Collection of Private Acts, p. 119; also see Phelan's History of Tennessee, Dedication, and page 233.


 This school became Washington College in 1795. Rev. Samuel Doak, a native of Virginia, educated at Princeton College and at one time a tutor in Hampden-Sidney College, was the president of this school from its incorporation in 1783 till 1818. Foote says: "He procured for his institution a small library in Philadelphia, caused it to be transported in sacks on pack-horses across the mountains, and thus formed the nucleus of the library at Washington College. The brick buildings overlook the site of the log college; but long must it be before the enlarged institution can equally overshadow the usefulness of the log academy and college that for a time supplied the opportunities for education for ministers, lawyers, and doctors, in the early days of Tennessee, and still is sending out its stream."3


        3 Foote's Sketches of North Carolina, p. 311.
Page 44

MORGAN ACADEMY.

        Morgan Academy, Burke County, one of the most noted schools in that part of the State then called the District of Morgan, was incorporated in 1783 with James Temple, president, and Waightstill Avery, Charles McDowell, William Moore, Alexander Irwin, James Greenlie, Benjamin Ellage, Abraham Denton, and David Vance as president and trustees.1


        1 Martin's Collection of Private Acts, p. 119.

OTHER INCORPORATED INSTITUTIONS.

        The following list includes all the incorporated schools of the eighteenth century in North Carolina which have not been previously mentioned. The date of incorporation is given in each case. It will be seen that at the close of the Revolutionary War much interest was manifested in the promotion of education:

        Smith's Academy, Edenton, Chowan County, 1782.

        The General Assembly, in 1783, passed an act establishing two public schools in Onslow County, one in the village of New Town, at the mouth of White Oak River, and the other at the Richlands of New River. By the same act the name of New Town was changed to Swansborough.2


        2 Ibid., p. 118.


        Davidson Academy, Davidson County, 1785.--Two hundred and forty acres of State land were given this school.

        Grove Academy, Duplin County, 1785.--The North Carolina Chronicle, or Fayetteville Gazette, of January 3, 1791, contains the following advertisement of this institution, which gives an idea of its scope and character:

        "Gentlemen who wish to encourage literature in this part of the State are hereby informed that the Grove Academy in this county will, on the second Monday in January, again open; where the Greek and Latin languages will be taught, and also the sciences. Boarding may be procured on as moderate terms as can, from the present price of produce, be expected. We also presume that the order and regulation here observed, and the progress made by those who have been members of it, is equal to any which have been made in any private institution.

        "The assistance and encouragement of generous and patriotic gentlemen will be kindly received.

        "By order of the trustees.

"THOMAS ROUTLEDGE,
"Vice-President."

"DUPLIN COUNTY, December 24, 1790."

        Dobbs Academy, Kinston, Dobbs County (now Lenoir County), 1785.

        Franklin Academy, Franklin County, 1786.

        Pitt Academy, Martinborough, Pitt County, 1786.--By the same act the name of Martinborough was changed to Greenville.

        Pittsborough Academy, Chatham County, 1786.

        Richmond Academy, Richmond County, 1786.

        Warrenton Academy, District of Halifax (now Warren County), 1786.--Prominent among the trustees were Nathaniel Macon, Benjamin Hawkins, and Rev. Henry Patillo. The treasurer of the board was bound in a bond of £5,000. The institution could confer certificates of proficiency, but not degrees.

        Currituck Seminary of Learning, Currituck County, 1789.--Trustees were appointed to take charge of property and gifts to the institution, and to attend to the "building

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or purchasing of suitable and convenient houses, purchasing a library and philosophical apparatus, and supporting and paying the salaries of the provost and such number of professors and tutors as to them shall seem necessary."

        Onslow Academy, Onslow County, 1791.

        Lumberton Academy, Robeson County, 1791.

        Stokes Seminary, Wadesborough, Anson County, 1791.

        Stokes Seminary, Henderson, Montgomery County, 1797.

        Bladen Academy, Elizabeth, Bladen County, 1797.

        Seminary in Salisbury, Rowan County, 1798.

        Smithville Academy, Brunswick County, 1798.--The trustees were authorized by the act of incorporation to raise $7,000 by lottery for the school.

        Unity Meeting-House Academy, Randolph County, 1798.

        Adams Creek Academy, Craven County, 1798.

        Fayetteville Academy, Cumberland County, 1799.

        Moore County Academy, Moore County, 1799.


        Some of the above institutions had existed several years before being incorporated.

LOTTERIES FOR SCHOOLS.

        In the eighteenth and in the early part of the present century, it was common in North Carolina, as in other States, for the Legislature to grant to schools the right to raise funds for building and other purposes by means of lotteries. The University of North Carolina was assisted in this way several times.

        The following act, passed by the General Assembly in 1797, will show how these lotteries were conducted:

        "AN ACT to authorize the trustees of the Pittsborough Academy to raise the sum of seven hundred dollars, by way of lottery.

        "Whereas, The trustees of the academy aforesaid have represented to this General Assembly that the raising of the above sum of seven hundred dollars would be of great benefit to said institution:

        "I. Be it enacted by the General Assembly of the State of North Carolina, and it is hereby enacted by the authority of the same, That the trustees of the academy aforesaid shall have leave to raise by way of lottery the sum aforesaid, and that John Ramsey, James Taylor, Charles Chalmers, John Henderson, James Bradley, John Dabney, and William Warden shall be, and they are hereby, appointed commissioners for the purpose of opening and completing a scheme of a lottery calculated to raise the sum aforesaid, in the following manner:

3,500 tickets at two dollars each, is $7,000.  
1 Prize of four hundred dollars is . . . . . $400
2 Prizes of one hundred dollars is . . . . . 200
4 Prizes of fifty dollars is . . . . . 200
8 Prizes of thirty-five dollars is . . . . . 280
18 Prizes of twenty-five dollars is . . . . . 450
200 Prizes of ten dollars is . . . . . 2,000
490 Prizes of three dollars is . . . . . 1,470
400 Prizes of five dollars is . . . . . 2,000
1,123 Prizes . . . . . $7,000
2,377 Blanks.  
3,500 Tickets at two dollars each, is $7,000.  

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        "And the said commissioners, or a majority of them, shall be managers of said lottery, and shall be accountable for the prizes and profits thereof.

        "II. And be it further enacted, That when three-fourths of the said tickets are sold, that the drawing of the said lottery shall commence, under the management of the said commissioners, they giving thirty days' notice in the Fayetteville Gazette.

        "III. And be it further enacted, That all prizes shall be paid in four weeks after the drawing is finished upon demand of a possessor of a fortunate ticket, which prize shall be subject to a deduction of ten per cent.; and if such prize is not demanded within six months after the drawing is finished, of which public notice shall be given in some public paper in this State, the same shall be considered as relinquished for the benefit of said academy, and the produce of said lottery shall be vested in the trustees aforesaid."


        Sections IV and V of the act provide for the bond of the treasurer, and for the collection of the bond in case he should fail to perform his duty.

GERMAN IMMIGRATION--THE MORAVIANS.

        Of the 30,000 Germans who left their country in the early part of the eighteenth century to find homes in America, 18,000 are said to have eventually settled in North Carolina. Baron De Graffenried with his Swiss and Palatines settled in Newbern in the eastern part of the State. Later German emigration settled principally in the Piedmont section.

        In 1751 the religious sect known as the Unitas Fratrum, commonly called Moravians, purchased 100,000 acres of land in western Carolina, and in 1753 began their settlement, which from that time to this has been noted as one of the most moral, prosperous, and intelligent communities in the State.

        These Germans were, as a class, men of fair education and refinement, especially in the Moravian settlements. The latter, even before homes for all had been provided, erected a church and school-house in their settlement.

        One of the most noted of the early Moravian settlers in Carolina was John Jacob Fries, who came to the colony in April, 1754. Mr. Fries' was a native of Denmark, where, previous to his coming to America, he had officiated as an assistant minister and had acquired a wide reputation as an accomplished scholar, especially in the Hebrew language. He was one of the pioneer teachers of North Carolina, in which vocation he continued till his death in 1793.1


        1 Vide Reichel's History of the Moravians in North Carolina.

        Salem, one of the most beautiful towns in the State and the principal settlement of the Moravians, was laid out in 1765. The first permanent school-house for boys was built in 1794. An account of the Moravians,2

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written about 1800, contains the following: "The male children of the inhabitants of the town and of the other members of the congregations living in the neighborhood receive from their sixth to their twelfth or fourteenth year instruction in reading and writing, German and English, ciphering, history, geography, and some of them in the rudiments of the Latin language, drawing, and music."


        2 Supposed to have been written by Bishop Reichel, of the Moravian Church, and published in Martin's North Carolina, Vol. I, Appendix.

        The Salem Female Academy, one of the best equipped and most widely known institutions for higher female education in the South, was founded in 1802. Its history is valuable and interesting. Until the late Civil War it was the most noted female school in the South, and one of the best in the Union, and up to that time its influence on the higher female education in other States was marked. The total number of students who studied here between 1804 and 1856 was 3,470, from seventeen States. This school throughout its entire existence has been noted for the competent and successful teachers it has sent forth. It is patronized by every denomination, and the most distinguished men of the country have sent daughters there to be educated.

THE LUTHERANS.

        Previous to the Revo lutionary War the Lutheran congregation in the State was under the supervision of the Consistory of Hanover and the University of Göttingen, which not only gave pecuniary aid, but also sent over pastors and teachers, who were men of ability and scholarship. Gottfried Arndt was one of the most noted of these. After the Revolutionary War the North Carolina congregation was made subject to the Julius Charles University of Helmstadt, in the Duchy of Brunswick. The Lutherans have ever maintained good schools, and at this time have under their control North Carolina College in Cabarrus County, Concordia College in Catawba County, and Gaston College in Gaston County.3


        1 Vide Brneheim'sHistory of the German Settlements in North Carolina and South Carolina.

STATE OF EDUCATION IN 1795.

        The state of education in North Carolina during the closing years of the eighteenth century may be judged from the following extract from a very interesting and instructive work written by Rev. W. Winterbotham, which is entitled, A View of the United States of America, published in London, 1796. After giving an account of the State University, which had just been opened, he adds: "There is a very good academy at Warrenton, another at Williamsborough, in Granville (County), and three or four others in the State of considerable note."2

        2 American Journal of Education, Vol. XVI, p. 156.


 The principal of the Warrenton Academy, Professor George, was a graduate of Trinity College, Dublin.3


        3 Foote's Sketches of North Carolina, p. 543.
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        An announcement in the North Carolina Journal of June 22, 1795, written about the time of Dr. Winterbotham's visit to the United States, reads: "We have the pleasure to announce to the public that the academy at Thyatira, erected and conducted by Dr. McCorkle; the Warrenton Academy, under the management of the Rev. Mr. George; and the Chatham and Newbern Academies, are all in a very flourishing state. The high reputation and great experience of the gentlemen who have the direction of these seminaries will insure their establishment and success, and furnish annually a large number of students prepared to enter at once upon the higher branches."

        The State was now ready for a university. Men like Caldwell, Patillo, and Hall had prepared the people for a higher and more thorough education than could be obtained in the log colleges. It was through their efforts that constitutional provision was made for the establishment of the University, and now at the beginning of the nineteenth century we find it the leading institution for higher education in North Carolina.

TWO ACCOUNTS OF THE STATE OF EDUCATION AND SOCIETY BEFORE 1810.1

        1 See foot-note, p. 51.


In Caswell County.

        The following account of education in one of the northern central counties of the State is taken from an article by that distinguished North Carolinian, the Hon. Bartlett Yancy [now written Yancey], first published in the Raleigh Star, in August, 1810, and republished in the North Carolina University Magazine for November, 1860.

        Mr. Yancy says: "The progress of society and civilization depends upon the education and virtue of the people; great improvements, therefore, have been made since the first settlement of the county. From 1750 to twenty-five years after, it is computed that not more than one-third of the inhabitants could read, and scarcely half that number could write a legible hand; from 1775 to 1800 what was then called a common English education, viz, 'to read, write, and cipher as far as the rule of three,' was given to a little more than half of the inhabitants, but from 1800 up to the present time (1810) the progress of civilization and literature has been greater than for perhaps fifty years antecedent to that time. The great revival of religion about that period seems to have contributed much to the dissemination of morality, sound principles, and good order in society; but, as naturalists have observed, every calm is succeeded by a storm, and accordingly many of the inferior classes of society appear now more depraved than ever.

        "For the progress of literature in the inferior branches of an education, such as reading, writing, and arithmetic, since 1800, the people of this county are much indebted to Mr. Robert H. Childers. Greater improvement in writing could not have been expected by any man. At

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least one-half of the youth of the county who write well were taught, either directly or indirectly, by this excellent penman.

        "Situated within a quarter of a mile of the court-house is Caswell Academy. The plan of Caswell Academy was first conceived and brought to view in the winter of 1801. Early in the succeeding year between $500 and $600 was subscribed, and during the year 1803 it was completed for the reception of students. The Rev. Hugh Shaw and Bartlett Yancy were the teachers for the first two years; the number of students was from 55 to 65 each year. From that period the institution was not in a very flourishing state until 1808, since which time it has prospered much under the direction of Mr. John W. Caldwell, a gentleman educated in Guilford County by his father, the Rev. David Caldwell, well known in the State for his services in disseminating literature, morality, and religion among his fellow-citizens. The funds of the academy at present are low; it is now, and always has been, dependent on the liberality of the trustees of the institution and a few other public-spirited gentlemen of the county for a support. No library of consequence is yet established; a plan has, however, been suggested, and is now going into operation, by which it is hoped a good library will be procured in a few years. The number of students at present is 38.

        "Hico Academy, situated near the Red House, in Caswell, was erected, it is believed, in 1804, by a number of public-spirited gentlemen in that part of the county. Mr. Shaw, after he left Caswell Academy, became the teacher in this academy for two or three years, during which time, it is believed, it had between 30 and 40 students. It has since been on a decline, and about the middle of last month it was consumed by fire. * * * The trustees have, however, determined to rebuild it of brick, upon a more extended plan.

        "Since the establishment of these institutions the progress of virtue and of science in the county has exceeded the most flattering hopes of the friends of literature. * * * The inhabitants generally are more enlightened; men who thirty and forty years ago were considered the best informed and most learned among us are now scarcely equal in point of information to a school-boy of fifteen years."

        Mr. Yancy then mentions some honored citizens of North Carolina and Virginia who were fitted for the University at these institutions.

        He tells us that there were two societies in the county, constituted for intellectual improvement, their exercises being mostly polemical. In 1808 some gentlemen of Person and Caswell Counties organized a society for the encouragement of the arts and agriculture, but, at the time he writes, but little had been done for its promotion.

        As a further index to the condition of society in this section of the State, the following facts are drawn from Mr. Yancy's admirable sketch:

        At that time (1810) there were in Caswell County five practising physicians--John McAden, William S. Webb, Samuel Dabney, James Smith,

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and Edward Foulks; and three lawyers--Bartlett Yancy, Edward D. Jones, and Solomon Graves.

        The state of religion may best be estimated by the number of churches and communicants: "There are four Baptist churches and about 300 communicants; four Presbyterian congregations and about 200 or 250 communicants; three or four Methodist societies and 250 or 300 communicants."

        We are told that "the amusements of the polite part of society consist in balls, tea-parties, and visiting parties. Those of an inferior class consist of Saturday-night frolics, now become almost obsolete; shooting-matches and horse-racing afford amusement to the better sort of men, and now and then may be seen a party with an old, rusty pack of cards, amusing themselves for whisky. The only sporting club in the county is the 'Jocky Club' of the Caswell turf."

In Edgecombe County.

        In 1811 the Raleigh Star published a sketch of "Edgecombe County in 1810," by Jeremiah Battle, M. D., who was one of the first students of the State University. At this time he was a practising physician in Tarborough, Edgecombe County (in eastern North Carolina), but he afterwards removed to Raleigh, where he died in 1825. The North Carolina University Magazine for April, 1861, republished Dr. Battle's article, and it is from this that the following data are obtained:

        "The progress of learning for twenty-five years back has been slow, and perhaps has not more than kept pace with the population, till within these two or three years. The people now manifest some disposition to diffuse learning, perhaps from their finding the means of obtaining it more accessible now than heretofore. The custom at the public schools, and in some towns, among those who are desirous of intellectual improvement, has found its way here. Societies have been formed, and kept up with a tolerable degree of spirit, greatly to the benefit of the members thereof, both in talents and morals. * * * Some attempts have been made to procure libraries, but this, for some of the above reasons, was never effected, except by a society that was in existence about fifteen years ago. On the dissolution of that body the books were scattered a broad, or divided among those who contributed to the establishment. The agricultural society has appropriated a sum of money to procure an agricultural library. Some donations are made of books for this purpose. On the fourth day of July, 1810, proposals were made for the establishment of a society for the promotion of agriculture and the arts. The plan has succeeded so far as to go into operation. It has now upwards of thirty respectable members, whose public spirit is thus manifested, greatly to their benefit, and it is to be hoped to the benefit of the country. * * *

        "It is believed that about two-thirds of the people generally can read, and one-half of the males write their names, but not more than

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one-third of the women can write. The girls not at school are learning and are very desirous to write; it is deemed a more important accomplishment in that sex among the common people now than formerly. * * *

        "There are seventeen county schools in the county, at which there are about four hundred scholars; nothing more is attempted to be taught in them than the elements of reading, writing, and arithmetic, and but few of the teachers are qualified to do justice to those. Notwithstanding this apparently infant state of literature, we may easily discover that it is progressing; for fifty years ago there was not more than one or two schools in the whole county. For want of an academy in this county several have been sent to those in the adjacent ones, viz, at Westrayville and Vine Hill. It is in contemplation to establish an academy at Mount Prospect, in this county, and we can not account for the delay otherwise than from the general indifference with which learning is still viewed."

        Dr. Battle, in the article quoted from above, says that there was but one lawyer and few physicians in the county in 1810, but that quacks were abundant.

        The only religious denominations were the Baptists and Methodists. The former had several churches and numbered about five hundred and twenty communicants. The Methodists were not strong numerically, but had several places of worship.

        Amusements were not pursued to any great extent. The principal out-door sports were hunting, fishing, shooting-matches, course-racing, and quarter-racing. There were no "sporting clubs." Dr. Battle says: "Card-playing is an amusement confined to a few; and they are not much disposed to make the winning and losing any great object. Gambling under the name of amusement has nearly ceased. The ladies have never been known to play for money. Balls and family tea-parties afford the principal amusements in which the ladies participate, and those are not so common as formerly."1


        1 It must not be understood that the above accounts represent the general educational condition of North Carolina in 1810. They are true for the counties of which they treat, but, as has been shown, those parts of the State in which Presbyterians were influential, good classical schools had existed since about the middle of the eighteenth century.

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CHAPTER III.

THE UNIVERSITY OF NORTH CAROLINA.

THE CONSTITUTION AND THE UNIVERSITY.

        North Carolina was one of the first States to make constitutional provision for the higher education. To the Scotch-Irish Presbyterians occupying Central and Piedmont Carolina is due the lasting honor of having established the first academies in the Province, and it is said that it was through their influence that the clause providing for a university was inserted in the initial Constitution of the State. It is worthy of note that the men of Mecklenburg County, whose capital, Charlotte, was termed by Cornwallis "the hornets' nest of the Revolution," instructed their delegates, John Phifer, Robert Irwin, Zaccheus Wilson, Hezekiah Alexander, and Waightstill Avery, to use their endeavors for the establishment of a college and its endowment and maintenance. In the efforts to promote education, privileges which the British Government had accorded other colonies had been denied this, and, doubtless, the refusal of the King to grant a charter to Queen's College, in Charlotte, on conditions similar to those of Harvard and Princeton, fired the resentment of the Revolutionary patriots, and quickened their action under the blessings of liberty and the protection of the new-born Republic.

        It was one of the darkest hours of the Revolution when the representatives of the people met at Halifax, November 12, 1776, to throw off their provisional government and adopt a permanent constitution. The recent defeat of the Continental Army at Long Island and the capture of New York filled the country with gloom and despondency, but these sturdy sons of Carolina had hearts full of stern resolution and abiding faith. On the 18th December a State Constitution was adopted, and it is in obedience to a clause of Section XLI that the University owes its establishment.1


        1 It is worthy of note that this clause is almost identical with Article XLIV of the Constitution of Pennsylvania, which was adopted by the Convention which met in Philadelphia from July 15 to September 28, 1776.

        In the annual address before the Alumni Association of the University of North Carolina, which convened in Raleigh on January 26, 1881, President Kemp P. Battle thus alluded to the members of the convention: "They not only framed a constitution of surpassing wisdom, but

Page 52a

Illustration

SECTION OF LIBRARY--UNIVERSITY OF NORTH CAROLINA.

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with faith approaching sublimity, when bullets were being moulded and soldiers were marshalling, and the roar of cannon was echoing among the hills, they provided for the interests of unborn children. Their clear vision looked through the murky present, and discerned the needs of the distant future. They knew that their children would not be capable of freedom without education. They knew there could be no education without teachers. They knew that teachers could not be procured without institutions of higher learning, and while providing for the education of the masses they made the requirements of the University a part of the fundamental law. They coupled common school education with the education of the University. Hear these golden words written amid storms and thundering, to be made good when the sun shone brightly on a free and united people: 'A school or schools shall be established by the Legislature for the convenient instruction of youth, with such salaries to the masters, paid by the public, as may enable them to instruct at low prices; and all useful learning shall be duly encouraged and promoted in one or more Universities.'"

        The conventions of 1835, 1861, 1865, and 1868 left the requirements of the University in the Constitution. The people, in 1873, by a separate vote, indorsed the University, and intrusted its management to the General Assembly. The convention of 1875 re-enacted the University provisions, and its action was ratified by the people in 1876. Thus the University, born of the Constitution of 1776, has continued the child of the State.

        The present Constitution provides, in Article IX, Sections 6, 7, and 14, that "The General Assembly shall have power to provide for the election of trustees of the University of North Carolina, in whom when chosen, shall be vested all the privileges, rights, franchises, and endowments thereof, in anywise granted to or conferred upon the trustees of said University; and the General Assembly may make such provisions, laws, and regulations, from time to time, as may be necessary and expedient for the maintenance and management of said University.

        "The General Assembly shall provide that the benefits of the University, as far as practicable, be extended to the youth of the State, free of expense for tuition; also that all the property which has heretofore accrued to the State, or shall hereafter accrue, from escheats, unclaimed dividends, or distributive shares of the estates of deceased persons, shall be appropriated to the use of the University.

        "As soon as practicable after the adoption of this Constitution, the General Assembly shall establish and maintain in connection with the University, a department of agriculture, of mechanics, of mining, and of normal instruction."

        The Hon. John Manning, LL.D., professor of law in the University of North Carolina; in an address before the University Alumni Association in 1884, after emphasizing the constitutional claims of the University for State aid, said: "So that the University does not lack the sanction

Page 54

either of the Constitution or of the people. Under the loving care of the people of the State, led by wise master-builders, much more than from the liberality of the General Assembly, the University grew in the lapse of nearly a century to be a great institution, the nursing mother of the ingenuous youth of the State without distinction of party or sect. Embracing all her children in her great catholic heart, she has always striven to allay sectional feeling, to moderate sectarian heat, to cultivate and encourage a broad, ardent love for the State, a veneration for her early history and traditions, an appreciation of the domestic virtues of her citizens, and a love of liberal learning."

THE UNIVERSITY CHARTERED.

        While the war for independence was progressing, the mandate of the Constitution respecting education lay dormant; but when peace was restored, the people again turned their attention to the promotion of learning.

        In November, 1789, North Carolina adopted the Constitution of the United States, and on the 11th of December following the University was chartered. The preamble to the act for its establishment reads as follows: "WHEREAS in all well regulated Governments, it is the indispensable Duty of every Legislature to consult the Happiness of a rising Generation, and endeavor to fit them for an honorable discharge of the social duties of life, by paying the strictest attention to their Education:--And whereas an University supported by permanent funds, and well endowed would have the most direct tendency to answer the above purpose: 1st, Be it therefore enacted," etc. The corporators named in this act as trustees were forty of the most distinguished men in the State. In the list are to be found the names of many of North Carolina's early Governors, judges, Senators and Representatives in Congress. Let us call the roll of these friends and promoters of the higher education: Samuel Johnston, James Iredell, Charles Johnson, Hugh Williamson, Stephen Cabarrus, Richard Dobbs Spaight, William Blount, Benjamin Williams, John Sitgreaves, Frederick Hargett, Robert W. Snead, Archibald Maclaine, Samuel Ashe, Robert Dixon, Benjamin Smith, Samuel Spencer, John Hay, James Hogg, Henry William Harrington, William Barry Grove, Samuel McCorkle, Adlai Osborne, John Stokes, John Hamilton, Joseph Graham, John Williams, Thomas Person, Alfred Moore, Alexander Mebane, Joel Lane, Willie Jones, Benjamin Hawkins, John Haywood, Sr., John Macon, William Richardson Davie, Joseph Dixon, William Lenoir, Joseph McDowell, James Holland, and William Porter.

A SITE CHOSEN.

        At a meeting of the board of trustees held in Newbern on January 2, 1792, a committee was appointed "to view and examine the most eligible

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Illustration

 OLD EAST BUILDING--UNIVERSITY OF NORTH CAROLINA.

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situations whereon to fix the University in the counties of Wake, Franklin, Warren, Orange, Granville, Chatham, and Johnston."

        The trustees met in Hillsborough August 1, 1792, to decide on a location and to provide for the erection of buildings. On August 3 ballots were taken for the selection of a point the centre of a circle of 15 miles radius, within which the University should be located, the place to be determined by a committee of the board constituted of one member from each judicial district. The fact that the charter provided that the site should not be within five miles of the permanent seat of government or any court house, prevented any of the leading towns from being chosen. Many places were put in nomination, but finally Cypritz Bridge, over New Hope River, in Chatham County, was selected as the point within 15 miles of which the university buildings should be placed.

        On November 1, 1792, the committee met at Pittsborough, Chatham County, to make a final decision as to location. Several handsome offers of land and money were made to secure the election. Eleven hundred and eighty acres were offered at a place called New Hope Chapel Hill, and on the 9th of November the committee decided in its favor by a unanimous vote.

        The trustees at their next meeting ratified the report of the above committee. On motion of Governor Davie commissioners were appointed to lay off a town and superintend the erection of university buildings. It was provided that the first to be erected should accommodate fifty students, the cost not to exceed $5,000.

LOCATION AND BUILDINGS.

        The University is located in Chapel Hill, Orange County, twenty-eight miles from Raleigh, the capital of the State. In colonial times a chapel of the Church of England was built there, which was known as New Hope Chapel Hill, and from this circumstance the village takes its name.

        The location was wisely chosen. It is not far from the geographical centre of the State, and is noted for its beauty and healthfulness. One can scarce imagine a more inviting spot than the campus. The buildings are surrounded by a grove of old forest trees, chiefly oak and hickory, which completely hide them from the rest of the village. The grounds, about 50 acres, are beautifully undulating. Adjoining the campus is a magnificent forest of several hundred acres. Here the young academic may find that monastic quiet and seclusion which used to be thought so essential to student life.

        The village of Chapel Hill was laid off, the first lots sold, and the corner-stone of the old east building was laid on the 12th day of October, 1793.

        President Battle, in the address before the alumni in 1881, said: "We have fortunately an account of the proceedings of this day, so memorable, written by Davie himself, the chief actor. I will endeavor to

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take the veil off this picture of long ago, and wipe off the dust which obscures it.

        "The Chapel Hill of eighty-eight years ago was vastly different from the Chapel Hill of to-day. It was covered with a primeval growth of forest trees, with only one or two settlements and a few acres of clearing. Even the trees on the East and West avenue, named by the Faculty, in recognition of the wise and skilful superintendence of the extensive repairs of our buildings prior to the re-opening in 1875, Cameron, after our president [of the association], were still erect. The sweet-gums and dog-woods and maples were relieving in the autumnal sun, with their russet and golden hues, the general green of the forest. A long procession of people for the first time are marching along the narrow road, afterwards to be widened into a noble avenue. Many of them are clad in the striking, typical insignia of the Masonic fraternity, their Grand Master arrayed in the full decorations of his rank. They march with military tread, because most of them have seen service, many of them scarred with wounds of horrid war. Their faces are serious, for they feel that they are engaged in a great work. They are proceeding to lay the foundations of an institution which, for weal or woe, is to shape the minds of thousands of unborn children; whose influence would be felt more and more, ever widening and deepening as the years roll on, as one of the great forces of civilization. * * *

        "The tall, commanding figure most conspicuous, in the Grand Master's regalia, is that of William Richardson Davie. He is no common man. He had been a gallant cavalry officer in the Revolution. He had been a strong staff on which Greene had leaned. He had been conspicuous in civil pursuits, an able lawyer, an orator of vast influence. With Washington and Franklin and other great men he had assisted in evolving the grandest Government of all ages--the American Union--out of an ill-governed and disintegrating confederacy. He was beyond his times in the advocacy of a broad, generous education. His portrait has been drawn by a masterly hand, Judge Archibald Murphey, one of the most progressive and scholarly men our State has known. In his speech before the two societies at Chapel Hill he says: 'Davie was a tall, elegant man in his person, graceful and commanding in his manners. His voice was mellow and adapted to the expression of every passion; his mind comprehensive yet slow in its operations, when compared with his great rival [Alfred Moore]; his style was magnificent and flowing; he had a greatness of manner in public speaking which suited his style, and gave to his speeches an imposing effect. He was a laborious student, arranged his discourses with care, and, where the subject merited his genius, poured forth a torrent of eloquence that astonished and enraptured his audience.'

        "Judge Murphey says: 'I was present in the House of Commons when Davie addressed that body upon the bill granting a loan of money to the trustees for erecting the buildings of the University, and although

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more than thirty years have since elapsed, I have the most vivid recollection of the greatness of his manner and the powers of his eloquence on that occasion.' General Davie was afterwards Governor of the State; an envoy of the United States to the court of France. I find him styled in the journal of the University, in 1810, 'the founder of the University,' and he well deserved the title."1


        1 Proceedings of the Alumni Association, 1881, pp. 22-23.

        Other trustees present on this occasion were Alfred Moore, afterwards a judge of the Supreme Court of the United States; William H. Hill, member of Congress; John Haywood, for forty years treasurer of the State; Alexander Mebane, member of Congress; Thomas Blount, member of Congress; John Williams, one of the three judges first appointed under the State Constitution of 1776; Frederick Hargett, State Senator; and Dr. Samuel E. McCorkle, one of the most noted teachers in the State.

        Dr. McCorkle delivered the address on the occasion. The report of it which has been preserved is evidence that the high estimate which was placed on his ability by his contemporaries was well deserved.

        The 12th of October is annually observed as "Foundation or University Day," when an address is delivered by some well-known alumnus.

        

Illustration

Campus and Buildings
OF THE
UNIVERSITY OF NORTH CAROLINA.

        1 Smith Hall,--Library.
2.South Building.
3.Gerard Hall,--Chapel.
4. Memorial Hall.
5. New East Building.
6. Old East Building.
7. Old West Building.
8. New West Building.
9. Person Hall,--Chem. Building.
10. Gymnasium.

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        The university buildings are ten in number. The following list, furnished the writer by President Battle, gives the dates of erection, together with the purposes for which they are now used:

        1, 2. Old east (1795) and old west (1826) buildings, each three stories, 36 by 120 feet, used for dormitories, with the exception of two rooms about 36 feet square in each, used, one as a museum, the others for lecture-rooms.

        3. Person Hall (1796), 36 by 54 feet, one story, once used for religious as well as other exercises, hence often called "Old Chapel." It is now the lecture room of the professor of chemistry, and contains also the industrial museum. A chemical laboratory 70 by 30 feet, has been recently added to this building.

        4. South building (1814), three stories, 50 by 116 feet, used for dormitories, except two rooms 28 by 36, and three rooms 20 by 30, of which one is set apart for the Young Men's Christian Association and the others for lecture-halls.

        5. Gerrard Hall (1827), 45 by 66 feet, one story, used for religious as well as general exercises, hence often called "New Chapel."

        6. Smith Hall (1852), 35 by 122 feet, one and a half-story. The basement is divided into a qualitative and quantitative laboratory. The main room above contains the University library.

        7, 8. New east (1859) and new west (1859) buildings, the former four, the latter three stories, each 40 by 116 feet. The former has four lecture and laboratory halls, the hall of the Philanthropic Literary Society, established 1795, and the Philanthropic library, each 36 by 54 feet. The latter has three lecture and laboratory halls, and the hall of the Dialectic Literary Society, established 1795, and the Dialectic library, each 36 by 54 feet. Dormitories are in both of these buildings.

        9. The University Memorial Hall (1885), a very handsome design for an auditorium. It is 136 by 128 feet, with a ceiling 52 feet high. It has 2,000 seats on the floor, 200 chairs on the rostrum and 250 chairs in the music gallery. On the walls are many marble tablets commemorating the eminent officers and alumni of the University. On four large tablets are the names of all the sons of the instituti on who lost their lives in the Civil War.

        10. Gymnasium Hall (1885), 110 by 45 feet, one story, is fitted up with the most approved appliances for physical culture.


        The total value of the lands and buildings is estimated at over $350,000.

ENDOWMENT AND INCOME.

        An act entitled "An act for raising a fund for erecting the buildings, and for the support of the University of North Carolina," was passed by the General Assembly in 1789.

        This endowed the institution with all the arrearages due to the State from receiving officers up to the 1st of January, 1783, and with all property that had theretofore, or should thereafter, escheat to the State. This grant of escheats, though not of immediate was finally, by the energy and good management of the trustees, of great value. This, with private benefactions, constituted the fund for the erection of buildings and the principal part of the endowment.

        At the first meeting of the board of trustees, held in Fayetteville, November, 15, 1790, James Hogg, Esq., in behalf of Colonel Benjamin Smith (who had been an aid of General Washington and subsequently Governor of the State), of Brunswick County, presented the University

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with 20,000 acres of land located in Obion County, Tennessee. About the year 1835 this land was sold for $14,000.

        In 1791 the General Assembly voted a loan of $10,000, which was afterwards converted into a gift.

        On the location of the University in 1792 the citizens of Chapel Hill presented $1,596 in cash and 1,180 acres of land. After reserving sufficient land for the institution, $3,068 were realized from the sale of lots in the village.

        In 1797 Major Charles Gerrard, of Edgecombe County, gave 1,300 acres of land, from the sale of which about $40,000 were realized.

        In 1797 General Thomas Person, the old chief of the "Regulators," gave $1,025 in cash towards the erection of the buildings.

        The gifts of Smith, Gerrard, and Person were the earliest, and for that reason the most important benefactions to the University.

        In 1803, $5,080, the profits of two lotteries granted by law, were added to the funds of the institution.

        The following extract from a memorial presented to the General Assembly in 1867, by Governor Jonathan Worth, in behalf of the trustees of the University, shows the condition of the endowment at that time:

        "The moneyed endowment on December 10, 1862, was ascertained to be, over and above its liabilities, $148,520.26. This endowment was derived from escheated and derelict property and remnants of doubtful debts transferred to the institution by the charter; by a direct grant from the public treasury of $10,000 in 1791; from the gift in 1789 of 20,000 acres of Tennessee land, by the late Governor Smith; a still more valuable donation by the late Major Charles Gerrard, and by smaller gifts from hundreds of patriotic men and women in every section of the State.

        "The General Assembly, in February, 1859, chartered the bank of North Carolina and, with a view to promote the interests of the University, provided in the second section 'that the State shall be entitled to subscribe the amount of the literary fund now invested in the bank of the State as part of the capital stock, and the trustees of the University of North Carolina also, as part thereof, a sum not exceeding $200,000.' The trustees made the subscription accordingly. The General Assembly of 1860-61 and the convention of 1861-62 secured an arrangement with the several banks of the State which subjected all their available means to public control. The convention of 1865, on October 19th, repudiated the War debt thus created, broke the bank in whose stock the funds of the University were invested, annihilated, and more than annihilated, the entire moneyed endowment of the University.

        "The General Assembly, at the last session, appropriated $7,000 for the temporary relief of the institution, and this sum, together with the above-mentioned sum of $10,000, making the aggregate amount of $17,000, are the only direct grants ever made from the public treasury."

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        In 1867 the General Assembly transferred to the University the land scrip granted by the General Government, a history of which is subjoined.

        The General Assembly, in 1881, voted an annual appropriation of $5,000, which in 1885 was increased to $20,000. This, added to the interest paid on the certificate of indebtedness issued for the land scrip, gives to the University an annual appropriation of $27,500 from the State treasury.

THE LAND-SCRIP FUND.

        The General Government, by an act approved July 2, 1862, granted to the several States and Territories land scrip to the amount of 30,000 acres for each Senator and Representative in Congress, in trust, to be applied to the endowment and maintenance of one or more colleges, "the leading object of which should be, without excluding other literary and scientific studies (and including military tactics), to teach such branches of learning as are related to agriculture and the mechanic arts, in order to promote the liberal and practical education of the industrial classes."

        Among the conditions of the grant were these: "If the principal or the interest of the fund should, by any action or contingencies, be diminished or lost," the State should restore it; if the college should not be established, the State should repay to the General Government the entire amount of the sales of the scrip; and that no greater expenditure than 10 per cent. of the fund should be made for the purchase of lands, erection of buildings, etc.; the remainder of the fund to be vested in some safe stock, yielding not less than 5 per cent. per annum, and the amount thus funded to be preserved intact and intangible forever.

        By a joint resolution of the General Assembly, adopted February 22, 1866, North Carolina's quota of 270,000 acres of scrip was accepted in behalf of the State. By an act of the Legislature, passed February 11, 1867, this scrip was transferred to the trustees of the University of North Carolina to be used by them in accordance with the terms of the grant; at the same time it was provided that the commissioners of each county should have the authority to select and have at all times in the University one student from the county, without the necessary means to defray his expenses, who should receive tuition and room rent free.

        The trustees sold the scrip at the then market price, 50 cents per acre, realizing $135,000. Of this $10,000 were used for building purposes, etc.

        In 1868 a new board of trustees came into office under the reconstruction acts, and the land-scrip fund, $125,000, passed into their hands. This fund their treasurer invested in North Carolina securities, part of which were valid, but bearing no interest. The larger part was in special-tax bonds, which the General Assembly declared to be void and worthless, owing to the illegality of their issue.

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        In 1874, the trustees appointed in 1868 having been removed by an amendment to the Constitution, a board of trustees was elected by the General Assembly. This board reported on the condition of the fund, and asked the assistance of the Legislature in carrying out the provisions under which the scrip had been accepted by the State. The General Assembly of 1874-75 directed the State treasurer to issue to the trustees of the University a certificate of indebtedness for $125,000, bearing interest from January 1, 1875, at 6 per cent., payable semi-annually.

        By act of the General Assembly, session of 1887, it was ordered that the interest arising from this fund should be transferred from the University to the College of Agriculture and the Mechanic Arts as soon as the latter should be ready to begin the work of instruction.

PLAN OF EDUCATION.

        The first action taken by the trustees looking towards the literary character of the University was the adoption of a report, submitted by Samuel McCorkle at a meeting of the board held at Pillsborough, in November, 1792. This report is interesting and valuable, as showing what studies these early promoters of the institution thought most essential in a liberal education. It provided that on the opening of the University the attention of the student should be confined to the following subjects: "The study of languages, particularly the English; the acquirement of historical knowledge, ancient and modern; the study of belles-lettres, mathematics, and natural philosophy; the improvement of the intellectual powers, including a rational system of logic and moral philosophy; information in botany, to which should be added a complete knowledge in the theory and practice of agriculture best suited to the climate and soils of this State; the principles of architecture." It will be seen from this that it was intended to provide a liberal and comprehensive curriculum. Both literature and science were to be provided for, and the course here outlined will compare favorably with that provided in the colleges of to-day.

        The report further recommended "that steps be taken to procure apparatus for experimental philosophy and astronomy. In this they [the committee] would include a set of globes, barometers, thermometers, microscope, telescope, quadrant, prismatic glass, air pump, and an electrical machine. A library, your committee are also of opinion, should be provided, but the choice of books will perhaps come more immediately within the province of the faculty of the University." More liberal ideas of what was requisite for a well-rounded education could not have been expected at that early day.

ELECTION OF A PROFESSOR OF HUMANITY.

        The committee appointed by the trustees to prepare a "plan of education" reported December 21, 1793. The report specified that the exercises of the institution should commence on January 15, 1795; that

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the first commencement should take place on July 10 following, to be succeeded by a vacation of one week only, and that the students should live at commons. Tuition in the English department was fixed at $8 per annum; for instruction in the Latin, Greek, and French languages tuition was $12.50; and for the higher branches of science it was $15. The committee recommended that one person be employed under whose care the University should be placed. He was to be styled "Professor of Humanity," and to receive a salary of $300 per session and two-thirds of all tuition fees. An assistant was to be appointed at a salary of $200 and one-third of the tuition money. Neither of these was to be regarded as having any right or claim to the presidency. The report was adopted. The election of teachers was postponed until January 10, 1794, when the Rev. David Kerr, of Fayetteville, was chosen "Professor of Humanity."

OPENING OF THE UNIVERSITY.

        The University was opened for students in February, 1795, and from that time to this it has been the recognized head of the higher education in North Carolina. It is one of the few institutions of the State which has traditions reaching back to the foundation of the Government. Truly, it may be called the child of the State, and its history is inseparably connected with that of the parent. Its influence in North Carolina can not be estimated; nor has this influence been confined within the limits of the State, but especially has it been felt in the Southern and South-western States. It is doubtful whether any other university in this country can show a list of alumni of which so large a percentage has achieved so many and such honorable successes in all the avenues of life. It would be difficult to name a place of trust or honor within the gift of the people of the State or nation that has not been filled by an alumnus of the institution, and thus its history becomes an integral part of the history of the higher education in the United States. To confirm this statement it is only necessary to mention the names of James K. Polk, William R. King, John Branch, John Y. Mason, William A, Graham, Thomas H. Benton, Willie P. Mangum, Aaron V. Brown, Jacob Thompson, Judges Pearson, Moore, and Dick, and Bishops Green, Otey, Polk, and Hawks. Scores of others whom the State and nation has honored could be named. It is a pleasant duty to trace the development of such an institution, and its history will now be considered.

FIRST REGULATIONS, 1795.

        On the opening of the University, in February, 1795, it was provided by the trustees that there should be four literary classes entered upon annually, distinguished by the appellation of first, second, third, and fourth. In order to enter a higher class it was necessary to pass an examination on the studies of the preceding class.

Page 62a

        

Illustration

SOUTH BUILDING--UNIVERSITY OF NORTH CAROLINA.

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        To enter the first class the applicant was required to "pass a competent examination" on Cæsar's Commentaries, Sallust, Ovid or Virgil, "or other Latin books equivalent," and the Greek grammar. This class was to devote the year to the study of English grammar, Roman antiquities, and the Latin classics. The second class studied arithmetic, book-keeping, geography, Grecian antiquities, and Greek classics. The third class devoted the whole time to mathematics, including geometry, surveying, navigation, algebra, natural philosophy, and astronomy. The fourth class had logic, moral philosophy, principles of civil government, chronology, history, ancient and modern, the belles-lettres, "and the revisal of whatsoever may appear necessary to the officers of the University." It was also provided that those who wished to study only the sciences and the English branches "be either formed into a class called the scientific class, or else arranged with some of the literary classes when they shall be studying the sciences." In addition to the annual examinations, three quarterly examinations were given.

        The students were required to attend daily both morning and evening prayers, morning prayers being held at sunrise. From then until 8 o'clock the time was devoted to study. One hour was given to breakfast. Then followed three hours of study and recitations. After an intermission of two hours came another period of work, which lasted till 5 o'clock. Evening prayers were then held, and the student was allowed his freedom from that time till 8 o'clock, when he was required to repair to his lodgings, which were not to be left without the consent of a teacher till prayers the next morning. A monitor was appointed for each class, who reported absences and disorderly conduct.

        Every Saturday morning the students were required to speak, read, and exhibit compositions, the afternoon being given them for recreation.

        From the opening until about the close of the Caldwell administration there was a steward's hall connected with the University, and the students "boarded at commons," being seated at the table according to classes. The following picture of student life is taken from an address delivered at the University in 1859 by Dr. William Hooper, who entered that institution in 1804. He said: "Coarse corn bread was the staple food. At dinner the only meat was a fat middling of bacon, surmounting a pile of cole-worts; and the first thing after grace was said (and sometimes before) was for one man, by a single horizontal sweep of his knife, to separate the ribs and lean from the fat, monopolize all the first to himself, and leave the remainder for his fellows. At breakfast we had wheat bread and butter and coffee. Our supper was coffee and the corn bread left at dinner, without butter. I remember the shouts of rejoicing when we had assembled at the door, and some one jumping up and looking in at the window, made proclamation: 'Wheat bread for supper, boys!' And that wheat bread, over which such rejoicings were raised, believe me, gentlemen and ladies, was manufactured out of what

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we call seconds, or, as some term it, grudgeons. You will not wonder if, after such a supper, most of the students welcomed the approach of night, as beasts of prey, that they might go a-prowling and seize upon everything eatable within the compass of one or two miles; for, as I told you, our boys were following the laws of Lycurgus. Nothing was secure from the devouring torrent. Bee-hives, though guarded by a thousand stings, all feathered tenants of the roost, watermelon and potato patches, roasting ears, etc.--in fine, everything that could appease hunger was found missing in the morning. These marauding parties at night were often wound up with setting the village to rights." Dr. Hooper then relates some amusing and characteristic student exploits.

THE FIRST PROFESSORS.

        At the opening of the University no president was appointed. As has been before noted, the Rev. David Kerr, a graduate of Trinity College, Dublin, who had been conducting a classical school at Fayetteville, N. C., was elected "Professor of Humanity" and had the general management of the institution. He had charge of the department of ancient languages. Mr. Charles W. Harris, a citizen of the State and a graduate of Princeton, was appointed professor of mathematics. Mr. Samuel A. Holmes had charge of the preparatory department.

        In a few years the entire personnel of the faculty had changed. In 1796 Mr. Kerr resigned. He demitted the ministry, removed to Mississippi, and began the practice of law. In 1802 he was appointed to a judgeship in that Territory by President Jefferson. After the resignation of his professorship in 1796, Mr. Harris entered upon the practice of law, and before his death in 1803 he had won an enviable reputation in his profession. He was regarded as one of the most promising young men in the State. The last of the trio, Mr. Holmes, resigned in 1798.

        Mr. Harris was succeeded in the professorship of mathematics by the Rev. Joseph Caldwell, whom he had known at Princeton. Mr. Caldwell became first professor, and, from this time till his death in 1835, his history is a part of that of the University.

AN INTERESTING LETTER.

        The writer, while exploiting the manuscript records of the University, came across some correspondence of Prof. Charles W. Harris, which shows the practical tendency of the higher education, gives an insight into the workings of the University, and pictures the state of society at Chapel Hill at that time.

        The letter, from which the following extract is taken, is addressed to Dr. Charles Harris, Cabarrus County, and is dated "University, April 10, 1795." Professor Harris says:

        "We have begun to introduce, by degrees, the regulations of the

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University, and as yet have not been disappointed. There is one class in Natural Philosophy and Geography, and four in the Languages.

        "The Constitution of this college is on a more liberal plan than that of any other in America, and by the amendments which I think it will receive at the next meeting of the trustees, its usefulness will probably be much promoted. The notion that true learning consists rather in exercising the reasoning faculties and laying up a store of useful knowledge, than in overloading the memory with words of dead languages, is becoming daily more prevalent. It appears hard to deny a young gentleman the honour of a college after he has with much labour and painful attention acquired a competent knowledge of the Sciences, of composing and speaking with propriety in his own language, and has conned the first principles of whatever might render him useful or creditable in the world, merely because he could not read a language two thousand years old. Though the laws at present require that the Latin and Greek be understood by a graduate, they will in all probability be mitigated in their effect. These old forms which have been sanctioned by time but not by utility ought to be dispensed with. I have lately found many good hints on education in a book entitled the rights of woman--a book of very great merit, the production of an original genius, and penned in such a strong, manly style that you would scarcely believe it to be the work of a woman. For we are taught by many able writers and tolerably accurate observers of mankind that the natural weakness of a woman's body extends to her mind and becomes characteristic of her thoughts and words as well as of her actions. Miss Mary Wollstonecraft is the lady born effectually to rectify these misrepresentations from which so much evil has sprung. Miss' intention is to bring about a total reform in the education of women, but she takes occasion to speak of the error in the present plan of teaching young men and boys in Europe. 'The memory,' says she, 'is loaded with unintelligible words to make a show of, without the understanding acquiring any distinct idea; but only that education deserves emphatically to be termed cultivation of mind, which teaches young people how to begin to think.' She effectually overthrows Chesterfield's plan of bringing up boys. The amendments which she proposes are two numerous to be detailed in a letter, but are such as do the greatest honour to the authoress and may be beneficial to mankind. That there is much wrong in the old manner of educating is plain and whatever alterations will be made in our University will be made by those who can be actuated by no other principle than general utility. At present we find much difficulty in procuring books; the trustees have ordered two hundred dollars to be expended for that purpose, but it is very uncertain when the books will arrive. Dr. Williamson is commissioned to purchase and he is so totally engaged about his own book which he is preparing for the press, that he may forget others of less importance. Col. More presented us with

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globes; Mr. Beneham with an air pump as soon as it can be procured. We will shortly have an electrical machine and other trifles.

        "Our society is not so good at this place as we could wish. My only resort is to Mr. Kerr, who makes ample amends to me for the want of any other. He is a violent Republican and is continually deprecating the aristocratical principles which have lately prevailed much in our Executive."

FIRST PURCHASE OF BOOKS AND APPARATUS.

        Early in 1795 Dr. Hugh Williamson, author of a history of North Carolina, was requested by the trustees to invest $200 in books for the University. This he did, purchasing principally Greek and Latin works, lexicons, etc.

        On December 4, 1795, the trustees voted an annual appropriation of $50 for the purchase of books.

        The trustees, on December 7, 1795, instructed Professor Kerr to have an air-pump, condenser, microscope, lenses, concave mirror, loadstones, magnets, phials for an electrical machine, and a set of surveying instruments purchased.

        During the first years of the institution a number of books and some apparatus for the scientific departments were given by individuals. This policy of individual contributions has continued to the present time.

        The first large purchase of books and apparatus was made in the first quarter of this century.

THE CURRICULUM, 1796.

        On December 9, 1796, the committee appointed by the trustees to prepare and digest a plan of education made its report, which was adopted. The following is an outline of the system introduced:

        The students of the institution were "divided into a Preparatory School, and the Professorships of the University."

        In the preparatory school the English language was "taught grammatically on the plan of Webster's and South's Grammars." Thorough instruction in arithmetic was provided. Geography was taught on the plan of Guthrie. French and Latin were required, and before the student could enter the University the grammars of these languages had to be mastered and several standard authors in each read. The study of Roman antiquities was required. Greek was optional, but to enter the University class on this, it was necessary that the student should be able to read and translate the Gospels correctly.

        Instruction in the University was given in the following schools, called "professorships," viz:

        I. Rhetoric and belles-lettres.--Rhetoric on the plan of Sheridan; belles-lettres on the plan of Blair and Rollin.

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        II. Moral and political philosophy and history.--The following text-books were used: Paley's Moral and Political Philosophy; Montesquieu's Spirit of Laws; Adams's Defence; De Lolme on the English Constitution; the Constitution of the United States; Vattel's Law of Nations; Burlamaqui's Principles of National and Political Law; Priestley's Lectures on History; Federal Policy; Millot's Ancient and Modern History; Hume's History of England with Smollett's continuation; Chronology on the most approved plan.

        III. Natural philosophy.--This subject was taught under the following heads: General properties of matter; laws of motion; mechanical powers; hydrostatics; hydraulics; pneumatics; optics; electricity; magnetism; geography; the use of globes; the geometrical, political, and commercial relations of the different nations of the earth; astronomy on the plan of Ferguson.

        IV. Mathematics.--The required course embraced algebra, geometry, trigonometry, and the application of trigonometry to the mensuration of heights and distances, of surfaces and solids, and surveying and navigation. In addition to the above, if desired, instruction was furnished in spherical trigonometry, conic sections, and in the other higher branches of the science.

        V. Languages.--Extended courses were provided in the modern and ancient languages. The principal Latin authorities were Virgil, Cicero, and Horace; in Greek, selections were made from the works of Homer, Lucian, and Xenophon. Prose composition in these languages was required.

        The trustees, at their meeting on December 9, 1796, changed the above schedule of studies by no longer requiring the study of geography in the preparatory department, and Montesquieu's Spirit of Laws, Vattel's Law of Nations, and Hume's History of England with Smollett's continuation, in the University; though we find that the use of both Vattel and Montesquieu was continued. About this time Nicholson's Astronomy was substituted in the place of Ferguson's.

        The greatest attention was given to the study of the English language, mathematics, and political science, and previous to 1800 the degree of Bachelor of Arts was conferred on passing "an approved examination in the English language and the sciences." It was then required that the course in Latin should also be completed before this degree would be conferred. In 1801 it was provided that after February 1, 1802, no one should be admitted to this degree "unless he shall have acquired a competent knowledge of either the Greek or French language." To enter the Freshman class, the candidate had to pass an examination on either Greek or French equivalent to that required in Latin. In July, 1804, it was enacted that no student should be admitted to a degree without having taken the course in Greek, exceptions being made in the case of those then studying for degrees.


THE FIRST GRADUATES.

        The first to be enrolled as a student of the University was Mr. Hinton James, of Wilmington, N. C., who entered February 12, 1795.

        During the first session forty-one students were enrolled, and in 1796 the attendance reached one hundred.

        The commencement first observed was on July 4, 1798, the first degrees (Bachelor of Arts) being conferred on that occasion. The graduating class numbered seven, viz: Samuel Hinton, William Houston, Hinton James, Robert Locke, Alexander Osborne, Edwin Jay Osborne, and Adam Springs. From that time till the appointment of a president, in 1804, forty young men were graduated.

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THE FIRST PRESIDENT, REV. JOSEPH CALDWELL, D. D.

        Dr. Caldwell was of Scotch and French descent. The persecution of the Huguenots in France, and the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes, caused his maternal grandfather, Lovel, to leave his country and seek a home in England. After remaining there a short time he came to America and settled on Long Island. His daughter married a Mr. Harker, a Presbyterian minister, and their daughter Rachel became the wife of Joseph Caldwell, M. D., a native of Ulster, Ireland, and at that time a resident of New Jersey. Dr. Caldwell died April 19, 1773, and on April 21, the day following his burial, was born the subject of this sketch. Mrs. Caldwell was left in poverty, but, assisted by President Witherspoon, of Princeton College, she was enabled to give her son a good education. He entered Princeton in 1787, and in 1791 took his degree with the honorary appointment of Latin salutatory. Soon after graduation he became connected with a classical school at Elizabeth-town, N. J., and in 1795 he was appointed a tutor in Princeton, which position he resigned the following year to accept a professorship in the University of North Carolina. As chairman of the faculty, on him devolved the duty of outlining the course of study. This being the case, and having succeeded a Princeton graduate, it is easy to understand why the curriculum was modelled after that of the College of New Jersey.

        No president was elected until 1804, Dr. Caldwell being promoted to that position. By his able management the institution was conducted safely through the many difficulties of its infancy, occasioned by a meagre endowment and a deficiency of good preparatory schools.

        When Dr. Caldwell came to the University the trustees and the public were prejudiced against the classics, and it is owing to his efforts that Greek was finally given just recognition in the curriculum. But the greatest service which he rendered to the State and to the University was the firm stand he took and the influence he wielded in stemming the tide of infidelity which at one time threatened to engulf the State. Rev. Dr. J. Rumple, referring to this period of the University's history, says: "Strong bands of sympathy and gratitude united our people to the French nation, and as a natural consequence French opinions and French infidelity rolled like a devastating tide over the land. The writings of Voltaire, Volney, and Paine were in the hands of almost all, and the public mind was poisoned. Professor Kerr not only demitted his ministerial office, but renounced Christianity. Professor Harris, Caldwell's predecessor and friend, was shaken in his faith, and at one time agreed that the Bible must be surrendered. Professor Holmes, his co-laborer, not only renounced Christianity but openly taught that morality and virtue, as well as religion, were merely the watchwords of hypocrites. His only gift to the library contained the works of Paine. General Davie, a master spirit in the board of trustees,

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OLD WEST BUILDING--UNIVERSITY OF NORTH CAROLINA.

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and the acknowledged leader in the Legislature, was deeply imbued with infidel principles until reclaimed by the arguments of Caldwell, and the number of the trustees that were at that time firm supporters of the Bible was few. Dr. Caldwell stood nearly alone in his contest against fearful odds, and he deserves the singular honor of having fought a terrible battle successfully without noise, and of having won a signal victory without sounding the trumpet of triumph. When we remember what immense influence is exerted by a University standing alone, and manifestly at the head of all the educational institutions of the State, it appears impossible to estimate the desolation that would be caused by the poisoned stream flowing into hundreds of homes from this poisoned fountain."

        Dr. Caldwell's efforts in behalf of the University were ceaseless. The institution so grew in reputation and numbers that new buildings had to be erected to meet the demands for lecture halls and dormitories. In 1811, by personal solicitation, he secured $12,000 for the completion of the "south building," which had been commenced in 1798 but had remained unfinished for want of funds.

        Now that the University was in a prosperous condition, Dr. Caldwell yielded to his inclinations for study, and in 1812 he resigned the presidency and returned to the chair of mathematics. He now devoted himself to his chair and to the completion of his geometry, which, although certain parts of it had been used by his students for several years previous, was not published till 1822.

        On the resignation of his successor to the presidency, the Rev. Robert Hett Chapman, he again, on December 17, 1816, became president, in which position he continued the rest of his life.

        In 1824 the trustees voted an appropriation of $6,000 for the purchase of books and apparatus, and sent President Caldwell to Europe for this purpose. He remained abroad ten months. On his return the University buildings were illuminated, and he was tendered an ovation by the students. Mr. Paul C. Cameron, who was then a student at the University, says that President Caldwell "returned his thanks for the pleasant welcome, and addressed the students with the affection of a long-absent father returned to his home and duties. His heart was full and his emotions most manifest."

        After his return from this trip Dr. Caldwell, in 1827, built an astronomical observatory at the University, which was the first in the United States, and continued its operation till his death.1


        1 The Nation, Vol. XLVII, p. 131 (August 16, 1888).

        In 1830 Dr. Caldwell projected and started the Harbinger, the first newspaper ever published at Chapel Hill. It was controlled and edited by the Faculty. After a few years its publication ceased.

        He was not only a learned professor and divine, but was also an enthusiastic and efficient advocate of the public schools and the railroad

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systems of the State. He originated the idea of a railroad from the Atlantic through the State to Tennessee, which has since been constructed, opening up the mountain counties to the outside world, and uniting all sections of the Commonwealth in bonds of common interests.

        The following, taken from the North American Review of January, 1821, evidences the influence the University, under the management of President Caldwell, was exerting on education in the State: "In an ardent and increasing zeal for the establishment of schools and academies for several years past, we do not believe North Carolina has been outdone by a single State. The academy at Raleigh was founded in 1804, previously to which there were only two institutions of the kind in the State. The number at present is nearly fifty, and is rapidly increasing. Great pains are taken to procure the best instructors from different parts of the country, and we have the best authority for our opinion that in no part of the Union are the interests of education better understood and under better regulation than in the middle counties of North Carolina. The schools for females are particularly celebrated, and are much resorted to from Georgia, South Carolina, and Virginia. In the year 1816, the number of students at academies within the compass of forty miles amounted to more than one thousand. This space comprised the counties of Warren, Granville, Orange, Wake, Franklin, and two or three others adjoining. All the useful and ornamental branches of knowledge are taught at most of these institutions."

        In his address before the Alumni Association in 1881 President Battle quotes the above, and with pardonable pride adds: "In those days the University was the only institution for higher learning in North Carolina, and when we contrast the general darkness in 1795 with the rapid improvement as shown by the extract from the North American Review in twenty-five years, can not the University say with triumph, 'These schools were my children; I am their alma mater--their creative and fostering author?'"

        Besides two or three occasional sermons, Dr. Caldwell published a Compendious System of Elementary Geometry, in seven books, to which an eighth is added, containing such other propositions as are elementary; subjoined is a Treatise on Plain Trigonometry. He published, also, in one of the Raleigh newspapers, a series of articles called Letters of Carlton, which were designed to awaken a spirit of internal improvement in the State, and another series on Popular Education or Free Schools. These were republished in a volume about the year 1825.

        Few men have been held in greater esteem while living, or have been more reverenced when dead, by a State, than was the first President of the University. The imposing shaft to his memory, erected on the campus by the alumni, stands a fit testimonial to his valuable services; but the most enduring monument of his power and wisdom is the advance which North Carolina made in intelligence and virtue through the instrumentality of his labors.

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GERRARD HALL--UNIVERSITY OF NORTH CAROLINA.

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        The monument bears the following inscriptions:

        In grateful acknowledgment of their obligations to the first President of this University, JOSEPH CALDWELL, D. D., the President of the United States, the Governor of North Carolina, and other Alumni have raised this monument A. D. 1847.

        Born at Lamington, N. J., April 21, 1775. Professor of Mathematics in this University, 1796. Died at Chapel Hill January 27, 1835.

        He was an early, conspicuous, and devoted advocate of the Common Schools and Internal Improvements in North Carolina.

        Near him repose the remains of his beloved wife, Helen Caldwell.


THE CURRICULUM DURING CALDWELL'S ADMINISTRATION.

        About the beginning of President Caldwell's administration the trustees ordered that the class studying political science should read De Lolme's English Constitution, Montesquieu's Spirit of Laws, the Constitution of the United States, and the modern constitutions of Europe, and "that the other books on civil government and political constitutions, which by an ordinance of December 4, 1795, formed a part of this course, should no longer be considered as doing so." But few changes were made in the curriculum first adopted, till on December 19, 1818, it was superseded by the following course leading to the degree of Bachelor of Arts.

        In the preparatory school.--Latin grammar; Corderius or Sacra Historia; Æsop's Fables, 25; Selectæ Vetui; Cornelius Nepos or Viri Romæ: Mair's Introduction; Cæsar's Commentaries; Prosody; Ovidi Editii Expungata; Virgil's Bucolics and six books of the Æneid; Greek grammar; St. John's Gospel and Acts of the Apostles in Greek; Græca Minora to Lucian's Dialogues.

        In the college.--Freshman class, first session: Sallust; Adam's Antiquities; Græca Minora continued; elements of ancient and modern geography; arithmetic; algebra; English grammar; composition; theses; declamation. Second session: Virgil's Georgics; Cicero's Orations; Græca Majora, first volume; algebra continued; Adam's Antiquities; English grammar; composition; declamation; theses.

        Sophomore class: First session: Græca Majora continued, first volume; Horace; algebra continued; geometry; theses; composition; declamation. Second session: Horace continued; Homer's Iliad; geometry continued; geography; composition; declamation.

        Junior sophistics.--First session: Plain trigonometry; logarithms; mensuration of heights and distances; surveying; spherical trigonometry; classics; composition; declamation. Second session: Navigation; conic sections; fluxions; natural philosophy; classics; composition; declamation.

        Senior class.--First session: Chemistry; mineralogy; geology; philosophy of natural history; moral philosophy; Stuart's Essays on the Progess of the Moral and Ethical Sciences; logic; natural philosophy continued; Playfair's Essay on the Progress of the Mathematical and Physical Sciences; astronomy; classics; English grammar; composition; declamation. Second session: Chemistry; mineralogy; geology continued; rhetoric; chemistry; metaphysics; classics; composition; declamation.


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        In the course here given one can not fail to notice the prominence given to classical and mathematical studies and the time devoted to composition and the cultivation of oratory. To the latter, more than anything else, is due the fact that such a large proportion of the alumni became distinguished in public life.

THE INFLUENCE OF YALE.--MITCHELL, OLMSTED, AND ANDREWS.

        President Caldwell was assisted by an able corps of instructors. In the Faculty were some intellectual giants who not only gave reputation to the University, but whose contributions to letters and science made them prominent among the learned men of their day.

        Rev. Dr. Elisha Mitchell, who was called from Yale College to the University of North Carolina in 1817, was the most noted of all.

        Dr. Mitchell came of a noted New England family--one whose influence has been widely felt in religion, science, and politics. He was born in Washington, Litchfield County, Conn., August 19, 1793. His father, Abner Mitchell, was a farmer. His mother, Phoebe Eliot, was a descendant in the fifth generation of John Eliot, the "Apostle to the Indians," and minister of Roxbury, Mass., from 1632 to 1690.

        Prof. Charles Phillips, in a memoir of his friend and colleague, Dr. Mitchell, published in 1858, and from which the data for this sketch are principally drawn, says: "He possessed many of the characteristics which marked the Eliots, especially of the earlier generations. The Rev. Jared Eliot, M. D. and D. D., minister for many years at Killingworth, Conn., was Dr. Mitchell's great-grandfather. He was distinguished in his own times for his knowledge of history, natural philosophy, botany, and mineralogy, while as a theologian he was sound in the faith and delighted in the doctrines of gospel grace. Among his correspondents were Dr. Franklin and Bishop Berkeley, and in 1762 he was honored by the Royal Society of London with a gold medal for a valuable discovery in the manufacture of iron. This ancestor, Dr. Mitchell closely resembled in many peculiarities of body and soul. Both were men of large stature, of great bodily strength, of untiring activity, of restless curiosity, of varied and extensive attainments, of a quaint and quiet humor, of persevering generosity, and of a well-established piety."

        Dr. Mitchell was graduated at Yale in 1813, in the class with Hon. George E. Badger, Dr. Denison Olmsted, and others, who afterwards became noted as statesmen and scholars. After graduation he accepted a position in a male academy at Jamaica, Long Island, which he held till the spring of 1815, when he became principal of a female school in New London, Conn. From there he was called to Yale as tutor in 1816. Dr. Mitchell and Dr. Olmsted were recommended to the trustees of the University in 1816, by a son of President Dwight, of Yale, the Rev. Sereno E. Dwight, chaplain to the Senate of the United States, through Judge William Gaston, then a member of Congress. In 1817 they were

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appointed to professorships in the University--Dr. Mitchell to the chair of mathematics, and Dr. Olmsted to that of chemistry, then first established in the institution.

        Dr. Mitchell entered upon the discharge of his duties February 1, 1818, and from that time till his death he was the foremost professor in the institution. On the resignation of Dr. Olmsted, in 1825, he was transferred to the chair of chemistry, mineralogy, and geology, a position better suited to his tastes and in which he made his reputation for scientific scholarship. Dr. Phillips says of him, that "even while a professor of mathematics he had frequently indulged his taste for botany by pedestrian excursions through the country around Chapel Hill. After he took upon himself instruction in chemistry, mineralogy, and geology, he extended and multiplied these excursions, so that when he died he was known in almost every part of North Carolina, and he left no one behind him better acquainted with its mountains, valleys, and plains; its birds, beasts, bugs, fishes, and shells; its trees, flowers, vines, and mosses; its rocks, stones, sands, clays, and marls. * * * Nor were his accomplishments as a professor confined to his own department. In the ancient languages he was frequently ready and able to help a colleague who was prevented from discharging his own duties. In the mathematics he would often, at public examinations, propose such questions as showed that his earlier love still retained a hold on his attention and affections. He was a good writer, and in the department of belles-lettres he was a well-read and instructive critic." He was a correspondent of Agassiz and other scientists, and kept himself fully abreast of the scientific progress of his times.

        Dr. Mitchell contributed many able articles to the scientific publications of his day. He contributed the following interesting papers to Silliman's Journal: January, 1830, "A Substitute for Welther's Safetytube," and "The Geology of the Gold Regions of North Carolina;" January, 1831, "The Causes of Winds and Storms;" April, 1831, "An Analysis of the Protogæa of Leibnitz;" July, 1831, a reply to Redfield's criticism of his article on winds and storms; January, 1839, "Observations on the Black Mountains in North Carolina." He was the author of a manual of chemistry, the second edition of which was passing through the press at the time of his death; a manual of geology, illustrated by a geological map of North Carolina; a manual of natural history, and a collection of facts and dates respecting the history, geography, etc., of the Holy Land.

        When he came to the University the academic staff numbered 4 and the students 120. At his death there were 16 professors and 440 students in the institution.

        Dr. Mitchell died a martyr to science, and the incidents of his death present a picture of tragic interest. By observations in 1835, 1838, 1844, and 1856 he had established the fact that the peaks of the Black Mountains, in North Carolina, are the highest east of the Rocky Mountains.

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A controversy arose between him and the Hon. Thomas L. Clingman as to which was the higher, Mount Mitchell or Clingman's Peak, named respectively in their honor. In June, 1857, he visited the Black Mountains to make further observations in order to fully settle this dispute, but this was not his only object. Dr. Phillips says: "One object before him in 1857 was to collect in a southern latitude corrections for barometrical observations on mountain heights. He proposed to connect the railroad survey across the Blue Ridge, in North Carolina, with the top of Mitchell's Peak (Mount Mitchell) by a series of stations differing from each other by 500 feet of altitude." On Saturday, June 26, 1857, he set out alone across the mountains for a settlement on Caney River. This was the last time he was ever seen alive. Not returning when expected, search was made for him, and on July 8 his body was found in a pool of water on the mountain-side, into which he had fallen from a precipice some 40 feet above. His remains were taken to Asheville and there interred, but it was finally decided to give them sepulture on Mount Mitchell, and on June 16, 1858, they were buried on the highest point of that peak. His death and eminent services to science were chronicled by the press throughout the United States.

        In July, 1885, the writer made a pilgrimage to his grave. It is an humble mound, inclosed by a wall of rough stones collected on the mountains. The surroundings are majestically grand. It has been beautifully said that "the green-hued ivy and the many-hued rhododendron lend their wild beauty to the scene, and the dark-leaved firs spread their funeral pall over the spot where he lies."

        The mountain is his monument--he needs no other.

        Denison Olmsted, LL. D.--Probably no other professor of the University ever achieved so wide a reputation as did Professor Olmsted. He was a classmate of Dr. Mitchell at Yale, having entered that institution in 1809, and graduating in 1813. For two years he taught in New London. In 1815 he was called to Yale as tutor, which position he held until his election to the professorship of chemistry in the University of North Carolina in 1817.

        Under the auspices of the Legislature of North Carolina he began a geological survey of the State, which was the first to be undertaken in the Union.

        In 1825 he was recalled to Yale as professor of mathematics and natural philosophy. After 1835 he was professor of natural philosophy. His Natural Philosophy, which is a valuable contribution to science, appeared in 1831, and his Astronomy, another important work, in 1839.

        He was one of the earliest advocates of special institutions for the professional training of teachers, and he also deserves honorable mention for his advocacy of improvements in the elementary schools in the United States.

        He was born at East Hartford, Connecticut, June 18, 1791, and died at New Haven, in that State, May 13, 1859.

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SMITH HALL, LIBRARY--UNIVERSITY OF NORTH CAROLINA.

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        Ethan Allen Andrews, LL. D.--Professor Andrews came to the University as professor of ancient languages in 1822. He, too, was an alumnus of Yale, having been graduated in 1810. The duties of his chair were filled with signal ability, and it caused much regret when he resigned, in 1828, to accept the professorship of ancient languages in the New Haven Gymnasium. In 1829 he established the New Haven Institute for Young Ladies. In 1833 he removed to Boston, where he succeeded Jacob Abbott as principal of a female school, and also became senior editor of the Religious Magazine. In 1839 he returned to New Britain, Conn., where he was born April 7, 1787, and began the publication of a series of Latin text-books. He died there March 4, 1858.

        These young professors, fresh from Yale, brought new life into the institution. Prior to their advent Princeton thought and Princeton methods had prevailed to the exclusion of all others. The disciples of Dwight and Witherspoon worked together in harmony and brought about a blending of Yale and Princeton methods.

THE SECOND PRESIDENT, REV. ROBERT HETT CHAPMAN, D. D.

        On the resignation of President Caldwell, in 1812, Rev. Robert Hett Chapman, D. D., a prominent Presbyterian divine, was called to the presidency of the University.

        Dr. Chapman was born at Orange, N. J., March 2, 1771, and died at Winchester, Va., June 18, 1833. He was graduated at Princeton in 1798, and, after studying theology, was licensed to preach by the Presbytery of New York in 1793. For a short time he was a professor in Queen's College, New Brunswick. From 1796 to 1799 he was pastor at Rahway, N. J., and from 1801 to 1812 he preached at Cambridge, N. Y. He accepted the presidency of the University of North Carolina, December 16, 1812, resigning it November 23, 1816, to again enter actively upon the work of the ministry. As president he continued the policy of Dr. Caldwell, his predecessor and successor. After leaving the University he held pastorates in North Carolina, Tennessee, and Virginia.

THE THIRD PRESIDENT, DAVID LOWRY SWAIN, LL. D.

        At the time of President Caldwell's death the University was firmly established, and its influence was gradually being appreciated in other States. The high school of 1795 had become one of the foremost colleges in the Union.

        In the selection of Dr. Caldwell's successor the trustees appreciated their responsibility. Scholars with more than national reputation were presented for the position, but the board of trustees with great unanimity tendered the presidency to the then Governor of the State, David Lowry Swain. Although a man of varied acquirements, it was not for his scholarship that he was selected, but on account of his personal

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popularity, his intense devotion to the State, and his acknowledged executive capacity.

        In Governor Swain were combined the best qualities of the Puritan and the Cavalier. His father, George Swain, was of good New England stock. George Swain was born in Roxbury, Mass., in 1763, and on coming South he settled in Georgia. He served in the Legislature of Georgia five years, and was a member of the convention which revised the Constitution of that State. In 1795 he removed to Buncombe County, North Carolina. Soon after this he married Caroline Lowry, a widow, whose maiden name was Lane. She was a sister of Joel Lane, the founder of the city of Raleigh, and of Joseph Lane, at one time United States Senator from Oregon, and Democratic candidate for Vice-President of the United States on the ticket with General Breckinridge in 1860.

        On January 4, 1801, was born David Lowry Swain. His early education was received at home. At the age of fifteen he was sent to the Newton Academy, near Asheville, founded by the Rev. George Newton, a Presbyterian clergyman. Senator Z. B. Vance says that this school was justly famous in that part of the State, and that many of the prominent citizens of North Carolina, beyond the Blue Ridge, and of other States, were educated, in whole or in part, at that institution. Governor B. F. Perry and Hon. Waddy Thompson, of South Carolina, M. Patton, R. B. Vance, James Erwin, and other prominent citizens of North Carolina, were classmates of young Swain while there. He taught Latin at this school for five months.

        He entered the Junior class of the University of North Carolina in 1821, but, for want of means, he only remained four months. In 1822 he commenced the study of law in the office of Chief-Justice Taylor, in Raleigh, and in December of that year obtained license to practise law.

        He returned to Buncombe County and entered upon the practice of his profession. His advancement was rapid. In 1824 he was elected a member of the lower house of the Legislature from his county, and was continued by successive elections for five years. The Legislature, in 1829, elected him solicitor of the Edenton circuit. He was elected a judge of the Superior Court in 1830. In 1832 he was elected Governor. Under the Constitution of 1776, the Governor was elected for only one year. Governor Swain was successively re-elected in 1833 and 1834. He was a delegate to the convention of 1835, which revised and amended the State Constitution, in which he took a prominent part. In 1835 he was elected president of the University, which position he held until 1868.

        Under his energetic and able management, the University made rapid and permanent progress. The halls were filled with students from all parts of the South, the number at one time reaching nearly five hundred. The Faculty was enlarged, and the course of study extended and made more thorough. The finances were improved and wisely managed.

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Several large and handsome buildings were added, ample provision being made for lecture rooms, libraries, and society halls. The campus, containing 50 acres, naturally one of the most beautiful, if not the most beautiful college campus in the Union, was inclosed and ornamented by walks and shrubbery.

        President Swain was the head of the department of history and political science, and we are told that so brilliant and fascinating were his lectures in political economy and constitutional and international law that these courses were always largely attended. Such was his reputation that many from other States who afterwards became distinguished statesmen were influenced to pursue their studies at the University of North Carolina rather than at older and better-known institutions.

        The then Governor of North Carolina, now Senator Zebulon B. Vance, in a memorial oration on The Life and Character of Hon. David L. Swain, delivered at the University in 1877, said:

        "How well do I remember the many occasions during my sojourn at the University when he, as my preceptor, esteeming such influences of greater importance to the class than the texts of the lessons, would for the time give his whole soul to the stirring up of these generous and emulous sentiments in the hearts of his pupils. The very first recitation in which I ever appeared before him was one such. I shall never, never forget it! In 1851 I entered the University and joined the Senior class as an irregular. This first lesson was in constitutional law. A single general question was asked and answered as to the subject in hand, and then he began to discourse of Chancellor Kent, whose treatise we were studying; from Kent he went to Story, from Story to Marshall, repeating anecdotes of the great Americans who had framed and interpreted our organic law, and touching upon the debate between Hayne and Webster. From these he went back and back to the men and the times when the great * * * principles of Anglo-Saxon liberty were * * * placed one by one as stones polished by the genius of the wise and cemented by the blood of the brave in the walls of the temple of human freedom. He told us of the eloquence of Burke, of the genius of Chatham; he took us into the prison of Eliott and went with us to the death-bed of Hampden; into the closet with Coke and Sergeant Maynard, and to the forum where Somers spoke; to the deck of the Brill where William, the deliverer, stood as he gazed upon the shores of England; to the scaffolds of Sydney and of our own glorious Raleigh. Warming as he went with the glowing theme, walking up and down the recitation room, which was the library of the "old South," with long and awkward strides, heaving those heavy, passionate sighs which were always with him the witnesses of deep emotion, he would now and then stop, reach down from its shelf a volume of some old poet, and read with trembling voice some grand and glowing words addressed to man's truest ambition that thrilled our souls like a song of the chief musician. A profound silence was

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evidence of the deep attention of the class, and the hour passed almost before we knew it had begun."

        This incident is characteristic of President Swain, as is testified by many of his old pupils.

        It was during the administration of President Swain that the State Historical Society was founded in January 1844, the University Alumni Association organized in 1843, and the University Magazine established in March, 1844. He was eminent for his knowledge of North Carolina history and the author of some valuable monographs on Revolutionary and ante-Revolutionary periods, several of which were published in the University Magazine.

        Under his able and progressive management the University had developed into vigorous manhood, but the War, like an untimely frost, came and checked its promising career.

REQUIREMENTS AND COURSES DURING SWAIN'S ADMINISTRATION.

        It was under the administration of President Swain that the University reached its highest development and prosperity. His predecessor had laid a broad foundation. Many of those graduated during the presidency of Dr. Caldwell had become teachers, and now classical schools were established in every section of the State. The preparatory school in connection with the University was no longer a necessity, and we find it quietly dropped. The standard of instruction was raised, and the requisites for admission made more stringent. As early as 1838, and probably before, candidates for admission into the Freshman class were required to sustain an approved examination on the grammar of the English, Latin, and Greek languages, including Latin prosody, Mair's Introduction, or Andrew's Exercises; Cæsar's Commentaries (five books); Ovid's Metamorphoses (Gould's edition--extracts from the six books); Virgil's Bucolics, and six books of the Æneid; Sallust; Greek Testament (St. John's Gospel and the Acts of the Apostles); Græca Minora or Greek reader; arithmetic; algebra, through equations of the first degree; ancient and modern geography.

        In the main, after the remodelling of the curriculum at his accession, the requirements in the different departments of the University remained the same throughout the administration of President Swain.

        The session of 1854-55 is taken as a typical one. The academic staff then numbered sixteen. The University consisted of eight departments and a school for the application of science to the arts, added in 1854, with a president and four professors.

        The time required for the completion of the studies of each department, together with the number of recitations given, will enable one to form an idea of the relative importance attached to each. The requirements for admission to the Freshman class of the University have already been given.

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        In the collegiate classes the requirements were as follows:

        In Latin.--Freshman class, 166 recitations: Virgil's Georgics, Cicero's Orations, and five books of Livy read. Sophomore, 148 recitations: Odes and Satires of Horace, Epistles of Horace and Cicero on the Immortality of the Soul. Junior, 57 recitations: Cicero de Officiis.

        In Greek.--Freshman class, 167 recitations: Xenophon's Anabasis and one book of Herodotus read. Sophomore, 148 recitations: One book of Thucydides, five of Homer's Illiad, and Select Orations of Demosthenes. Junior, 54 recitations: Two tragedies of Sophocles. Senior, 38 recitations: One Tragedy of Sophocles.

        We find the instructors in these departments complaining that candidates for admission are generally deficient in some part of the preparatory studies, especially in Latin construction, Greek grammar, Roman and Grecian antiquities, and ancient geography, and mythology. At the same time they acknowledge that they are much indebted to "the faithful teachers who are laboring to promote classical learning by thorough elementary instruction. * * * We trust that our obligations to them will be still further increased; for on their efforts we must, in a great measure, depend for success in elevating the standard of scholarship in the University."

        In history.--Besides the historical works read in Latin and Greek, the following were required: Freshman class, 78 recitations: Grecian and Roman antiquities and ancient history studied. Junior, 78 recitations: History of the Middle Ages and modern history, with attention to that of England and America.

        The text-books recommended in this department were Bojesen's Greek and Roman Antiquities, Weber's Outlines, Tytler's Universal History, and Smith's Lectures on Modern History. It was provided that throughout the entire course the classes should be guided to the best sources of information on all the more important subjects of historical inquiry and stimulated from time to time to extend their investigations beyond the text-books.

        In French.--Sophomore class, 38 recitations: Levizac's Grammar and Perrin's Fables used. Junior, 76 recitations: Florain's Gonzalve de Cordone and Bossuet's Orations. Senior, 35 recitations: Selections from Racine's Tragedies and Molière's Comedies. Throughout the course, lectures were given from time to time on the history and character of French literature.

        In logic and rhetoric.--Sophomore class, essays required every third week. Junior, 3 recitations per week and one original oration from each member during the session. Senior, 4 original orations from each member during the year. The text-books used were Whateley's Elements of Logic and Rhetoric, with reference to the works of Mill and Campbell, and occasional lectures upon the principles of taste and criticism.

        In mathematics.--The Freshman class had 4 recitations a week, the Sophomore 5, and the Junior 4. The text-books used were Pierce's Algebra, Geometry, Trigonometry, Navigation and Surveying, and Spherical Trigonometry; Church's Analytical Geometry, and Differential and Integral Calculus; Olmsted's Natural Philosophy, and Norton's Astronomy. A course of lectures was given in natural philosophy and astronomy, illustrated by appropriate experiments.

        In chemistry, mineralogy, and geology.--Senior class, 3 lectures and 3 recitations in each per week. The text-books of Draper, Graham, Regnault, and Silliman were used in the course.

        This department was under the direction of the distinguished Dr. Mitchell, who was also one of the professors in the School for the Application of Science to the Arts, where the studies of this department were taught with great thoroughness.

        In political science and philosophy.--Required in course during the Senior year three days per week. Text-books used were Wayland's Political Economy, Story's Familiar Exposition of the Constitution, and Kent's Commentaries on American Law, Vol. 1; Wayland's Moral Science, Abercrombie's Inquiries concerning the Intellectual Powers, and Wayland's Intellectual Philosophy. A course of lectures was also

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delivered on the history of constitutional law. It was provided that no portion of the text-books should be omitted, "but the whole carefully recited, subsequently reviewed, and each member of the class separately and rigidly examined on the entire system."


SCHOOL FOR THE APPLICATION OF SCIENCE TO THE ARTS.

        As before stated, in January, 1854, a "School for the Application of Science to the Arts" was established with Elisha Mitchell, professor of chemistry, mineralogy, and geology; James Phillips, professor of pure mathematics and natural philosophy; Charles Phillips, professor of civil engineering, and Benjamin S. Hedrick, professor of chemistry applied to agriculture and the arts.

        The object of this school was to prepare young men for professional life as engineers, artisans, farmers, miners, and physicians. They were given both practical and theoretical instruction. The University catalogue for 1854-55 says: "It is judged that this course will secure the greatest benefits to the various interests of our community. For, while theory without practice is in danger of becoming visionary and unproductive--practice without theory may become devoted to isolated efforts, or to a barren routine of imitations."

        It was provided that "as this school is an integral part of the University, candidates for its first degree will be allowed to substitute civil engineering or agricultural chemistry for the ancient and modern languages, or for international and constitutional law, at their own election, but only during the second term of their Senior year. Those students of the University who seek for a professional education may leave the academic course at the end of the first term of their Senior year and devote themselves entirely to their own special studies during a period of eighteen months. At the end of six months they will receive the degree of Bachelor of Arts along with the rest of their class, and at the end of their fifth year the degree of Master of Arts. Instruction will be given to others also who are connected with the University only as pupils of this school. From them an attendance of two years and a half will be required generally, but, as usual, they will be admitted at the beginning of their course to such classes as their own acquisitions may suit. On completing the required studies these pupils will receive the degree of Bachelor of Science."

        To enter the department of civil engineering the student was required to stand approved examinations on arithmetic, algebra, geometry, and plane and spherical trigonometry, with its application in surveying, navigation, and in the mensuration of heights and distances. The course in this department comprised three years. The text-books used were Church's Analytical Geometry, Church's Differential and Integral Calculus, Davies's Descriptive Geometry, Davies's Shades and Shadows, Smith's Mechanics and Engineering, Mahan's Civil Engineering,

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Illustration

NEW EAST BUILDING--UNIVERSITY OF NORTH CAROLINA.

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Gillespie on Roads and Railroads, Trantwine, Borden, Loud, etc., on Geodesy and Earth Works.

        Mechanical, topographical, and architectural drawing, both plane and isometrical, were taught throughout the course.

        Students in the department for the application of chemistry to agriculture and the arts were instructed in analytical chemistry and its application to the analysis of soils and manure, the assaying of soils and minerals, the analysis of mineral waters, and the testing of drugs and medicines. Daily work in the laboratory was required.

        In addition to the lectures, the following works were required for reading and reference: Will's Outlines of Chemical Analysis, Rose's Analytical Chemistry, Regnault's Chemistry, Johnston's Agricultural Chemistry, Stockhardt's Field Lectures, Plattner's Testing with the Blow-pipe, and Bowman's Medical Chemistry.

LAW SCHOOL.

        A professorship of law was established in 1846, but the professor received no salary from the University; neither was he nor were his students subject to the ordinary regulations.

        There were two classes, the students of the first or independent class having no connection with any other department, and the college class consisting of students who were also pursuing their studies in the University. Tuition in the first class was $50, and in the latter $25 per session, all fees being paid to the professors of the department.

        The full course occupied the independent class two years, at the end of which the degree of Bachelor of Laws was conferred on those students passing approved examinations.

        The plan of studies comprised Blackstone's Commentaries, Cruise's Digest of Real Property, Fearne on Remainders, Iredell on Executors, Stephen on Pleading, Chitty's Pleading, Selwyn's Nisi Prius, Smith on Contracts, Greenleaf on Evidence, and Adams's Doctrine of Equity, together with lectures on the common law, having special reference to the legislation and judicial decisions of North Carolina. Moot courts were held from time to time, presided over by one of the professors, for the discussion of legal questions.

        On the transfer of the University to President Pool and his associates in 1868 the law school was abandoned, but on the accession of President Battle, in 1876, it was re-opened with the Hon. William H. Battie, LL. D., as professor. In 1881 the Hon. John Manning became the head of this department, which position he has occupied continuously since. For the past few years the number of students in this department has averaged about twenty-five.

        Besides the University Law School there is only one other regularly organized law school in the State, the Dick and Dillard Law School, at Greensborough, an excellent institution.

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THE CIVIL WAR.

        The War fell upon the University like a thunderbolt. Prosperity was shattered and discordant elements introduced which were not harmonized until years after the close of that eventful struggle. The War and the days of reconstruction are the period of the University's distress and humiliation, and they constitute the only dark picture in its history.

        After North Carolina passed the ordinance of secession and war had been declared, both students and professors were eager for the conflict. Seven members of the faculty and nearly all the students joined the army. They were inspired by patriotic motives, for they believed they were fighting for liberty and home. But in all the excitement incident to the struggle President Swain was calm and remained faithful to the institution over which he had been called to preside. His efforts were mainly directed to keep the University open, and it was his boast that during the four years of war the college bell never failed in its daily calls, and the institution was maintained in full working order. In doing this he was fiercely assailed by many who urged that college walls should not prove a protection to those whose fortune it was to be favored by wealth and influence. But conscious of his own integrity of purpose, he did not waver in the course adopted.

        Senator Vance, in the address before referred to, said: "Governor Swain appealed to the Confederate government more than once to prevent the handful of college boys left from being drafted. President Davis himself seconded these efforts in the earlier years of the War, declaring that 'the seed corn should not be ground up.' But as the exigencies of the country increased, this wisdom was lost sight of, the collegians were again and again called upon, till at the time of Lee's surrender there were but about a dozen here still keeping up the name and forms of a college. But even while the village and the University were occupied by 4,000 Michigan cavalry, the old bell was rung daily, prayers were held, and the University was kept going."

A ROMANCE OF THE WAR.

        Federal cavalry, under General S. D. Atkins, took possession of Chapel Hill, April 17, 1865. General Sherman, in consequence of a visit from President Swain, as a member of the commission to surrender the city of Raleigh, had ordered that the University should be protected from pillage and destruction, which was done very effectually.

        General Atkins, while visiting President Swain on official business, accidentally saw his daughter; he afterwards sought her acquaintance, addressed her, and was accepted. During the summer her father visited General Atkins's home in Illinois and satisfied himself as to his character and social standing. Her father's permission having been secured, Eleanor Hope Swain, against the protest of friends, married the Union General in August, 1865. They now reside in Freeport, Ill.

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NEW WEST BUILDING--UNIVERSITY OF NORTH CAROLINA.

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Mrs. Atkins is the only living child of President Swain. No male representative of the family survives.

        President Swain had never entertained extreme views in regard to "State rights," and did not permit himself to become embittered against the North during the War. Mrs. C. P. Spencer, a neighbor and familiar acquaintance of President Swain, in her Pen and Ink Sketches of the University, says: "Governor Swain believed this marriage was but the first of many others like it to take place all over the South; that our peace was to flow like a river, and that North and South were coming together at once to be more firmly united than ever. He was a sagacious man and accustomed to calculate possibilities very closely and accurately, but he did not once dream of the party issues that were to spring up and divide the country even more effectually than the War, nor of the bitterness that was to be engendered and revived."

        This marriage provoked much adverse criticism throughout the State. President Swain's course was censured by many, some being alienated from the University on account of it; but now that prejudice has yielded to reason, his wisdom in this matter is admitted. Had all been as charitable as he was, the wounds of the War would soon have been healed.

LAST YEARS OF SWAIN'S ADMINISTRATION.

        Now that the War was over, it was hoped that the University would rise to its former prosperity. But it seemed that President Swain had lost his hold upon the affections of the people of the State, and in consequence the institution suffered. His liberal policy had pleased neither of the then existing political factions. The leaders of the Republican party looked upon him with suspicion, and regarded the University as "a hot-bed of treason." He had displeased many prominent and influential friends of the institution by his willingness to accept the results of the War and banish all sectional strife. Many clamored for his removal. His resignation was tendered in 1867, but was not accepted, the reason probably being that the trustees were aware that they were soon to be succeeded by a new board of trustees, and they wished to throw the responsibility of the reorganization of the University upon them.

        In 1868 the State passed under the new Constitution. There was an entire change in the State government. The University was placed in the hands of a new board of trustees, and one of their first official acts was to dismiss the president and Faculty, that they might remodel it on a partisan basis.

        President Swain did not long survive this dark hour of the University. On August 11, 1868, while out driving with a friend near Chapel Hill, he was thrown from the buggy and painfully injured. He died from the effects of his injuries August 27, following the accident. He was buried in Oakwood Cemetery, near Raleigh.

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        President Swain was an earnest Christian and an honored member of the Presbyterian Church. Senator Vance, in referring to his Christian character, says: "He was a praying man, and was not ashamed to be known as such. He first introduced the practice of opening the regular meetings of the faculty with prayer." Truly has it been said that "the soil of our State holds the dust of no son who loved her more or served her better."

RECONSTRUCTION.

        The first acts of the board of trustees, which had been appointed upon the adoption of the Constitution of 1868, were unconstitutional and condemned by the best citizens of the State.

        They ordered the University to be closed, declared all the chairs vacant, and all the professorships abolished. The Constitution of the State provides that the University shall be perpetuated and maintained, and the charter of the institution expressly states that the members of the Faculty shall not be dismissed unless certain specified charges shall be proved.

        The larger part of the endowment was unwisely invested and lost, and political bias was manifested in all that was done.

        Upon the re-opening of the University in 1869, the friends of the institution were dissatisfied to find that the late distinguished president and his able coadjutors had been succeeded by new and untried men.

        In referring to President Swain and this period of the history of the University, Mr. Paul C. Cameron, president of the Alumni Association, in an address before that body in 1881, said:

        "The shadows of a dark night were falling round him and his colleagues and the object of his care. A special Providence seemed watchful to save these old servants of our State University from the humiliation of a painful exile from homes, labors, honors, offices, and altars. Professor Mitchell had fallen on rest in the deep and dark chambers of the Black Mountain. Professor Phillips had lain down with his harness on, upon the rostrum of the chapel, for his long sleep whilst the students were assembling for morning prayer. President Swain, in visiting a small farm in preparation for the comfort of his small family of old servants, is by an accident fatally injured; lingering a few days his useful life and well-rounded labors are closed in charity and kindness to all, but with anxious fears for the future of an institution that he had loved so long and served so well. He knew that new and unknown men would soon be placed in charge. Pleasant is the memory of such a man to the good people of North Carolina, and they silently rebuked the punishment of a man without a crime, and a Faculty without a stain, and in fortitude submitted to the inevitable, and passed their sons to the care of the undisturbed institutions of learning of our sister State of Virginia."

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THE FOURTH PRESIDENT, REV. SOLOMON POOL, D. D.

        Rev. Solomon Pool, D. D., became president in 1869. Doubtless he had the interest of the University at heart in accepting the position, but time has proved that it was unfortunate for him and for the institution that he did so. In becoming a member of the Republican party at the time he did and under the then existing circumstances, he rendered himself unpopular with some of the best and most influential people in the State--the former friends and supporters of the University. The board of trustees, of which Dr. Pool was a member, was regarded with disfavor, and the fact that he was its choice did not add to his reputation.

        Without reputation for broad scholarship or administrative ability, without influential friends outside his own party, without any claim upon the people of the State, he accepted the presidency of one of the leading institutions in the Union. Even though his best efforts were put forth in its behalf, yet that his administration was a comparative failure is no surprise. It is due Dr. Pool to add that he was the best man of his party in the State for the position, and at that time it would have been almost, if not quite impossible, for any Republican to have succeeded in the management of the University.

        During the presidency of Dr. Pool the attendance at any time was not more than seventy-five, a large proportion of the students coming from the immediate neighborhood of the institution and none from without the State. The faculty numbered five; all were Republicans, and two of them were Northern men who had previously been connected with institutions for the education of colored people. This, in a measure, accounts for the small attendance. The writer is glad to add that the day has now come when no man is ostracized in North Carolina on account of political convictions, and that some of the most prominent physicians and one of the ablest divines in the State are professors in Shaw University, an institution in Raleigh for the higher education of the negro in medicine, law, divinity, and letters, and no right-thinking man condemns them for their course.

        After 1870 all exercises were discontinued until the reorganization in 1875. Dr. Pool continued as nominal president in charge of the University property until the reopening.

        Dr. Pool is a member of the Methodist Episcopal Church South. He is a native of Elizabeth City, N. C. In 1849, at the age of seventeen, he entered the University, where he was graduated in 1853. In December, 1853, he was elected tutor of mathematics in his alma mater, and in 1860 he was promoted to the adjunct professorship of pure mathematics, which position he held until 1866, when he accepted a Government position in the revenue service. He was president of the University from 1869 to 1875. After his connection with that institution was severed, he was for a short time principal of a school in Cary,

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but he now devotes all his time to the ministry. He is considered one of the ablest and most eloquent divines in the State.

THE RE-OPENING.

        In 1875, the trustees being elected by the General Assembly, in pursuance of a Constitutional amendment of that year, the University was re-opened with a corps of seven professors, the Rev. Charles Phillips, D. D., LL. D., professor of mathematics, being made chairman of the Faculty.

        Dr. Phillips is a native of Harlem, N. Y. His father, James Phillips, came to this country from England, and from 1826 to his death in 1867, was professor of mathematics at Chapel Hill. He was graduated at the University in 1841, and after studying a year at Princeton, became tutor of mathematics at his alma mater in 1844; was promoted to the professorship of civil engineering in 1853, and upon the death of his father was transferred to the chair of mathematics. After the dispersion of the Faculty of the University, he became professor of mathematics in Davidson College in 1869, where he remained till his recall to Chapel Hill in 1875. In 1879, owing to bad health he gave up active work and was made professor emeritus in his department. He has written much for the religious and secular press, and published a Manual of Trigonometry for use at the University.

        The requirements for admission were made essentially the same as at the close of the administration of President Swain. Three courses of study were provided: the classical, requiring four years for its completion, and leading to the degree of Bachelor of Arts; the scientific, requiring three years, and leading to the degree of Bachelor of Science; the agricultural, requiring three years, and leading to the degree of Bachelor of Agriculture.

        During the session of 1875-76 sixty-nine students were enrolled.

THE FIFTH PRESIDENT, KEMP PLUMMER BATTLE, LL. D.

        In 1876 the Hon. Kemp P. Battle was elected president of the University and has held the position continuously since. He is a son of the late Judge William H. Battle, at one time a member of the Supreme Court of North Carolina, and author of a digest of the laws of the State. President Battle was born December 19, 1831. He was graduated at the University in 1849, being valedictorian of his class, and for four years was tutor of mathematics in that institution. In 1854 he began the practice of law and made rapid advancement in his profession. He was a Whig delegate to the secession convention of 1861, and was State treasurer from 1866 to 1868. At the time of his election to the presidency he was a prominent lawyer of Raleigh.

        At the beginning of his administration the Faculty was increased, the courses enlarged, and the standard of instruction raised. The course

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leading to the degree of Bachelor of Agriculture was done away with, and a philosophical course, differing from the classical in that only one ancient language is required, more attention being devoted to the scientific studies, leading to the degree of Bachelor of Philosophy, was added. All the undergraduate courses were made co-ordinate, each requiring four years for completion. Post-graduate instruction leading to the master's degree (A. M., Ph. M., and M. S.) and the doctor's degree (Ph. D.) was provided. For the master's degree the candidate must take post-graduate study for one year in three subjects, submit a suitable thesis and pass satisfactory examinations. For the doctor's degree, two of the subjects of the post-graduate work of the first year must be continued for another session, the candidate then submitting a thesis and passing examinations.

        The University as now constituted embraces the following departments: The Literary Department, the Scientific Department, the School of Normal Instruction, the College of Agriculture and the Mechanic Arts, and the School of Law.

        Under the administration of President Battle its growth has been marked. Since 1876 the annual enrolment of students has averaged about 175. The academic staff now numbers 17.

        Beginning with the Swain administration the salaries have been as follows:

        In 1836 the president received $2,000 per annum and residence; the professors each $1,240 and residence. In 1860 the president's salary had been increased to $2,500, and the professors' to $1,700. The former now (1887) receives $2,500 and the latter $2,000 per year and residences.

PRESENT REQUIREMENTS AND COURSES.

        The requirements for admission to the University are as follows:

        In Latin.--Cæsar's Gallic War (5 books), Virgil's Æneid (5 books), Cicero's Orations (4). Equivalent amounts from other authors are accepted. A thorough acquaintance with the forms of declension and conjugation and the general principles of construction is absolutely essential. In Greek.--Xenophon's Anabasis (3 books), simple exercises in translating English into Greek, Greek Grammar (Goodwin or Hadley-Allen), a good knowledge of which is required. In Mathematics.--Arithmetic, and Algebra to quadratic equations. In English.--English Grammar (Whitney, Bain), Introduction to Rhetoric and Composition (Chittenden and D. J. Hill, or Reed and Kellogg), Outlines of English and American History and Literature (Freeman, Gilman).


        Applicants wishing to pursue the classical course are examined in all the above studies, and in addition are required to exhibit a general acquaintance with ancient history, geography, and mythology. Slight deficiencies in the amount of reading required in Latin and Greek are allowed to be made up by private study during the first session, if the rest of, the examination is satisfactory. Those desiring to take the philosophical course are examined in Latin or Greek, according to selection made, mathematics and English. For the scientific course the

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applicants are examined in Mathematics and English. Optional students are examined in such of the above as relate to the studies they select. For admission into advanced classes, applicants are examined in the studies completed by the classes they wish to join.

        The following undergraduate courses of study are provided. The figures in parentheses denote the number of recitations or lectures per week:

        1. Classical course, leading to the degree of Bachelor of Arts:

        First year.--First term: Algebra (4), Latin (4), Greek (4), English (2), History (1), Hygiene (six lectures), Practical Morals (six lectures). Second term: Geometry (4), Latin (4), Greek (4), English (2), History (1).

        Second year.--First term: Trigonometry (4), Latin (4), Greek (4), Chemistry (3), English (1). Second term: Analytical Geometry (4), Latin (4), Greek (4), Chemistry (3), English (1).

        Third year.--First term: Physics (4), Logic (2), English (1), Elective (9), of which at least (3) must be devoted to a modern or classic language. Second term: Physics (4), Logic and Psychology (2), English (1), Elective (9), subject to same condition as in first term.

        Fourth year.--First term: Political Economy (3), English Literature (3), Essays and Orations (1), Psychology and Moral Philosophy (2), Elective (6), subject to same condition as in third year. Second term: Constitutional and International Law (3), English Literature (3), Essays and Orations (1), Moral Philosophy (2), Elective (6), subject to same condition as in third year.

        Elective studies: History (3), French (3), German (3), Latin (4), Greek (4), Anglo-Saxon (3), Industrial Chemistry (3), Qualitative Chemical Analysis (3), Quantitative Chemical Analysis and Assaying (3), Physiology, Zoölogy, and Botany (3), Economic Entomology (3), Advanced Botany (3), Surveying and Engineering (3), Calculus (4), Practical Horticulture (2), Biological Laboratory (2), Astronomy (1½), Theoretical Mechanics (1½), Geology (1½), Mineralogy (1½), Metallurgy (1½), Mental and Moral Philosophy (2), Physics (2).

        2. Philosophical course, leading to the degree of Bachelor of Philosophy:

        First year.--First term: Algebra (4), Latin or Greek (4), German or French (3), English (2), History (1), Physiography (1), Hygiene (six lectures), Practical Morals (six lectures). Second term: Geometry (4), Latin or Greek (4), German or French (3), English (2), History (1), Physiography (1).

        Second year.--First term: Trigonometry (4), Latin or Greek (4), German or French (3), Chemistry (3), English (1). Second term: Analytical Geometry (4), Latin or Greek (4), German or French (3), Chemistry (3), English (1).

        Third year.--First term: Physics (4), Physiology (3), Logic (2), English (1), Elective (6). Second term: Physics (4), Zoölogy and Botany (3), Logic and Psychology (2), English (1), Elective (6).

        Fourth year.--First term: Political Economy (3), English Literature (3), Essays and Orations (1), Astronomy (3), Psychology (2), Elective (3). Second term: Constitutional and International Law (3), English Literature (3), Essays and Orations (1), Geology (3), Moral Philosophy (2), Elective (3).

        Elective studies: Studies to fill out the hours marked Elective in the above course may be chosen from either or both of the lists of Elective Studies given under the Classical Course and Scientific Course.

        3. Scientific course, leading to the degree of Bachelor of Science:

        First year.--First term: Algebra (4), German or French (3), or Latin (4), English (2), History (1), Entomology (1), Physiography (1), Physiology (3), Hygiene (six lectures), Practical Morals (six lectures). Second term: Geometry (4), German or French (3), or Latin (4), English (2), History (1), Entomology (1), Physiography (1), Zoölogy and Botany (3).

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Illustration

BIOLOGICAL LABORATORY--UNIVERSITY OF NORTH CAROLINA.

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        3. Scientific course--Continued.

        Second year.--First term: Trigonometry (4), German or French (3), or Latin (4), English (1), Chemistry (3), Qualitative Chemical Analysis (3), Biological Laboratory (2). Second term: Analytical Geometry (4), German or French (3), or Latin (4), English (1), Chemistry (3), Qualitative Chemical Analysis (3), Biological Laboratory (2).

        Third year.--First term: Physics (4), Mineralogy (3), English (1), Elective (8). Second term: Physics (4), Geology (3), English (1), Elective (8).

        Fourth year.--First term: Astronomy (3), Elective (12), (of which (6) must be devoted to Science). Second term: Elective (15), (of which (6) must be devoted to Science).

        Elective studies: Advanced Botany (3), Quantitative Chemical Analysis and Assaying (3), Surveying and Drafting (3), Calculus (4), Anatomy and Physiology of Domestic Animals (3), History (3), Psychology and Moral Philosophy (2), English Literature (3), Political Economy, Constitutional and International Law (3), French or German (3), Economic Entomology (2), Practical Horticulture (2), Agricultural Chemistry (1½), Metallurgy (1½), Mechanics (1½), Practical Geology (3), Essays and Orations (1), Physics (2), Logic and Psychology (2), Industrial Chemistry (3).


        In the College of Agriculture and the Mechanic Arts the following courses are given:

        1. Agriculture, leading to the degree of Bachelor of Science, with a certificate of proficiency in Agriculture:

        First and second years.--The same studies are required as in the corresponding years of the Scientific Course.

        Third year.--First term: Mechanics (4), Mineralogy (3), Industrial Chemistry (3), Agricultural Botany (3), Entomology (2). Second term: Physics (4), Geology (3), Industrial Chemistry (3), Agricultural Botany (3), Entomology (2).

        Fourth year.--First term: Land Surveying (3), Astronomy (3), Domestic Animals (3), Horticulture (2), Elective (4). Second term: Agricultural Chemistry (3), Horticulture (2), Elective (10).


        In addition to the above a two years' course has been arranged for those who wish to give special attention to agriculture and who can not remain four years. This course leads to no degree. The studies are as follows:

        First year.--First term: Algebra (4), Physiology (3), Chemistry (3), Qualitative Laboratory Practice (3), English (2), Entomology (1), Hygiene (six lectures). Second term: Geometry (4), Zoölogy and Botany (3), Chemistry (3), Qualitative Laboratory Practice (3), English (2), Entomology (1).

        Second year.--First term: Mechanics (4), Agricultural Botany (3), Anatomy and Physiology of Domestic Animals (3), Injurious and Beneficial Insects (2), Principles of Horticulture (2), Business Law (1). Second term: Agricultural Chemistry (3), Geology (3), Agricultural Botany (3), Feeding and Breeding of Domestic Animals (3), Injurious and Beneficial Insects (2), Practical Horticulture (2).

        2. Civil Engineering and Mining, leading to the degree of Bachelor of Science, with a certificate in Civil Engineering and Mining:

        First and second years.--The same studies are required as in the corresponding years of the Scientific Course.

        Third year.--First term: Physics (4), Mineralogy (3), Calculus (4), Surveying and Drafting (3). Second term: Physics (4), Geology (3), Calculus (4), Surveying and Drafting (3).

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        2. Civil Engineering and Mining--Continued.

        Fourth year.--First term: Engineering (3), Mining and Assaying (3), Quantitative Chemical Analysis (3), Practical Geology (3), Astronomy (3). Second term: Engineering (3), Metallurgy (3), Quantitative Chemical Analysis (3), Theoretical Mechanics (3), Elective (3).


        The Normal Department has been established in accordance with the State Constitution, and by a recent act of the General Assembly young men preparing to teach are given free tuition on the condition that they pledge themselves to teach at least one year after leaving the University. The special object of this department is to prepare teachers for the public schools.

        A two years' Normal Course is provided:

        First year.--First term: English (2), Algebra (3), Physiology (3), History of North Carolina (2), Commercial Arithmetic (1), Reviews and Methods of Teaching (5). Second term: English (2), Algebra (3), Zoölogy and Botany (3), History of United States (2), Book-keeping (1), School Economy (4).

        Second year.--First term: English (1), Algebra (4), Physical Geography (1), Elocution (2), Chemistry (3), or Physics or Latin (4), Graded Schools (3), Seminary (1). Second term: English (1), Physical Geography (1), Geometry (4), Chemistry (3), or Physics or Latin (4), Methods of Culture (2), History of Education (3), Seminary (1).


        This course leads to no degree, but upon passing approved examinations in the studies above enumerated, a certificate of proficiency is awarded.

        In the School of Law the plan of studies comprises (A) the course prescribed by the Supreme Court of North Carolina, and (B) an additional course for those desiring to compete for the degree of Bachelor of Science. The following works are used as text-books:

        (A) Blackstone's Commentaries, Washburn on Real Property, Schouler on Executors, Stephen on Pleading, Chitty's Pleading, Adams' Doctrine of Equity, 1st Greenleaf on Evidence, Smith on Contracts, Addison or Bigelow on Torts, Constitution of the United States and of North Carolina, Code of North Carolina, particularly the Code of Civil Procedure. (B) Parsons on Contracts, Pierce on American Railroad Law, Angell & Ames on Corporations, Willard's Equity Jurisprudence, Cooley's Constitutional Limitations, Wharton's Criminal Law, and Best's Principles of Evidence.


        In addition to the above, post-graduate courses are provided, open to students of any institution who have taken their baccalaureate degree, free of tuition. Applicants for a Master's degree must have completed the course leading to the corresponding Bachelor's degree. In all cases the instructors must be satisfied that the student is prepared to follow the course selected.

        1. Classical Course, leading to the degree of Master of Arts: Three studies, pursued for one year, to be selected from the following groups, subject to the condition that one study must, and two may, be selected from group 1, but not more than one from any other group:

  • 1. Latin, Greek.
  • 2. German, French, English.
  • 3. Political Science, Mental and Moral Science, History.
  • 4. Chemistry, Geology, Metallurgy, Natural History.
  • 5. Mathematics, Natural Philosophy.

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        2. Philosophical Course, leading to the degree of Master of Philosophy: Three studies, pursued for one year, to be selected from the following groups, subject to the same condition as in Classical Course.

  • 1. Latin, Greek, German, French, English.
  • 2. Political Science, Mental and Moral Science, History.
  • 3. Chemistry, Geology, Metallurgy, Natural History.
  • 4. Mathematics, Natural Philosophy.

        3. Scientific Course, leading to the degree of Master of Science: Three studies, pursued for one year, to be selected from the following groups, subject to the same condition as in Classical Course.

  • 1. Chemistry, Geology, Metallurgy, Natural History, Mathematics, Natural Philosophy.
  • 2. Latin, Greek, German, French, English.
  • 3. Political Science, Mental and Moral Science, History.

        4. The course leading to the degree of Doctor of Philosophy, requiring two years: For the first year the candidate may select any one of the courses offered for a Master's degree (A. M., PH. M., M. S.). The second year is devoted to a more extensive study of two of the subjects pursued in the first year.


EQUIPMENT FOR TEACHING.

        The Faculty includes seventeen teachers; there are eighteen lecture and recitation rooms; six laboratories and museums for daily scientific work; a large general museum; a select library of 25,000 volumes; a reading-room, which is provided with about 100 leading periodicals, and a fine supply of maps and illustrative apparatus. The library building is admirably fitted up, and will compare favorably with that of any university of this country. It is in charge of a regular librarian, and the books are well catalogued and arranged.

SCHOLARSHIP AND LOAN FUNDS.

        The B. F. Moore Scholarships.--This fund, now amounting to $6,000 in North Carolina 4 per cent. bonds, was established in 1878. The interest is devoted to the payment of the tuition of those students to whom the Moore scholarships may be awarded.

        The Deems Fund.--This fund was instituted in 1878, by the Rev. C. F. Deems, D. D., pastor of the Church of the Strangers, New York, as a memorial of his son, Lieutenant Theodore Disosway Deems, who was born at Chapel Hill while his father was in the Faculty of the University. In 1881 it was greatly enlarged through the munificence of Mr. William H. Vanderbilt.

        The object of this fund is to assist needy students by loans. The loans are made at 6 per cent. interest, and for a sufficient length of time to make the payment easy. The fund now amounts to $13,600.

        The Francis Jones Smith Fund.--The late Miss Mary Ruffin Smith, of Orange County, left a valuable tract of 1,440 acres of land in Chatham County, known as the Jones Grove Tract, the income of which, or of the proceeds if sold, is used for the education of such students as the Faculty may designate.

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        It is estimated that this land, at present prices, would sell for at least $13,000, but as real estate in this part of North Carolina is rapidly increasing in value, it is expected that more than that amount will ultimately be realized for it.

PRESENT SYSTEM OF GOVERNMENT.

        The University is, by the State Constitution, intrusted to the General Assembly. "Its government is under the control of a board of eighty trustees, elected by joint vote of the General Assembly. Of these one-fourth go out of office and their places are filled every two years. Although not so required by law, in practice they are distributed among Congressional districts. The board meets regularly twice a year--in the winter at Raleigh, on a day selected by the chairman, and in the summer at Chapel Hill, during Commencement week. The former is called the annual meeting. The Governor is ex-officio chairman of the board. Ten constitute a quorum. During the recess of the board an executive committee of seven trustees, elected at the annual meeting, exercises all the powers of the board of trustees, except those specially reserved." (University Catalogue, 1886-87, p. 9.)

LITERARY SOCIETIES.

        A prominent feature of Southern colleges is their literary societies. The exercises consist of debate, declamation, and composition. Social, economic, political, and historical questions are discussed. Parliamentary order is strictly enforced, and thus the young collegian becomes familiar with the management of deliberative bodies. In the distribution of honors and offices, "society politics," as it is termed, comes into play. Parties are organized, and their management is, in many respects, not unlike that of the political parties with which the students are likely to become connected after leaving college. It is often the case that the student finds his society the strongest tie to the institution, and many think the training there received for practical life equal to that given in the lecture-room.

        The literary societies of the University of North Carolina, the Dialectic and the Philanthropic, are noted throughout the South. Their members have filled the highest positions of trust and honor that the State and nation can confer. The writer is indebted to Stephen B. Weeks, A. M., instructor in English at the University, for the following information concerning them.

        The Dialectic Society was founded June 3, 1795, and from that time to the present has had about 2,700 members, some 1,100 having been graduated by the University.

        The society color is blue, and its motto is "Love of Virtue and Science." The hall is handsomely furnished. Portraits in oil of the following distinguished members adorn the walls: James K. Polk, William

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Illustration

PHILANTHROPIC SOCIETY HALL--UNIVERSITY OF NORTH CAROLINA.

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A. Graham, David L. Swain, Thomas Ruffin, Abram Rencher, J. Motley Morehead, Charles Manly, Willie P. Mangum, Thomas L. Clingman, Duncan Cameron, James Mebane, and Paul C. Cameron. There are also portraits of William Richardson Davie, Governor and minister to France, who, as grand master of the Masonic fraternity in North Carolina in 1793, laid the corner-stone of the first University building; George Edmund Badger, United States Senator and Secretary of the Navy, and other noted North Carolinians, who were honorary members of this society.

        The Philanthropic Society was founded August 1, 1795, under the name of "Concord Society." It received its present name August 29, 1796. Of its 2,141 members 818 were graduated at the University.

        The society color is white, and its motto is "Virtue, Liberty, and Science." Its hall is furnished similarly to that of the Dialectic. The hall contains oil portraits of the following members: William R. King, John Branch, John Y. Mason, Francis Lister Hawks, William Miller, James C. Dobbin, John Heritage Bryan, Bartholomew Figures Moore, Thomas C. Manning, James Grant, R. R. Bridges, Bryan Grimes, William L. Saunders, Jacob Thompson, Joseph John Daniel, J. Johnston Pettigrew, and Richard Spaight Donnell. In addition to the above there are portraits of the following honorary members: Joseph Caldwell, Elisha Mitchell, and William Gaston, at one time associate justice of the supreme court of North Carolina, the first Roman Catholic to hold office in the State.

        As a rule the students from the western part of the State join the Dialectic Society, and those from the eastern section the Philanthropic Society. Members of the two societies room in different buildings.

        The North Carolina University Magazine is published under the auspices of these societies.

GREEK LETTER FRATERNITIES.

        Greek letter fraternities have existed at the University since 1850. Before the War they were known to exist and were recognized by the Faculty. When the University was reorganized in 1875 nothing was said of them, but in January, 1885, they were formally recognized by the trustees.

        The following list includes all the fraternities that have existed or now exist at the University:

  • ΔKΕ,Β chapter, 1850-1861. Re-organized 1887.
  • ΦGΔ, Ε chapter, 1851-1861. Not re-organized.
  • Φ ΔΘ, E chapter, 1852-1861. Re-organized 1885.
  • ΔΨ, Ξ chapter, 1854-1863. Not re-organized.
  • ΔΦ, K chapter, 1855-1861. Not re-organized.
  • ΧΨ, Σ chapter, 1855-1861. Not re-organized.
  • ΦKΣ, Λ chapter, 1856-1861. Re-organized 1877.
  • ΣAΕ, Ξ chapter, 1857-1862. Re-organized 1885.
  • ΘΔΧ, Μ chapter, 1857-1862. Not re-organized.
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  • Ζg, Υ chapter, 1858-1868. Reorganized 1885.
  • ΧΦ, A chapter, 1858-1867. Not reorganized.
  • AΤΩ, AΔ chapter. Organized 1879.
  • KA (Southern order), g chapter. Organized 1881.
  • ΦΘA. Organized 1885.

        The Phi Kappa Sigma owns a fraternity hall, erected in the spring of 1887. This is the only hall built and owned by a Greek letter fraternity in the State.

        About one-half of the students are fraternity men.

INFLUENCE OF THE UNIVERSITY UPON THE SOUTH.

        Before the late War the University was eminent among the colleges of the Union. In the South it occupied a commanding position; in numbers it ranked among the first, and in influence and reputation it was only equalled by the University of Virginia.

        The growth of the institution is remarkable when we take into consideration the difficulties with which it struggled in its infancy. When Dr. Caldwell became president in 1804, there were but 60 students. From this time till his death in 1835 the average attendance per session was about 100, and the average number of graduates 16.

        The highest number put down in any annual catalogue during his administration was 173, but as the catalogue was always issued early in the session the full number for the year is not given.

        Among those who studied at the University before 1835, the following became prominent:

        William R. King, who was in public life, from 1810-57, as member of Congress, Secretary of Legation at St. Petersburg, United States Senator, being twice elected president pro tempore of the Senate, Minister to France, and Vice-President of the United States; Thomas H. Benton, United States Senator from Missouri, author of "Thirty Years' View," etc; John Branch, Governor of North Carolina, United States Senator, Secretary of the Navy, Governor of Florida Territory; John Henry Eaton, United States Senator from Tennessee, Secretary of War, Governor of Florida Territory, Minister to Spain, and author of "Life of Jackson;" John Witherspoon, president of Miami College, Ohio; Romulus M. Saunders, judge, and Minister to Spain; Hutchins G. Burton, Governor of North Carolina; A. D. Murphey, judge, and "Father of the Public Schools of North Carolina;" Rev. William Hooper, professor of languages in the Universities of North Carolina and South Carolina, and president of Wake Forest College; Willie P. Mangum, judge, and United States Senator from North Carolina; Bedford Brown, United States Senator from North Carolina; Charles Manly, Governor of North Carolina; John G. A. Williamson, Chargé d'Affaires to Venezuela; John M. Morehead, Governor of North Carolina; William D. Mosely, Governor of Florida; Alfred M. Slade, Consul to Buenos Ayres; William H. Haywood, United States Senator from North Carolina; Rev. Thomas B. Slade, president of Columbus (Georgia) Female Institute; Rev. Robert H. Morrison, president of Davidson College; William H. Battle, supreme court judge, North Carolina; Rev. Francis Lister Hawks, professor of divinity in Trinity College, Connecticut, vice-president of American Ethnological Society, 1855-59, president of American Geographical and Statistical Society, 1855-56, and author of History of North Carolina, Egypt and its Monuments, History of the Episcopal Church in America, etc.; Richmond M. Pearson, chief-justice supreme court, North Carolina;

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Illustration

MEMORIAL HALL--UNIVERSITY OF NORTH CAROLINA.

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William A. Graham, Governor of North Carolina, United States Senator, Secretary of the Navy, and Confederate States Senator; Rt. Rev. Leonidas Polk, bishop of Arkansas and Louisiana; Daniel M. Barringer, Minister to Spain; Joseph J. Daniel, supreme court judge, North Carolina William Miller, Governor of North Carolina, and Chargé d'Affaires to Guatemala; John Heritage Bryan, member of Congress from North Carolina; Richard Dobbs Spaight, member of Congress, and Governor of North Carolina; Edward Jones Mallett, Consul-General to Italy; Thomas N. Mann, Chargé d'Affaires to Guatemala; Thomas J. Green, brigadier-general in Texan army, and member of Texan Congress; John Bragg, judge, and member of Congress from North Carolina; Thomas Bragg, Governor of North Carolina, United States Senator, and Attorney-General of the Confederate States; Warren Winslow, Special Commissioner to Spain in regard to "Black Warrior" affair, and member of Congress from North Carolina; John Owen, Governor of North Carolina, and president of the Whig convention of 1840; Rev. William M. Green, Protestant Episcopal bishop of Mississippi; Rev. Thomas F. Davis, Protestant Episcopal bishop of South Carolina; Abram Rencher, Chargé d'Affaires to Portugal, Governor of New Mexico, and member of Congress; Mathias E. Manly, superior and supreme court judge, North Carolina; Thomas L. Clingman, United States Senator, and brigadier-general, C. S. A.; William W. Avery, Confederate States Senator from North Carolina; Cicero Stephens Hawks, Protestant Episcopal bishop of the diocese of Missouri; Jacob Thompson, member of Congress from Mississippi, and Secretary of the Interior; James C. Dobbin, member of Congress from North Carolina, and Secretary of the Navy; John L. Gay, professor in University of Indiana; James Grant, judge, Iowa; Rev. Solomon Lea, professor in Randolph-Macon College, and president of Greensborough Female College; William Blount Rodman, supreme court judge, North Carolina; Robert Ballard Gilliam, judge, and member of Congress from North Carolina. All of the above were natives of North Carolina. In addition to these should be mentioned the following, who entered the University from other States during this period: James Knox Polk, of Tennessee, Governor of Tennessee, member of Congress, and President of the United States; Aaron V. Brown, of Virginia, Governor of Tennessee, member of Congress, and Postmaster-General; Judge Thomas J. Haywood, of Tennessee; John Young Mason, of Virginia, judge, member of Congress, Secretary of the Navy, Attorney-General of the United States, Minister to France; George C. Dromgoole, of Virginia, member of Congress; Walker Anderson, of Virginia, professor in the University of North Carolina, and chief-justice supreme court of Florida; James Hervey Otey, of Virginia, Protestant Episcopal bishop of the diocese of Tennessee; Alexander D. Sims, of Virginia, member of Congress from South Carolina; Edward Dromgoole Sims, of Virginia, professor in Randolph-Macon College and University of Alabama; Thomas Samuel Ashe, of Alabama, Confederate States Senator, member of Congress, supreme court judge of North Carolina; John M. Ashurst, of Georgia, solicitor-general of Georgia; David V. Lewis, of Georgia, president Georgia Agricultural and Mechanical College; Judge Nathaniel W. Williams, of Tennessee; John A. Cameron, of Virginia, judge in Florida; Judge Henry Y. Webb, of Alabama; Thomas J. Lacy, of Kentucky, supreme court judge, Arkansas; Judge William M. Inge, of Tennessee; Erasmus D. North, of Connecticut, professor at Yale; Alfred O. P. Nicholson, of Tennessee, United States Senator from Tennessee; Oliver N. Treadwell, of Connecticut, president of Rockville Academy, Maryland; Archibald M. Debow, of Louisiana, author of "Industrial Resources of the South and West."


        Besides the above many could be mentioned who became distinguished in their respective States, but these will suffice to demonstrate that the instruction received at the University was of a high order, and political in its tendencies.

        During the thirty-three years of President Swain's administration (1835-1868), including the four years of the War, the average number of

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students enrolled per session was 207; the average number of graduates for the same time being 37 per session. The most prosperous years were from 1850 to 1860, inclusive, the average annual attendance being about 351, a large proportion of the students coming from without the State. The number of students in 1858 was 456, being the largest attendance ever enrolled at any one time in the history of the institution.

        President Swain, in a circular letter of September 4, 1860, addressed to the patrons of the University said: "Half the States of the Union are represented in our catalogue. We have students from about thirty colleges in various parts of the country, from Vermont to Texas, and are thus enabled to compare ourselves with other institutions. The comparison gives us much reason to be satisfied with the condition of things among us, and we may add, that at no previous period has our corps of instructors been more efficient, or the morals and scholarship of our students more encouraging." During this period may studied at the University who afterwards became distinguished. In the list of names the following are prominent:

        Frederick Divoux Lente, M. D., professor in the University of New York, founder and president of the American Academy of Medicine; John W. Moore, historian and novelist; Zebulon B. Vance, Governor of North Carolina and United States Senator; Matt. W. Ransom, United States Senator; Samuel Hall, chief-justice of Georgia; Washington C. Kerr, State geologist, North Carolina; Thomas Settle, supreme court judge, North Carolina, United States Minister to Peru, president National Republican Convention in 1872, and judge United States district court in Florida; Francis Preston Blair, member of Congress, major-general United States Army, and United States Senator; William S. Bryan, supreme court judge, Maryland; Thomas Courtland Manning, chief-justice supreme court of Louisiana and Minister to Mexico; General James Johnston Pettigrew, Secretary of Legation in Spain; William L. Saunders, secretary of State for North Carolina, author, and editor of North Carolina Colonial Records; George Davis, attorney-general of Confederate States; Samuel F. Phillips, United States Solicitor-General; A. M. Scales, Governor of North Carolina; Peter M. Hale and Theo. B. Kingsbury, journalists.


        The writer has found it impossible to secure a complete list of the students of the University before the War. The Philanthropic Society of the University has recently issued a "Register of Members" from 1795 to 1887, edited by Mr. Stephen B. Weeks. The Dialectic Society has not issued a register since 1852.1

        1 Since the above was in type the writer has learned that the Dialectic Society issued a catalogue of its members in June, 1888.


 The University has never issued a complete list of its students. But from the two society registers above mentioned it appears that of those who studied at the University before 1860, one became President of the United States; one Vice President of the United States; ten Cabinet officers; twelve ministers and chargé d'affaires; fourteen United States Senators; thirty-five members of Congress; fifteen Governors of States; fifty-five judges; three presidents of colleges outside of North Carolina, and twelve prominent professors in colleges not in North Carolina. Of course this list
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could be greatly increased if the writer had a complete and well-edited register of the Dialectic Society.

        The War fell upon the University like an untimely frost. It suffered during the days of reconstruction, and finally at the close of the Pool administration (1869 to 1870 inclusive) its glory appeared to have departed and its usefulness seemed at an end.

        With the re-opening in 1875 a brighter day dawned upon the institution. Since then the annual attendance has averaged 180. From 1875 to 1887, inclusive, 201 young men were graduated.

        From the opening of the University in 1795 to the present time about 5,000 students have matriculated.

        The attendance from States other than North Carolina is shown by the following table prepared by Mr. Stephen B. Weeks:

Student attendance by States, 1795-1887.

State. Number.
Virginia . . . . . 261
Alabama . . . . . 182
Tennessee . . . . . 168
South Carolina . . . . . 103
Mississippi . . . . . 99
Louisiana . . . . . 69
Georgia . . . . . 58
Florida . . . . . 38
Texas . . . . . 34
Arkansas . . . . . 15
Kentucky . . . . . 10
New York . . . . . 4
Iowa . . . . . 3
California 2
Missouri . . . . . 2
Connecticut . . . . . 2
Ohio . . . . . 1
Maryland . . . . . 1
District of Columbia . . . . . 2
New Mexico . . . . . 2
Indian Territory . . . . . 1
Total 1,057

        To complete the above table it is only necessary to add the attendance from North Carolina, about four thousand, making a grand total of five thousand students.

        A majority of the students from Virginia came from 1800 to 1825;1 of those from other States the majority came in the most flourishing period of the University--1850 to 1860.

        1 In this connection it is interesting to note the student attendance from North Carolina at the University of Virginia from 1825 to 1874. The following facts are taken from a table prepared by William P. Trent, A. M., an alumnus of the University of Virginia, now taking a post-graduate course at the Johns Hopkins University.

        Whole number of students from North Carolina, 380, which is four per cent, of the total attendance, divided as follows: Lawyers, 59; physicians, 119; clergymen, 7; editors, 1; teachers, 3; in Confederate service (one brigadier general), 76; farmers, 43; judges (one chief justice of North Carolina), 3; in State Legislature (one speaker), 13; number that emigrated to other States, 59.


 Since the re-opening in 1875 only twenty-five have been in attendance from outside North Carolina.

A TRIBUTE TO THE UNIVERSITY.

        President Andrew D. White, of Cornell University, in a letter to Prof. George T. Winston, professor of Latin in the University of North Carolina, thanking him for a copy of his monograph on The Greek, the Roman, and the Teuton, said: "Your subject interests me greatly.

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I have never realized so fully how near to us the history of Rome is, and how full of instruction it is for thinking men of our Republic. It gives me especial pleasure to think that with such a work as this you are reviving the old glories of your University. I remember in my young manhood the University of North Carolina was always spoken of with the greatest respect among men who knew anything about an American collegiate education. While the University of Virginia and Johns Hopkins have, to some extent, drawn away from it, I see no reason why its present Faculty should not give it a commanding position in the South-east of our Republic."

MEMBERS OF THE FACULTY--1795-1887.

Presidents.

        Joseph Caldwell, D. D., 1804-1812; Robert Hett Chapman, D. D., 1813-1816; Joseph Caldwell, D. D., 1816-1835; David Lowry Swain, LL. D., 1835-1868; Solomon Pool, D. D., 1869-1875; Kemp Plummer Battle, LL. D., 1876-.

Professors.

        Ancient languages (Latin and Greek): David Kerr, 1794-1796; Samuel Allen Holmes, 1796-1798; William Edwards Webb, 1799-1800; Archibald DeBow Murphey, 1800-1801; William Bingham, 1801-1805; Andrew Rhea, 1806-1814; William Hooper, 1817-1822; Ethan Allen Andrews, 1822-1828; William Hooper, 1828-1837; Manuel Fetter, 1838; Ashbel Green Brown, adjunct, 1855-1856.

        Latin language and literature: John DeBerniere Hooper, 1838-1848; Fordyce Mitchell Hubbard, 1849-1868; D. S. Patrick, 1869-1870; George Tayloe Winston, 1875-.

        Greek language and literature: Manuel Fetter, 1838-1868; F.P. Brewer, 1869-1870; J. DeBerniere Hooper, 1875-1885; Solomon Cohen Weill, acting professor, 1885-1886; Eben Alexander, 1886-.

        Mathematics: Charles Wilson Harris, 1795-1796; Joseph Caldwell, 1796-1817; Solomon Pool, adjunct, 1860-1868; Alexander McIver, 1869-1870; Charles Phillips, 1875-1879; Ralph Henry Graves, 1879-; James Lee Love, associate professor, 1885-.

        Mathematics and natural philosophy: Elisha Mitchell, 1817-1825; James Phillips, 1826-1867.

        Natural philosophy: Jacob Smiley Gillespie, 1797-1799; Walker Anderson, 1833-1836; Carey D. Grandy, 1879-1882; Joshua Walker Gore, 1882-.

        Chemistry: Denison Olmsted, 1817-1825; Elisha Mitchell, 1825-1857; William Joseph Martin, 1858-1867; Alexander Fletcher Redd, 1875-1880; Carey D. Grandy, assistant professor, 1875-1879; Francis Preston Venable, 1880-.

        Modern languages (French and German): Nicolas Marcellus Hentz, 1826-1831; John DeBerniere Hooper, 1836-1838; John Jones Roberts, 1841-1842; John DeB. Hooper, 1843-1848; Hildreth Hosea Smith, 1856-1868; John DeB. Hooper (French), 1875-1885; George Tayloe Winston (German), 1875-1885; Walter D. Toy, 1885-.

        (During the first years of the University great attention was given to the study of French, a native Frenchman generally being employed as tutor of that language.)

        Rhetoric and logic: Shepard Kosciusko Kollock, 1819-1825; William Hooper, 1825-1828; Walker Anderson, 1833; William Mercer Green, 1838-1849; Charles Force Deems, adjunct, 1842-1848; John Thomas Wheat, 1850-1859; Andrew Doz Hepburn, 1860-1867.

        History: Albert Micaja Shipp, 1849-1860.

        Law: William Horn Battle, 1845-1868 and 1876-1879; John Manning, 1881-.

        Political science: David Lowry Swain, 1835-1868; Kemp Plummer Battle, 1876-.

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        Agricultural chemistry: Benjamin S. Hedrick, 1853-1858; John Kimberly, 1856-1866 and 1875-1876.

        Agricultural chemistry and metallurgy: William Battle Phillips, 1885-.

        Natural history: William H. Smith, 1876-1877; Frederick William Simonds, 1877-1881; Joseph Austin Holmes, 1881-; Emilé A. de Schweinitz, assistant professor, 1884-1885; George F. Atkinson, associate professor, 1885-.

        English language and literature: Thomas Hume, Jr[.], 1885-.

        Theory and art of teaching: Nelson B. Henry, 1885-.

        Medicine (preliminary): Thomas W. Harris, 1878-1885.

        Lecturer on stenography: N. B. Cobb, 1880-1881.

        Mental and moral science: Adolphus W. Mangum, 1875-.

Tutors.

        Archibald DeBow Murphey, 1799-1800; P. Celestine Molié, (?)-1802; Richard Henderson, 1800-1804; Atlas Jones, 1804-1806; Jacob Martin, 1806-1807; Gavin Hogg, 1808; Abner Wentworth Clopton, 1809-1810; Lewis Williams, 1810-1812; William Hooper, 1810; Abner Stith, 1814-1816; Jacob Morrison, 1814-1817; John Harper Hinton, 1814-1815; John Patterson, 1816-1817; John Motley Morehead, 1817; Priestley Hinton Mangum, 1817; Robert Rufus King, 1817-1818; William Dunn Moseley, 1817-1818; Hamilton Chamberlain Jones, 1818; Simon Peter Jordan, 1818-1821; Robert Rufus King, 1819-1820; Jacob Hervey Otey, 1820-1821; Anderson Mitchell, 1821-1823; Joseph Hubbard Saunders, 1821-1825; George Shonnard Bettner, 1823-1826; Elisha Young, 1824-1825; Matthew Evans Manly, 1825-1826; Edward Dromgoole Sims, 1825-1827; Oliver Woolcott Treadwell, 1826-1829, John Jenkins Wyche, 1826-1828; Silas Milton Andrews, 1827-1828; Lorenzo Lea, 1828-1829; Thomas Bird, 1829-1831; Henry Grattan Smith, 1830-1832; John Allen Backhouse, 1830-1831; John DeBerniere Hooper, 1831-1833; Jacob Thompson, 1831-1833; Aegidius Mebane, 1832-1833; Jacob Hogg Norwood, 1833-1834; Thomas Lapsley Armstrong, 1833-1834; William Nelson Mebane, 1833-1834; Samuel Richardson Blake, 1834-1835; William Pugh Bond, 1835; Harrison Wall Covington, 1835; Abraham Forrest Morehead, 1835; David McAllister, 1835-1836; William Henry Owen, 1835-1843; Ralph Henry Graves, 1837-1843; Ashbel Green Brown, 1844-1855; Charles Phillips, 1844-1854; Kemp Plummer Battle, 1850-1854; William Henry Johnston, 1851-1852; Richard Hines, 1853-1854; Henri Herrisse, 1853-1856; Solomon Pool, 1854-1860; Joseph Blount Lucas, 1854-1858; Richard Henry Battle, 1855-1858; William Robards Wetmore, 1855-1858; Peter Evans Spruill, 1856-1858; Samuel Spencer Jackson, 1856-1860; Thadeus Charles Coleman, 1856-1857; Charles Andrews Mitchell, 1857; John Washington Graham, 1858-1860; William Lee Alexander, 1858-1859; Robert Walker Anderson, 1859-1861; William Carey Dowd, 1859; Edward Graham Morrow, 1859; Frederick Augustus Fetter, 1860-1863; George Pettigrew Bryan, 1860-1863; George Burgwin Johnston, 1860-1863; Iowa Royster, 1860-1863; Isaac E. Emerson, 1878-1879; Locke Craig, 1879-1880; Albert Lucien Cobb, 1879-1880 and 1883-1885; Robert Paine Pell, 1879-1881; Robert Watson Winston, 1880-1881; Angus Robertson Shaw, 1881-1882; Numa Fletcher Heitman, 1881-1882; Thomas Radcliffe, 1882-1883; Benjamin Franklin White, 1883-1884; Berrie Chandler McIver, 1883-1885; James Lee Love, 1883-1884; Augustus White Long, 1884; Solomon Cohen Weill, 1884-1885; James Randlette Monroe, 1885; Claudius Dockery, 1887-; Stephen Beauregard Weeks, 1887-.

THE ELISHA MITCHELL SCIENTIFIC SOCIETY.

        The Elisha Mitchell Scientific Society was provisionally organized at the University of North Carolina September 24, 1883. Its founders and first promoters were the professors in the scientific department of that institution. In naming it they paid a fitting tribute to the memory of North Carolina's best known scientist.

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        The call which was issued to all who were thought to be interested in the promotion of science in North Carolina was favorably received, and at a second meeting held October 1, 1883, permanent organization was effected and a constitution adopted.

        Prof. F. P. Venable, Ph.D., F. C. S., the first president of the society, in his report for 1883-84, states the objects of the organization as follows: "The proposed aims of the society were the arousing or an increased interest in scientific work, the building up of a spirit of research, the encouragement of those already at work, and the advancing of our knowledge of the State and its resources. The plan or system of work for the society was to have the centre of the organization at the University with enough resident members there for the transaction of business. Monthly meetings were to be held at which popular treatises on scientific subjects were to be read with the hope of interesting and training up a number of young scientific workers. An annual journal was to be published containing all papers on original work or observations contributed by members of the society." He further says that one of the aims of the society will be the collecting and preserving all scientific works published or in manuscript relating to the State, or the authors of which are North Carolinians.

        The society has now been in active operation for four years. Its objects are being admirably realized, and its success has been commensurate with the expectations of the founders. Scientific papers of great value have been presented which are printed in the annual reports. Each number of the journal contains about one hundred pages.

        The grades of membership are life, regular, associate, and honorary. The leading scientists of the State are united in furthering the aims of the society, and favorable notice has been taken of its work by some of the noted scientists of this country and Europe. It is in correspondence with some of the principal scientific societies of this and foreign lands.

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Illustration

WAKE FOREST COLLEGE.

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CHAPTER IV.

LEADING DENOMINATIONAL COLLEGES.

WAKE FOREST COLLEGE.

FIRST PROSPECTS OF THE ESTABLISHMENT OF A BAPTIST COLLEGE.

        Wake Forest College belongs to the Baptists of North Carolina. In methods and management it is pre-eminently a Christian institution. Its founders and first promoters were men of fervent piety and broad philanthropy, who recognized the needs of their denomination and the State,--increased facilities for the higher education. Their first efforts were to bring the churches of their faith into harmonious union, and then they prepared the way for an educated ministry, the primary object of the college.

        In June, 1829, Rev. Messrs. John Armstrong, W. R. Hinton, James McDaniel, and others, met in Tarborough and organized the "Benevolent Society," which had for its object the more effectual dissemination of the Gospel throughout the State. At the regular meeting of this society, held in Greenville, Pitt County, March 26-29, 1830, a resolution was adopted dissolving the society and transferring its funds to the Baptist State Convention, which was organized at that time.

        The most prominent founders of the convention were Rev. Messrs. Samuel Wait, Thomas Meredith, and John Armstrong. The primary objects of the convention, as stated in article second of its constitution, were the education of ministers and the promotion of home and foreign missions.

        At its next annual session, held at Cross-Roads Church, Wake County, in 1831, the convention accepted the offer of Rev. John Armstrong to educate students preparing for the ministry, and the board of managers were directed to send to him or to some other good school such young ministers as they should approve, and defray their expenses as far as the funds of the convention would allow.

        In August, 1832, the convention convened at Reeve's Chapel, Chatham County, and there it was decided to establish a school under the auspices of the denomination, to be managed by a board of trustees elected by the convention. Rev. William Hooper, chairman of the committee on education, in his report advocated the purchase of a farm and the establishment of a school. The report was received, and it was unanimously

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"Resolved, That the convention deem it expedient to purchase a suitable farm and adopt other preliminary measures for the establishment of a Baptist literary institution in this State, on the manual labor principle," and a committee was appointed to secure the funds and make the purchase.

        At this time manual labor institutions were in great favor throughout the country. Among the institutions operating on this plan at that time were the Virginia Baptist Seminary, Mercer Seminary (Georgia), Maine Wesleyan Seminary, Oneida Institute (New York), Cumberland College, and the Pennsylvania Manual Labor Institute. The manual labor system was thought wise, both on account of health and economy.

        Although the institution was intended primarily for the education of ministerial students, yet as this patronage would not support the school it was decided to admit all young men of good character.

        In August, 1832, the committee appointed by the convention to select a location for the school, purchased of Dr. Calvin Jones his farm, about 16 miles from Raleigh, containing 615 acres, for $2,000.

WAKE FOREST INSTITUTE.

        The board of managers, at a meeting held in Raleigh, September 25, 1832, decided that the Baptist school should be called Wake Forest Institute. It is said that in that part of Wake County bounded by the Neuse River on the south, the Franklin line on the west, and Smith's Creek on the east, the original oak forest was unusually fine. On this account the section was called the Forest of Wake, or Wake Forest; hence the name of the institution.

        At this time it was hoped that the school would be opened the following February, but the board, at a subsequent meeting, postponed the beginning of the work of instruction till February, 1834.

        Rev. Samuel Wait, D. D., as the general agent of the convention, did what he could in the way of collecting funds and furniture for the institute. On May 10, 1833, he was elected principal of the school. Dr. Wait was born in Washington County, N. Y., December 19, 1789. He was graduated at Columbian College, Washington, D. C., where he was for a while tutor. In 1827 he came to North Carolina on a collecting tour for that college. He so favorably impressed the Newbern Baptists that they called him for their pastor in 1827. No sooner had he made North Carolina his home than he began to labor for the organization of a Baptist State convention, the foundation of a Baptist college, and the establishment of a Baptist paper, all of which he was instrumental in accomplishing.

        He was president of the institute, later college, until 1846. He was afterwards president of a female college in Oxford, and later pastor of churches in Caswell County. He died in July, 1867, "honored and respected by all, and loved with surpassing devotion by the Baptists of North Carolina."

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THE CHARTER.

        The institute was chartered by the General Assembly of 1833-34. At that time there was much prejudice against the Baptist denomination, and at one time it seemed as if the Legislature would refuse a charter. Finally the lower house passed the bill by a respectable majority, but on its final reading in the Senate there was a tie. The speaker, Mr. William D. Moseley, an alumnus of the University of North Carolina, gave the deciding vote in favor of the charter.

        The charter conferred the most meagre privileges, and nothing was done by the State to encourage or aid the school. Rev. Dr. Samuel Wait, in a sketch of the origin and early history of the college, referring to the charter, says: "This created a board of trustees composed of such individuals as were desired, with certain provisions for perpetuating themselves, allowed the institution to acquire funds to the amount of $50,000, continuing the obligation to pay taxes the same as on all private property, and to be in force or continue twenty years and no longer. Was ever a charter given more meagre or lean than this? We have leave to be if we can. But no disposition to encourage us even to the value of a dime. We were not exempted from paying taxes. Such was the state of things then."

OPENING OF THE INSTITUTE.

        Prof. W. L. Poteat, in a sketch of the college which appeared in the Raleigh Register of April 2, 1884, says: "On the first Monday of February, 1834, the exercises were opened with about twenty-five students in attendance, which number was increased to seventy in August following. What did these first students find on reaching Wake Forest? On the spot where now stands the imposing old building they found a small but comfortable frame dwelling. To the right, about where the library building stands, was the garden, both its site and embellishment still marked by the everlasting jonquils, just now venturing into the chill spring air as they did in those olden days. From a window of the magnificent public hall in the Wingate Memorial Building one may look directly down upon what was then the horse-lot. Near by was the carriage-house, 16 feet by 24, in which Mr. Wait gathered his heterogeneous charge for lectures or morning prayers. For dormitories seven good log cabins were principally relied on. The hoe and the plow were not out of sight of the blackboard and desk, for, it will be remembered, manual labor was to begin the same day with mental labor among the books."

THE MANUAL LABOR SYSTEM.

        The system as first introduced here required that each student should labor three hours per day, receiving three cents per hour for his labor.

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Finally the time was reduced to one hour per day, and after about four years the system was abandoned altogether.

        Manual labor was unpopular with the students, and the system was never, from any standpoint, even a nominal success. Prof. W. T. Brooks, in an address before the alumni of Wake Forest College, in 1859, said: "The utter distaste which many of the students had for the system was but too evident when the bell rang for labor. When the roll was called some were taken suddenly ill (?)--unable to work; but when supper hour arrived it was very apparent that their sickness was not unto death."

        Prof. L. R. Mills, in a sketch of the financial history of the college,1 says: "It was supposed in the beginning that the students' daily labor on the farm would go a long way towards paying their board. After a close examination of their accounts for that year (1835), I find that they made on an average for a year's work $4.04."


        1 Wake Forest Student, Vol. III, Nos. 6, 7, and 8 (1884).

CHARGES AND EXPENSES.

        In 1835 the charges per month were as follows: Board, $6; tuition in Latin, Greek, etc., $2; tuition in English, $1.50; washing, $1; room and firewood, gratis. During this year the price of provisions advanced about 100 per cent. and the price of board was raised to $9 per month, and yet the steward's hall did not make expenses by several hundred dollars. At the close of the year the institution was in debt to the teachers, the steward, and the treasurer.

        The next year was more prosperous, the number of students reaching 142.

        The year 1838 was what is usually termed a "hard year." Owing to the stringency in the money market many of the banks were forced to suspend specie payments. But few of the subscriptions for the large brick building which was just completed could be collected, and the trustees found it difficult to make prompt payments. In this strait money was borrowed from the banks, and the village of Wake Forest was laid off and most of the land belonging to the college was sold. The manual labor department was abolished, the steward's hall, which had all along been an incubus, was done away with, and the students were allowed to board where they pleased.

BUILDINGS AND EQUIPMENTS.

        The college campus contains about thirty acres, artistically laid out and shaded by magnificent oaks.

        In the account of the opening of the institute a description of the first buildings used for school purposes was given. These have all disappeared, and in their place are four large and well-arranged brick buildings.

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Illustration

HECK-WILLIAMS BUILDING--WAKE FOREST COLLEGE.

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        The following is a list of the buildings, with the dates of their completion.

        (1) Old Building, 1838.--One hundred and thirty-two by 65 feet, four floors; cost $15,000. This building contains dormitories for about one hundred students, two lecture-halls, and the gymnasium.

        (2) Heck-Williams Building, 1878.--One hundred and ten by 45 feet, with 10 feet from projection in centre, two floors; cost $10,000. The funds were contributed by Col. J. M. Heck and Mr. J. G. Williams, both of Raleigh. It contains the Philomathesian and Euzelian Society halls, the library (containing about 15,000 volumes), the reading-room, elegantly fitted up with the necessary furniture by the Hon. Charles M. Cooke, now president of the board of trustees, and two lecture-halls.

        (3) Wingate Memorial Hall, 1880.--One hundred and two by 60 feet, with projection in front of 10 feet, two floors; cost $12,500. The first story contains a small chapel and four lecture-halls. The second story is the main hall, known as the Wingate Memorial Hall, in honor of the late president, W. M. Wingate. It will seat two thousand people, and its acoustic properties are excellent.

        (4) Lea Building (or chemical laboratory), 1887.--The central part is 32 by 65 feet, two stories, with a wing on each side 26 by 38 feet, one story. It has been erected at a cost of $15,000, and is said to be the best arranged chemical laboratory in the South. Apparatus costing $2,000 has been recently put in, and other additions are to be made. The funds for this building were mainly contributed by Mr. A. S. Lea, of Caswell County, in whose honor it has been named.


WAKE FOREST COLLEGE.

        By legislative enactment Wake Forest Institute was changed to Wake Forest College on December 26, 1838. By the amended charter the trustees were permitted to confer the usual degrees, to hold 600 acres of land and $250,000 free from taxation. The time of the charter was extended fifty years.

        In 1839 the college charges per annum were as follows: Tuition, $45; room rent, $2; bed and bedding, $4; wood, $2; servants' hire, $2; deposit for repairs, $2. Board and washing could be secured in the village at $8 per month.

        To meet the payment of some debts that were being pressed, the trustees, in 1840, borrowed $10,000 from the State literary fund.

        Dr. Wait resigned the presidency November 26, 1844, and his successor, Rev. William Hooper, D. D., LL. D., was elected president October 17, 1845, but did not enter upon the discharge of the duties of the position till the beginning of the next year.

        Dr. Hooper was one of the first trustees of the college, and had always manifested much interest in its welfare. He was a grandson of William Hooper, a signer of the Declaration of Independence, and was born near Wilmington, N. C., in 1792. In 1812 he was graduated at the University of North Carolina, and afterwards studied theology at Princeton, N. J. He was elected professor of ancient languages in the University in 1816. In 1818 he entered the ministry of the Episcopal Church, and was for two years rector of St. John's Church, in Fayetteville. Owing to change of views he became a Baptist, resigned his rectorship, and again entered the University as professor of rhetoric.

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He was afterwards a professor in South Carolina College, and came from that State to accept the presidency of Wake Forest, which he resigned in 1848. From this time his efforts in educational work were for the promotion of the higher education of women. In 1855 he was president of the Chowan Baptist Female Institute and in 1867 he became co-principal with his son-in-law, Prof. J. DeB. Hooper, of the Wilson Female Seminary. He died August 19, 1876, and was buried in the campus of the University at Chapel Hill, near the remains of President Caldwell. It has been said of him that "North Carolina has produced no better scholar, and his work at Wake Forest and the State University is to this day a fragrant memory."

        The liabilities of the college continued to increase, and in 1848 amounted to $20,000. It looked as if the property of the institution would have to be sold to meet the outstanding obligations. The State was pressing for a return of its loan, and the claim for the balance due on the building was being urged. Owing to these difficulties, the president of the college and the president of the board of trustees resigned. The trustees at their meeting of this year adjourned without arranging to meet the obligations. It seemed that the end had come.

        In this crisis Dr. Wait, Rev. J. S. Purefoy, and other friends of the institution rallied to its rescue, relieved it from temporary embarrassment, and before 1850 they had paid every cent of the indebtedness and secured the nucleus of a permanent endowment fund.

        After the resignation of Dr. Hooper, Rev. J. B. White was elected president, which position he held till 1852.

        In June, 1854, Rev. Washington Manly Wingate, D. D., was elected president. From his accession dates a new era in the history of the college. By his wise and able management, the difficulties which threatened to overwhelm the institution were surmounted and it was placed on a permanent basis.

        Dr. Wingate was born in Darlington, S. C., March 22, 1828; was graduated at Wake Forest in 1849; studied theology at Furman University, and then entered the pastorate in his native State. In 1852 he became the agent of his alma mater, which position he held until he was called to the presidency. He remained president until his death, February 27, 1879. To write his history during the twenty-five years that he was connected with Wake Forest would be to give the history of the Baptist denomination in North Carolina for that time. For a quarter of a century he was the foremost Baptist in the State, and his influence upon the higher Christian education is not to be estimated.

        Owing to the War all college exercises were suspended in May, 1862, and were not resumed until 1866. In 1864 the Confederate States authorities took possession of the college building and used it as a hospital till the close of the War.

        In 1862 the total funds of the college amounted to $56,167.54. These were invested principally in State and Confederate Government bonds.

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Of course most of these securities were worthless at the close of the War. At that time the endowment of the college amounted to $11,700. By 1883 it had grown to about $50,000. In 1883 $50,000 were added to the fund, making a total endowment of $100,000. Of this amount $10,000 were contributed by Mr. J. A. Bostwick, of New York. Since then Mr. Bostwick has brought the college and friends of education in North Carolina under renewed obligations to himself. In 1885 he inaugurated the "Bostwick loan fund" of $10,000, the interest of which is loaned to indigent young men for the payment of tuition fees. In 1886 the "Bostwick endowment fund" was founded, by a donation of $50,000, making his total contributions $70,000. On May 1, 1887, the endowment fund amounted to $153,006.44 and the total productive funds of the college to $172,263.04. The endowment fund is being augmented from time to time, and it is probable that before many years it will amount to several hundred thousand dollars.

        In 1879 Rev. Thomas Henderson Pritchard, D. D., was elected president of the college. He is an alumnus of Wake Forest and one of the ablest Baptist ministers in the South. After accomplishing a great work for the institution, he resigned the presidency in 1882, much to the regret of the friends of the college, to again enter actively upon the work of the ministry.

        After the resignation of Dr. Pritchard, Prof. W. B. Royall, of the chair of Greek, became chairman of the faculty.

        In 1884 Rev. Charles E. Taylor, D. D., at that time professor of Latin, was made president. He is one of the ripest scholars in the South, having studied with distinction at Richmond College, the University of Virginia, and in Germany. His administration has been a success in every particular. Through his efforts and influence the greater part of the present endowment fund was secured, and to him, more than to any other one man, is due the present efficiency of the college.

SCHOOLS AND DEGREES.

        The course of study comprises ten schools, viz: Latin language and literature, Greek language and literature, English language and literature, modern languages, pure mathematics, physics and applied mathematics, chemistry, natural history, moral philosophy, and political science.

        For admission to the college the requirements are about the same as at the State University. The requirements for degrees are as follows:

        Bachelor of Letters.--The student must be a proficient in the schools (that is, he must have obtained 75 per cent. of the maximum of scholarship on each study in the school) of Latin language and literature, Greek language and literature, English language and literature, moral philosophy, and political science, and in French or German, and experimental physics.

        Bachelor of Science.--English language and literature, pure mathematics,

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physics and applied mathematics, chemistry, natural history, political science, and in French or German.

        Bachelor of Arts.--Latin language and literature, Greek language and literature, English language and literature, pure mathematics, physics and applied mathematics, moral philosophy, and political science, and in junior chemistry, zoölogy, and geology.

        Master of Arts.--All of the schools.

        A course is also given preliminary to the study of medicine, but leading to no degree.

        Candidates for degrees are required during their Senior year to deliver four public orations, or to submit in lieu thereof, under certain conditions, theses.

LITERARY SOCIETIES.

        But two literary societies are allowed, the Euzelian and the Philomathesian. They were founded in February, 1835, and there has ever been a healthy rivalry between them. As the college has grown in prosperity, the good effects have been felt in the societies. For many years they occupied halls on the fourth floor of the old college building, but were given large and comfortable quarters on the second floor of the Heck-Williams building on its completion in 1878. The college library and the society libraries were then consolidated and placed in "Library Hall," which is in the centre of the building and separates the society halls. It is said that there are not two prettier or more handsomely furnished college-society halls in the South than those at Wake Forest. The walls, tastefully frescoed and panelled, are adorned with oil portraits of members who have honored their alma mater and reflected credit on their societies. The "Phi" color is red and the "Eu" blue, and these colors are displayed on their banners and regalia. Their mottoes are, respectively, "Esse quam videri malo" and "Inveniam viam aut faciam."

        In preparing a young man for the active duties of life, these societies are worthy of special mention as an important adjunct of the college. Each Friday night and Saturday morning during the session is devoted to debate, reading of essays, and transacting the business of the society. The rules of parliamentary procedure are strictly enforced. The student has here an opportunity to formulate and express in his own language the information gathered in the recitation room. He learns to think and speak while on his feet. The proceedings of the societies are kept secret, but in February of each year they celebrate the anniversary of their organization by a public debate and orations.

        The Wake Forest Student, established in January, 1882, and second to no college periodical of its class in the country, is published by the societies. A medal is awarded each year to the student contributing the best article to this magazine. Besides this, each society gives an

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Illustration

LEA BUILDING, CHEMICAL LABORATORY--WAKE FOREST COLLEGE.

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two medals, one for improvement in debate and the other for the best essay, open to competition among its members only.

        During the last fifty years the societies have made a noble record, as is attested by the success of their members in this and other States. With the increasing prosperity of the college, their future usefulness is assured.1


        1 This account of the societies was prepared by the writer for a sketch of the college which appeared in the Raleigh (N. C.) State Chronicle of June 11, 1886.

        Greek-letter fraternities are not permitted in the college.

INFLUENCE OF THE COLLEGE.

        Wake Forest has an honorable record. Since its foundation seventy instructors and twenty-five hundred students have been connected with the institution. More than four hundred of the students have become ministers of the Gospel, eight have been college presidents, and a large number have been professors in various institutions. They have served their country in both the State and National Legislatures, have adorned the highest judicial tribunals of the State, and as farmers, teachers, physicians, merchants, and manufacturers have proved themselves good and progressive citizens.

        Wake Forest stands second to no educational institution in the State. The Faculty is liberal and progressive. It contains men who have been graduated with distinction at the University of Virginia, Leipsic, Johns Hopkins, and other well-known institutions.

        The last catalogue shows nine professors and a student attendance of two hundred, representing seven States.2


        2 Since the above was written two additional professors have been elected, and the student attendance has increased to two hundred and twenty-five.

        The close proximity of the college to the State capital gives its students a manifest advantage in the observation of political and economic phenomena. They have access to the State library and museums, and the privilege of attending the sessions of the State Legislature. Theirs is the advantage of both village and city life.

        Liberal and philanthropic friends, North and South, have established the institution on a good financial basis. Its influence is extending beyond State limits, and its future is bright with promise.

DAVIDSON COLLEGE.

PRESBYTERIAN INFLUENCE.

        The pioneer promoters of advanced educational work in North Carolina were Presbyterians. It was through their endeavors that Queen's College was established. Failing to secure Royal recognition for that institution, the name was changed to Liberty Hall Academy and chartered by the State Legislature. After the suspension of Liberty Hall the Presbyterians sent their sons to Princeton, Mt. Zion College in

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South Carolina, and later to the University of North Carolina. It is said that it was through their efforts that the clause providing for a University was inserted in the State Constitution. But the expenses of educating at those institutions prevented many of the citizens of the western part of the State from giving their sons the advantage of collegiate training, so they determined to have a college located in their midst.

        The first definite move for this purpose was a convention held at Lincolnton in September, 1820, which was attended by representatives from both the Carolinas. A board of trustees was named, and about the close of that year the State Legislature granted a charter for

WESTERN COLLEGE.

        The charter was liberal in its provisions. The trustees constituted a close corporation without ecclesiastical connection or control. The reason assigned in the charter for the establishment of this college is "that the more western counties in the State are distant from Chapel Hill, which renders it inconvenient for their youth to prosecute their education there." It was provided that the institution should be located "somewhere to the south-west of Yadkin River." More than half the trustees were Presbyterians.

        There was much opposition to the establishment of the college by the friends of the University. The trustees could not agree as to the location, or the selection of professors. They met from time to time till 1824, when the project was abandoned. But the idea still lived, and the Presbyterians decided to establish a denominational college on the manual labor plan. The theory was that indigent students could do sufficient work to pay their college expenses, while the financially better-circumstanced would be benefited physically and mentally by the amount of labor required.

DAVIDSON COLLEGE.

        At the meeting of the Concord Presbytery, then embracing that part of the State south-east of the Yadkin River, at Prospect Church, in the spring of 1835, resolutions were adopted looking to the establishment of a Presbyterian college in that section.

        A prominent alumnus of Davidson, A. Leazar, Esq., in a recent address, referring to the early history of his alma mater, said: "The unwritten story is that upon a black-board standing against the wall of the log house at Prospect was written, by the hand of Rev. Robert H. Morrison, the modest and unambitious declaration of those wise men, that 'with reliance upon God's blessing' they would undertake the establishment of a school for the promotion of liberal learning 'preparatory to the Gospel ministry.' To Rev. Messrs. R. H. Morrison, John Robinson, Stephen Frontis, and Samuel Williamson, with Elders Robert Burton,

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Illustration

DAVIDSON COLLEGE--MAIN BUILDING.

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William Lee Davidson, John Phifer, and Joseph Young, was committed the responsibility of preparing plans and selecting a location for the college."

        In the fall of 1835 arrangements were perfected to begin the erection of the necessary buildings, and the following summer a site was chosen in the northern part of Mecklenburg County, near the Iredell County line, which has been called "the literary and geographical centre of the State." William Lee Davidson, a son of General William Davidson, donated the building site, besides a large tract of land and other valuable gifts. Rev. Dr. Morrison and Rev. P. J. Sparrow secured subscriptions amounting to $30,000.

        The institution was named Davidson College in honor of General William Davidson, who fell while bravely fighting for the liberty of his country at Cowan's Ford, on the Catawba River, about 7 miles from where the college stands, on February 1, 1781. General Davidson was born in Lancaster County, Pa., in 1746. His father, George Davidson, came to North Carolina in 1750, and settled in that part of Rowan County which is now Iredell. General Davidson was probably educated at Crowfield Academy and Queen's College. He entered the Continental Army as major of the Fourth Regiment of North Carolina troops, under Colonel Thomas Polk, in General Nash's brigade. He was with Washington the greater part of the time from 1776-79. He lost his life in the engagement with the forces of Lord Cornwallis at Cowan's Ford, to which reference has been made. His sword hangs in Davidson College Museum. The Continental Congress passed resolutions eulogizing him and ordered a monument to be erected to his memory, which, however, was never done. No shaft marks his resting place. Davidson College is his monument. He could not have one nobler and, it is to be hoped, more enduring.

        The college was opened in March, 1837, with 66 students and the following Faculty: Rev. R. H. Morrison, president; Rev. P. J. Sparrow professor of languages; and Mortimer D. Johnston, tutor of mathemat, ics. A charter was granted by the Legislature December 28, 1838. The manual labor system was introduced, but proving a failure here, as at Wake Forest College, it was abandoned after a trial of four years.

        In 1855 the institution was placed on a good financial basis by the magnificent bequest of Maxwell Chambers, of Salisbury, N.C., amounting to $258,000. But the limit of the endowment as provided by the charter was $200,000; so only that amount could be received.

        The college prospered until the outbreak of the Civil War. It continued its operations during that conflict with from four to six professors, and was not suspended till just before the surrender of Lee. It was, however, soon re-opened. About $100,000 of its endowment was lost by reason of the War.

        Since the establishment of the institution the following have held the office of president: Rev. R. H. Morrison, D. D., 1837-40; Rev. Samuel

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Williamson, D. D., 1841-54; Rev. Drury Lacy, D. D., 1855-60; Rev. J. L. Kilpatrick, D. D., 1860-66; Rev. G. W. McPhail, D. D., LL. D., 1866-71; Prof. J. R. Blake, A. M. (chairman of Faculty), 1871-77; Rev. A. D. Hepburn, D. D., LL. D., 1877-85; Rev. Luther McKinnon, D. D., 1885.

PRESENT STATUS OF THE INSTITUTION.

        The college is under Presbyterial control. It was established by the Concord Presbytery, but from time to time other Presbyteries have been invited to take part in the oversight of the institution, until now each of the Presbyteries in the States of North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, and Florida has representatives in the board of trustees.

        The endowment (invested funds) amounts to $105,000. There are thirteen separate buildings belonging to the college, valued at $150,000, viz: The main college building, the chapel, two society buildings, three dormitory buildings, and six professors' houses, all of brick, except three of the residences.

        There are five endowed scholarships, viz: One of $3,000, the Maxwell Chambers scholarship, endowed by the Presbyterian Church of Salisbury, N. C.; one of $1,500, the D. A. Davis scholarship, also endowed by the Salisbury Presbyterian Church; two of $1,000, the George Bower scholarship, endowed by Mrs. A. C. Davis, of Salisbury, and the Thomas Brown scholarship, endowed by Brown & Bro., of Winston, N. C.; and one of $500, endowed by General R. Barringer and George E. Wilson, Esq., of Charlotte, N. C. Some of these entitle the incumbent to free tuition, and others go to pay the room rent and incidental expenses of the nominee.

        There are two literary societies connected with the institution, the Philanthropic and the Eumenean. Each has a commodious and handsomely furnished hall. Their exercises consist in debate, declamation, and composition. Under their auspices the Davidson Monthly, a literary magazine of merit, is published.

        Each society annually awards a debater's, an essayist's, and a declaimer's medal; and the two together award an orator's medal, which, in a public contest, is competed for by representatives from each society.

        The college and society libraries together number about 11,000 volumes.

        Greek letter fraternities are allowed, and each of the following has a chapter at the college: Mystic Seven, ΣAΕ, KA, and ΦAΧ.

        Two regular courses of study leading to the degrees of Bachelor of Arts and Bachelor of Science, each requiring four years, are provided. The requirements for admission are about the same as at the State University. A post-graduate course leading to the degree of Master of Arts is offered. The classes are divided into Freshman, Sophomore, Junior, and Senior, and there is but little latitude allowed in the choice of elective

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studies. Davidson College is noted for thoroughness, and it ranks with the best colleges of the South.

        The necessary expenses of a student for the collegiate year of ten months is about $250, the same as at the University and other colleges of the State.

        The faculty numbers 8 professors, and during the session of 1886-87 there were 119 students enrolled.

        Since the opening of the institution (including the session of 1886-87) there have been 1,875 young men enrolled as students, of whom 571 have been graduated.

        Many of North Carolina's most honored and best known citizens have been and are alumni of Davidson. Not only North Carolina but many other States, especially of the South, have appreciated the influence of those who were educated at this institution.

TRINITY COLLEGE.

THE BEGINNINGS AND HISTORY OF THE INSTITUTION.1


        1 The materials for this sketch are drawn from an address by Rev. Dr. B. Craven, in The Centennial of Methodism in North Carolina, Raleigh, 1876, an account of Trinity College by Prof. J. F. Heitman in the Raleigh Register, and data furnished by Mr. A. W. Long, now graduate student to English of the Johns Hopkins University, and late professor of history and English literature in Trinity College.


        Trinity College is managed by a board of trustees appointed by the North Carolina Conference of the Methodist Episcopal Church, South. It is distinctively a denominational college, and from humble beginnings it is now ranked among the leading institutions for the higher education in the State. It is located in Randolph County, near the sources of the Cape Fear and Uwharrie Rivers, 5 miles from the town of High Point, on the North Carolina Railroad, and 100 miles west of the capital of the State.

        The beginnings of this institution are to be found in the grammar school, established in 1838, near the present location of the college, by the Rev. Brantly York, D. D. The following year this school was moved to the present site, a good framed building erected, and a charter secured from the Legislature for the institution under the name of Union Institute. The object of the founders was to establish an academy in which their sons and those of their neighbors might receive a good practical education.

        In 1842 Dr. York resigned the management of the school, and Rev. B. Craven, then nineteen years old, was elected to take charge. From 1843 to 1850 the annual gross income of the school varied from $300 to $1,800, the general average being about $1,200. For this period the student attendance varied from 28 to 184, the average being about 105.

        In January, 1851, the institution was rechartered, the name being changed to Normal College. By this new charter the school was

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brought under State supervision. The Governor of the State was made ex-officio president of the board of trustees, and the superintendent of common schools, secretary. The object of this connection was to secure a better grade of teachers for the common schools. By a provision of the charter a certificate from the Normal College was made lawful evidence of qualification to teach in the public schools, and no further examination was required.

        The institution became very popular, and the number of students rapidly increased. The good results that were expected from the normal feature did not follow. On the contrary, it worked harm. Many received the normal certificate who were not at all adequately qualified for teaching the most elementary branches, and yet they were authorized to teach in any common school in the State which might be open to them. During the normal period, 1851 to 1859, the average annual number of matriculations was 197, and the gross income for the same time averaged about $5,000 per annum.

        

Illustration

Trinity College.

        At the annual session of the North Carolina Conference of the Methodist Episcopal Church, South, held at Salisbury, in 1851, the first connection between the conference and this school was formed. The trustees of the college agreed that young men preparing for the ministry should be educated without charge, and in return the conference indorsed the institution and annually appointed a visiting committee.

        In 1853 the charter was amended, giving the college authority to confer any and all degrees and do all other acts usually granted to literary institutions of high grade. The trustees were loaned $10,000 from the State literary fund, which was used for building purposes.

        The management of the institution was transferred to the North Carolina Conference of the Methodist Episcopal Church, South, in 1856. This transfer was not fully effected until 1858, and in 1859, by an act

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of the Legislature, the college was vested in the Conference, with all the rights and privileges usually granted in such cases, the name being changed from Normal to Trinity College. By this act all connection with the State was severed, all normal features annulled, and the institution placed on the same footing as the other denominational colleges.

        From 1859 to 1862 the gross income averaged $7,500 per annum and the number of students 204. During the War the exercises were continued, but with a constantly decreasing number of students. In 1863 President Craven resigned and Prof. W. T. Gannaway was placed in charge as president pro tempore, which position he held until 1865. On the arrival of General Hardee's corps in the village in April, 1865, exercises were suspended. Dr. Craven was re-elected president in 1865, and in January, 1866, the exercises were resumed.

        On November 7, 1882, the honored president and founder of the college and one of the foremost men in the State, Rev. Braxton Craven, D. D., LL. D., died. His death was a sad blow to the institution, and it is just beginning to recover from the effects. Prof. W. H. Pegram was appointed chairman of the faculty until the trustees could elect a president.

        In 1883 the Rev. M. L. Wood, D. D., became president. The institution became embarrassed, and at the close of the fall term of 1884 Dr. Wood resigned. The number of students continued to grow smaller, and many of the friends of the college were despondent as to its future. Just at this juncture three noble laymen of the Methodist Church, Messrs. Julian S. Carr, J. W. Alspaugh, and James A. Gray, came forward and proposed to the Conference that they would give $3,000 per year, for two years, for the support of the college, provided they should be allowed to manage the institution in their own way (subject to the general supervision of the trustees), and further provided that the Conference would contribute $2,500 per year as a supplement to their contribution. Their proposition was accepted, and they were constituted the "committee of management."

        President Wood and Prof. L. Johnson, of the chair of mathematics, having resigned, the remaining members of the faculty were retained under the new management. They were Prof. J. F. Heitman, chairman of the faculty and chair of metaphysics; Prof. M. T. Gannaway, chair of Latin and French; and Prof. W. H. Pegram, chair of natural science. Mr. H. H. Williams, A. M., was elected professor of Greek and German; Mr. J. M. Bandy, Ph. B., of mathematics; and Mr. A. W. Long, A. B., of history and English literature. Mr. N. C. English, A. M., was elected professor of business law and principal of the preparatory department.

        During the two years of this management, the college took several decided steps forward. The curriculum was broadened, examinations were made more rigid, and the system of grading examination papers

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made more strict. The number of students increased from 75 to 146 and confidence in the future of the institution was restored.

        At the close of the session of 1886-87 the college again came under the control of the conference. Two additions have been made to the faculty. Rev. J. F. Crowell, A. B. (Yale) was elected president, and Prof. J. L. Armstrong (Randolph-Macon and Leipsic), professor of French and German. Professors Williams and Long having resigned in order to continue their studies, the former at Yale and the latter at Johns Hopkins, English and German were assigned to Professor Armstrong, Greek and metaphysics to Professor Heitman, and history and theology to President Crowell. No other changes were made except that Mr. Julius Hathcock was elected a tutor in the preparatory department.

        The degrees conferred in course are bachelor of philosophy, bachelor of arts, and master of arts. Four years are generally required for the completion of a course of study leading to a degree. The standard of admission is about a year below the requirements of the State University, and consequently the standard of graduation has been lower. The new administration has already taken steps to raise the standard of instruction.

        There are two literary societies--the Columbian and the Hesperian--connected with the institution. They publish a college monthly. Greek letter fraternities were at one time permitted, but their influence being thought bad, they have been disbanded and are forbidden in the college. The libraries of the literary societies have recently been added to the college library, which now numbers about ten thousand volumes. Medals for oratory and scholarship are awarded annually by the societies and friends of the institution.

        Efforts are being made to raise a liberal endowment fund. One year ago this fund was only $6,000; now it is nearly $40,000, and it is expected that it will reach $100,000 by the close of the present year.

        From the re-opening in 1866 to the present time the average attendance has been about one hundred and fifty. The brick building has been recently enlarged. There are now ample accommodations for two hundred students. The college property, including land, buildings, furniture, and apparatus, is valued at $50,000.

        The number of students now in attendance is the largest the college has had in ten years. The institution is stronger and more aggressive than it has been since the death of its founder, and its friends believe that a bright and useful career is opening up for it in the educational work of North Carolina.

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Illustration

PEACE INSTITUTE.

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CHAPTER V.

THE HIGHER FEMALE EDUCATION.

FEMALE SCHOOLS.

        The State has never made the least provision for the higher female education, and it was not until the beginning of the present century that organized individual or denominational effort was made to establish female schools.

        In the promotion of the higher education, as well as of primary education, the best results can not, as a rule, be attained by individual or denominational endeavor operating without State competition, and so at no time have the girls of North Carolina had opportunities for intellectual development equal to those provided for the boys. The reason for this is that few individuals or denominations can provide for an institution so munificently as can a State, and if able, some stimulus is generally necessary to induce them to do it. The male colleges have always had the State University to quicken them to emulation, and in their efforts to surpass it in equipment and in the character of the instruction offered, steady growth and development have resulted.

        The first and best of the early female schools was the Salem Female Academy, founded by the Moravians in 1802, an account of which is given in this connection. Other female schools which flourished before the late Civil War, and still exist, are St. Mary's School (Episcopal), Raleigh, Wake County, established 1842; Greensborough Female College (Methodist Episcopal, South), Greensborough, Guilford County, 1846; Chowan Baptist Female Institute (Baptist), Murfreesboro', Chowan County, 1848; Thomasville Female College, Thomasville, Davidson County, 1849; Asheville Female College (Methodist Episcopal, South), Asheville, Buncombe County, 1850; Wesleyan Female College, Murfreesboro', Chowan County, 1853; Charlotte Female Institute (Presbyterian), Charlotte, Mecklenburgh County, 1857; Select Boarding and Day School, Hillsborough, Orange County, 1857; Davenport Female College, Lenoir, Caldwell County, 1858; Mt. Pleasant Female Seminary (Ev. Lutheran), Mt. Pleasant, Cabarrus County, 1858. Of those that no longer exist the following were prominent: Lochiel, near Hillsborough, Orange County, opened and conducted for a while by Walker Anderson, at one time a professor in the University of North Carolina, and later chief-justice of Florida; Rock Rest, near Haw River, Alamance County, afterwards removed to Pittsborough, Chatham County; Edgeworth Seminary, Greensborough, Guilford County, established under the auspices of Governor John M. Morehead; Floral Female College, Shoe Heel, Robeson

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County; and female schools at Williamston, Granville County; Warrenton, Warren County; and Milton, Caswell County.

        The following institutions have been recently established: Peace Institute, Raleigh, Wake County, 1872; Shelby Female College, Shelby, Cleveland County; Mt. St. Joseph College (Roman Catholic), Hickory, Catawba County, 1880; Claremont Female College, Hickory, 1880; Statesville Female College, Statesville, Iredell County, 1883. Other institutions of merit might be mentioned, for nearly every town in the State of any size has its female academy.

        The following sketches of the leading female schools, given in the order of their establishment, will show the character of the provision made for the higher education of women in North Carolina.

SALEM FEMALE ACADEMY.

        The Salem Female Academy, so well and favorably known throughout the South, is located at Salem, Forsyth County, in the north-western part of the State. The property of the institution is valued at $200,000. Salem is situated immediately adjacent to Winston, and they are often called the "twin cities." These towns are in the midst of a rolling, woodland country, among the foot-hills of the Blue Ridge, at an elevation of about 1,000 feet above the level of the sea.

        This school "is one of the five institutions of higher learning in the United States which are the property of the American Moravian Church, and are conducted under the supervision of the executive boards of its provinces, North and South. The first Moravian boarding schools in this country were institutions in which the children of the church were educated. As their parents, by reason of the responsibilities incurred in their missionary enterprises, were incapacitated for providing for these children, their education and maintenance devolved entirely upon the church. The sons and daughters of both laymen and clergymen were accordingly placed at schools, whose government, domestic arrangements, and routine life closely resembled those of the family, and were, in fact, designed as far as possible to compensate their pupils for the loss of home. Parental training, thorough instruction in useful knowledge, and scrupulous attention to religious culture were characteristics of those early schools, and are still the main features of the modern schools of which they were the precursors."

        The following facts concerning the academy were furnished the writer by Rev. Edward Rondthaler, D. D., one of the principals. Visitors in Salem toward the close of the last century were often impressed with the superior educational facilities enjoyed by the Moravian youth of this small town, and expressed the desire that their children might become partakers in their advantages. Thus the impulse was awakened in the minds of some of the Moravian people to serve God by ministering to the educational needs of the South. A work for girls was accordingly devised under the direction of an experienced educator,

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Bishop Reichel, who had been the founder of a similar institution for boys in the North.

        All the conditions of such an enterprise needed to be supplied de novo and out of small means. Several years were thus occupied. Rev. Samuel Kramsch, a gentleman of fine scholastic culture, was appointed principal on October 31, 1802. Several ladies were selected as assistants. On October 5, 1803, the corner-stone of a new building was laid with appropriate ceremonies. The spirit which animated the founders appeared in the corner-stone document, which stated that the stone was laid "with fervent prayer to our Lord, that by the school to be established in this house, His Name may be glorified, His Kingdom of Grace be enlarged in this country, and the salvation of souls of those who shall be educated therein be promoted." This prayer has been fulfilled during four-score years to a degree which the founders could not have anticipated.

        On May 16, 1804, the first pupils came from abroad. The curriculum at that time was as follows: Reading, grammar, writing, arithmetic, history, geography, German, plain needle-work, music, drawing, and ornamental needle-work. Admittance was limited to the years between eight and twelve, and the stay terminated at the age of fifteen years. Gradually the number of pupils increased until every State in the South was represented, and some of them very largely. The curriculum was enlarged, until in the "select class" a fair collegiate course was enjoyed without graduation, however. The academy was only incorporated at a late date--February 3, 1866--and its first diploma of graduation was conferred in 1877.

        The new academy building was erected 1854-56, during the principalship of the widely known and revered Rev. Robert de Schweinitz. There were at that time 216 boarding pupils, the largest number until the years of the Civil War, when the school was overcrowded with pupils sent as much for shelter and protection as for education.

        The whole number of alumnæ, not including day pupils, has been between six and seven thousand. The number of graduates since 1877 is 153.

        The school is regularly graded, with a four years' mathematical and classical course. Special advantages are offered in music, painting, drawing, and needle-work. A commercial course is also provided. Technically, it belongs to the preparatory schools, its object being to carry its pupils to the standard of entrance required at Vassar, Wellesley, or Smith Colleges.

        The corps of instructors at this time numbers 26. During the session of 1886-87 there were 222 students in attendance, representing eleven States.

        The influence of the Salem Female Academy has been wide-spread. For many years it was the only institution of repute in the South for female education. Its pupils have, therefore, been unusually well represented

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in the leading families of the South. A great many of its alumnæ have become teachers and heads of seminaries and academies, carrying the thorough and painstaking methods of this school into their own institutions. It is probably owing to the influence of the Salem Academy that preparatory institutions for the education of girls are more numerous in the South, and, as a rule, better equipped than are similar institutions for boys.

ST. MARY'S SCHOOL.

        This institution is located at Raleigh, the capital of the State. The buildings, six in number, are located in an oak grove of 20 acres, on elevated ground, a mile from the State capitol. Three of the buildings are of brick, two of stone, and one of wood. They are admirably arranged for school purposes and are furnished with modern improvements. The school was founded in 1842, under the auspices of the Episcopal Church in North Carolina, and has operated continuously since.

        The Rt. Rev. Theodore B. Lyman, D. D., is visitor of the school; the Rev. Bennett Smedes, A. M., principal and rector, and Miss M. E. J. Czarmonska, lady principal. The academic staff numbers 16 teachers, and from February, 1886, to February, 1887, there were 197 students from nine States in attendance.

        The school is divided into primary, preparatory, and academic departments. In the primary department the best features of the kinder garten system are retained, while those suited only to the nursery are discarded. Three years are required to complete the preparatory course. The academic course is arranged for five years, but if accomplishments are added more time is needed to complete it. The courses in French and German are each five years, and those languages are taught with much thoroughness. The department of music is one of the noted features of this school. It is under the direction of Dr. Auguste Kürsteiner, and the system pursued is modelled after that of the Leipzig Conservatory.

GREENSBOROUGH FEMALE COLLEGE.

        The college building, a magnificent brick structure, is located near the western limits of Greensborough, in the center of a beautiful park of 40 acres. Greensborough is in the central part of the State, and is noted for the intelligence and social refinement of its citizen

        In 1837 the trustees of the Greensborough Female School sent a petition to the Virginia Conference of the Methodist Episcopal Church, asking that a female college, under the auspices of the denomination, be established at Greensborough. It was in this year that the North Carolina Conference began its separate existence. The petition was referred to a committee, which reported favorably, and in 1838 the North Carolina Conference secured a charter for the institution from the State Legislature.

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ST. MARY'S SCHOOL.

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        This is the first female college chartered in North Carolina, and, with the exception of the Wesleyan Female College at Macon, Georgia, the first south of the Potomac.

        A site for the institution, consisting of 40 acres, was secured, and in September, 1843, the corner-stone of the college building was laid. This building, costing about $20,000, was completed in the summer of 1845.

        In 1846 the institution was opened for students, with the Rev. Solomon Lea as president. Mr. Lea resigned in December, 1847, and was succeeded by the late Rev. Albert M. Shipp, D. D., afterwards professor in Vanderbilt University, Tennessee. In 1850 the Rev. Charles F. Deems, at that time a professor in the University of North Carolina and now pastor of the Church of the Strangers, in New York City, became president, who in turn was succeeded by Rev. T. M. Jones, D. D., in 1854.

        Owing to the large attendance the building was enlarged in 1856, and again in 1859. The building was burned August 9, 1863, and the War prevented the immediate rebuilding.

        In 1869 a new charter was secured for the institution, and a board of trustees was elected in 1870. The present school building was commenced in 1871, and on August 27, 1873, the college was opened with 9 teachers, and, under the presidency of Doctor Jones, has continued in successful operation since.

        A preparatory course, and a collegiate course requiring four years are provided. The faculty at this time numbers 15, and during the session of 1886-87 there were 186 students, representing six States, in attendance.

CHOWAN BAPTIST FEMALE INSTITUTE.

        The Chowan Baptist Female Institute is located at Murfreesborough, Chowan County, in the north-eastern part of the State. The campus, embracing 28 acres, is a beautiful place. This institution is the pride of eastern Carolina, and is one of the best equipped and most thorough in the State. Its history is interesting as a successful denominational effort in behalf of the higher female education.

        In 1848 the Bertie Union Meeting (Baptist), embracing the counties of Northampton, Hertford, and Bertie, recognizing the need for female education, sent a communication to the Chowan Baptist Association asking that a high school for girls be established by the association.

        This request was acted upon favorably, and trustees were appointed with instructions to make arrangements for such a school.

        The trustees purchased and fitted up a house and lot in Murfreesborough at a cost of $1,225. The school was formally opened October 11, 1848, with the Rev. A. McDowell, D. D., of South Carolina, a graduate of Wake Forest College, as principal. In 1849 small-pox in the town necessitated the suspension of the school, but work was resumed the following month, with Rev. M. R. Forey as principal.

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        The rapidly growing patronage of the school made it necessary to have larger buildings. So encouraging was the outlook that in 1851 a joint stock company took charge of the school, selected a new site, and contracted for the large and handsome brick building now occupied, which was completed the following year. The property at that time was estimated at $35,000, but with the improvements which have since been added it is valued at more than $50,000. The funds were contributed principally by the Chowan Association, though other associations, especially the Portsmouth (Va.) Association, aided handsomely. With its enlarged facilities the institution was soon filled with young ladies from the States of North Carolina, Virginia, South Carolina, Alabama, Mississippi, Georgia, Texas, Maryland, and New York, and the District of Columbia.

        Rev. Mr. Forey was succeeded in the principalship by Rev. William Hooper, D. D., LL. D., in 1854. The institute continued its work throughout the War, although it was not far from the scene of active military operations.

        In 1862 Dr. Hooper resigned and Dr. A. McDowell, who had returned to the institution in 1855 as professor of mathematics and natural science, was elected president.

        In 1878 the joint stock company gave the institute to the Baptist denomination. Although there are other Baptist schools in the State conducted by individuals, this is the only school property devoted to female education held by the denomination.

        On May 27, 1881, Dr. McDowell died. Prof. John B. Brewer, at that time president of the Wilson Collegiate Seminary for young ladies, was elected to the presidency, and assumed the duties of the position in October, 1881. President Brewer is one of the foremost educators in the State. He is a graduate of Wake Forest College, and has associated with him 8 teachers from some of the best schools of our country. There are two departments--the preparatory, requiring two years, and the collegiate, requiring four years, for completion. Since its foundation the average attendance at this school has been about 100, nearly all of whom were boarders. As an evidence of its prosperity it may be well to add that the present building is soon to be greatly enlarged to meet the increasing demand for room.

THOMASVILLE FEMALE COLLEGE.

        This institution is located at Thomasville, in Davidson County, near the centre of the State. It was established in 1849, by Mrs. Charles Mock, and was called Silva Grove Female Seminary. During the presidency of Rev. Charles F. Deems, D. D., who was prominent in educational work in North Carolina before the war, and is at this time a well-known pastor in New York City, it was chartered by the Legislature, in 1855, as Glen Anna Female Seminary. Soon after this the school came under the management of Mr. John W. Thomas, who placed it on a better

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Illustration

CHOWAN BAPTIST FEMALE INSTITUTE.

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basis by erecting a large four-story brick building and equipping it for school purposes. At the outbreak of the War the attendance numbered one hundred and fifty young ladies, from several of the Southern States. The exercises were continued during the War. In 1867 the name of the institution was changed by act of the Legislature to Thomasville Female College. After the death of Mr. Thomas, in 1873, the institution was closed for a year and a half. In 1874 the property was purchased by Prof. H. W. Reinhart, of Richmond College, and the school re-opened. In 1879 a large addition was made to the building, making it one of the largest and most attractive school buildings in the State. In 1885 the Rev. J. N. Stallings, an alumnus of the University of North Carolina, became principal. The institution is divided into primary, preparatory, collegiate, ornamental, and domestic departments. The corps of instructors numbers nine, and the catalogue for 1886-87 shows a student attendance of eighty-three.

PEACE INSTITUTE.

        This institution is situated at Raleigh, about one mile from the State capitol. The grounds comprise 8 acres, artistically laid out and admirably suited for exercise and amusement. The main building, costing more than $40,000, is lighted by gas and electricity, and is heated by steam. It is claimed that it is the largest and best equipped school building in the State.

        In 1857 the plan of having a school of high grade for young ladies, at the State capital, was discussed by many prominent men in the North Carolina Synod of the Presbyterian Church. Steps were taken to establish such a school, William Peace, an elder in the Raleigh Presbyterian Church, heading the subscription list with $10,000, and it is in his honor that the school is called Peace Institute.

        Presbyterians throughout the State contributed liberally, and in 1858 the erection of a building was commenced.

        The War prevented the opening of the school, and the Confederate government took charge of the building for hospital purposes. After the fall of the Confederacy, the Federal authorities took possession and used it for the Freedmen's Bureau. When the directors again got control of the property it was in such a condition that they almost despaired of putting it in a suitable condition for school purposes, and were on the point of selling it to Rev. Dr. Tupper, president of Shaw University, for the use of a colored school, but some friends came forward and contributed sufficient funds to enable the directors to make the necessary repairs, and the building was made ready for the school.

        In 1872 the property was leased to Rev. R. Burwell, D. D., and his son, John B. Burwell, A. M., at that time principals of the Charlotte Female Institute, and since then it has been under their direction.

        Dr. Burwell has probably been connected longer with institutions for girls than any other educator in the State. In 1837 he opened a female

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school in Hillsboro'. In 1857 this school was removed to Charlotte, where it was known as the Charlotte Female Institute. This institution is still one of the best female schools in the State. He continued the management of this school until his removal to Raleigh, in 1872.

        The growth of Peace Institute has been steady. The corps of instructors numbers fifteen, and during the past five years the average enrolment has been over 200 students, representing more than half a dozen States. Instruction is given in the following departments: Collegiate, normal, primary, and kindergarten, music, and fine arts. In thoroughness and equipment it stands second to no female school in the South.

OXFORD FEMALE SEMINARY.

        The seat of this seminary is Oxford, Granville County, in the northern part of the State.

        This institution is the continuation of the Raleigh Female Seminary, which was established in Raleigh, about 1870, by the Rev. William Royall, D. D., now a professor in Wake Forest College, and one of the most learned men in the State. After the resignation of Dr. Royall, Prof. F. P. Hobgood became president, and in 1880 he moved the institution to Oxford, changing the name to Oxford Female Seminary.

        The buildings of the Oxford Female Seminary, which were erected about 1850, were remodeled in 1880 at a cost of $4,500. Since that time about $5,000 additional have been spent in building and repairs. The school grounds are about four acres, beautifully laid out.

        The course of study comprises a preparatory and a collegiate department. There are nine teachers in the faculty, representing the University of Virginia, the Stüttgart Conservatory, Cooper Institute, and other well-known institutions of learning and art. During the session of 1885-86 there were one hundred and thirty-seven students enrolled, an increase on any previous year.

GENERAL CHARACTERISTICS.

        North Carolina has no Vassar or Bryn Mawr. The reason is obvious. With one or two exceptions all of the female schools are owned and directed by the principals. They can not be blamed for managing them in such a way as will remunerate them most, just as merchants and manufacturers manage their affairs. It is to be expected that they will add improvements, extend their curricula, and secure the best teachers only as they are forced to do so by rival institutions or the demands of public sentiment. Owing to the fact that none of these institutions are endowed, nor receive any income from any source other than from the pupils, they can not reach the highest degree of efficiency. It is well known that at the best colleges and universities of this country only a small fraction of the expenses are met by the fees from students. Until there is in the State a well endowed female college it can not be expected

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OXFORD FEMALE SEMINARY.

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that the quality of the higher female education will be equal to that provided in most of the Northern States.

        But it must not be judged from the above that North Carolina has no good female schools, nor that they are managed wholly on selfish principles. The principals of these schools are men of liberal culture, devoted to their profession, and with the means at their disposal they deserve great credit for having placed the standard of instruction as high as it is.

        A well known professor in one of the leading female schools says that "the higher female education in North Carolina is not high." But while the courses of study in the female schools are not very extended, yet the instruction given, as far as it goes, is thorough. Most of these institutions give from three to five years' courses in Latin, French, German, history, English language and literature, the natural sciences, and mathematics as far as and including trigonometry.

        The following schedule of classes and studies required at Peace Institute will give a fair and comprehensive view of the extent and character of the subjects taught in the collegiate departments of the leading female schools in the State, for in the main their curricula are about the same:
FIRST CLASS. SECOND CLASS.
First term, twenty weeks. Second term, twenty weeks. First term, twenty weeks. Second term, twenty weeks.
Higher lessons in English.* Reading and spelling.* Higher lessons in English completed. Elocution and spelling. Grammatical analysis. Elocution and spelling. English synonymes. Elocution and spelling.
Arithmetic to percentage.* Arithmetic completed. Algebra begun. Algebra completed.
First lessons in botany. Physiology. Natural history. Physics.
History of the United States. History of England. Ancient history commenced. Ancient history completed.
Latin grammar and reader. Cæsar. Sallust. Virgil.
French grammar. French grammar. Reading from different authors. Grammar. Reading from different authors. Composition or letters. Reading from different authors. Composition or letters.
German grammar. German grammar. Sprachlehrer. Sprachlehrer continued. Compositions. Reading from different authors.

        * All pupils are required to take these schools; the rest elective.



        * Spelling and dictation exercises through second year.


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JUNIOR CLASS. SENIOR CLASS.
First term, twenty weeks. Second term, twenty weeks. First term, twenty weeks. Second term, twenty weeks.
Rhetoric and composition commenced. Elocution. Rhetoric and composition completed. Elocution. English literature and elocution. Principles of criticism.
Geometry. Trigonometry, plane.* Trigonometry, spherical.* Arithmetic reviewed.
Chemistry. Geology. Physical geography. Astronomy and history of science.
General history commenced. General history completed. Mental philosophy. Moral philosophy and evidences of Christianity.
Cicero. Horace commenced. Horace completed. Livy.
Grammar Larousse. Fables de Lafontaine. Composition. Grammar Larousse. Littérature contemporaine. Compositions. Entretiens sur la Grammaire. Molière. Compositions. Littérature classique. Racine.
Selections from the classics. Compositions. Weber's Literature. Compositions. Hayes' Grammar. Compositions. Goethe. Schiller.

        * In lieu of these, book-keeping and advanced arithmetic can be taken.


        The charges for board and tuition in the regular course as represented above, in the leading female schools of the State, amount to about $250 per annum.

        Nearly all the institutions of which accounts have been given provide good courses in vocal and instrumental music, in pastel, charcoal, and crayon drawing, and in oil and water-color painting, for which extra charges are made. One criticism of the higher education provided for young ladies in North Carolina is that more attention is given to the attainment of these accomplishments than to the acquirement of a substantial education. A professor in one of these schools writes: "It seems to me that the more cultured (?) of our people care less for a substantial education for their girls than the masses do. Poverty and necessity are driving us from the heathenish notion that all the preparation a woman needs for the battle of life is a delicate body, a pretty face, and a musical voice."

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        The leading institutions have libraries varying from five hundred to two thousand volumes. As a rule their stock of scientific apparatus is small and insufficient. The great need of all these schools is funds.

        The cheapest and best way to educate the next generation is to educate every girl of the present one. The mother gives more education that is of practical effect in life than all the teachers. It has been well said that "the physical, mental, and moral muscles of a child are beginning to harden before he ever gets into the hands of a teacher." A better and more healthful sentiment in regard to the education of women is growing up in the Old North State, which, it is hoped, will soon develop itself in a practical way.

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CHAPTER VI.

SECONDARY INSTRUCTION.

GENERAL CRITICAL SURVEY.

        Schools for secondary instruction are numerous, but it is impossible to collect full and reliable statistics concerning them. The State superintendent of public instruction informs the writer that he does not know the number of private schools in the State, and that no provision is made for collecting information concerning them. The reports which they make to the United States Commissioner of Education are meagre and unsatisfactory, and private individual effort to reach them has proved unsuccessful.

        A stranger reading their catalogues and announcements might be led to suppose that many of them offer advantages for study superior to those of Phillips Exeter, and other excellent fitting schools in the East, but to one who has had an insight into their management and is acquainted with their workings such a supposition is impossible.

        The first criticism that the writer would urge is that they undertake too much. Some of these schools endeavor to offer the advantages of a college, while many of the so-called colleges are in reality secondary schools, but in attempting to place themselves on a higher plane than they are fitted to occupy they lose in thoroughness and efficiency.

        As a rule, no well ordered system of study and student advancement are provided in these schools, though there are several notable exceptions to which reference will be made. The most noticeable defect in the educational system (if system it may be called) is in the primary training of the pupil. Proper attention is not given to the groundwork of his education. He is advanced from the primary to the preparatory department before the essential rudiments of an education have been mastered. The charge for annual tuition is determined by the student's grade; the schools are private property; the teachers are ambitious; the result is that it is not infrequent that the child is assigned work beyond his capacity. Parents as well as teachers are to be blamed for this. Many regard their children as intellectual prodigies and are dissatisfied if they are not rapidly promoted in school. In their eyes he is the best teacher who advances (?) his pupils fastest. If he attempts to hold the child to primary work longer than the parents think necessary, they withdraw their patronage and send to one who will gratify their vanity. It is pleasing to the pupil to be advanced rapidly from class to class. He is not yet old enough to realize the advantage

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of a thorough preparation. It is patent, therefore, that the self-interest of the teacher, the vanity of the parents, and the whim of the child, as represented above, tend to superficiality.

        After the student has been advanced from the primary to the preparatory department, the object in most cases is to get him in college as soon as possible, or if he is not fitting for college, to silver-plate him with a business course (?) which he is assured will answer his purposes in practical life without the necessity of submitting to college drill and discipline for four years.

        Instead of providing a broad and liberal course of study, the object of most of these schools is to give the student enough Latin, Greek, and mathematics to enable him to enter college with credit, and in but few instances is this result attained. Only the outlines of history are taught, and this in a superficial way; political economy is hardly ever included in the curriculum; the courses in political and physical geography are short and unsatisfactory; botany, geology, physiology, zoölogy, and natural philosophy are barely touched upon; the modern languages are hardly ever taught; and the student is given such a meagre course in his own language and literature that in after life as a writer and speaker he is often made to feel the deficiencies of his early training.

        From the preparatory school the student goes to college, passes the entrance examination in Latin, Greek, and mathematics, enters upon advanced studies, and, at the end of four years is presented to the world as a graduate; but in few cases can he be said to be educated, in the full sense of what that word implies; for the defects of preliminary training are too often manifest.

        For the more than one hundred secondary schools reporting from North Carolina, excepting only a few institutions, the above is true; and not only is it true for this State, but for many others of the Union, especially in the South.

GRADED SCHOOLS.

        The public graded schools in the larger towns, the first being established at Greensborough in 1875, are exerting a good influence in systematizing and making more thorough primary and preparatory instruction throughout the State. Maj. S. M. Finger, superintendent of public instruction, in his report for 1885-86, says: "These schools have done a great deal of good, not only in the communities in which they are located, but to the whole State. They are examples of the possible efficiency, popularity, and cheapness of education at public expense.

        "They are becoming so efficient as to command respect and patronage of all classes of our people. I wish that every citizen of the State could spend a day in one of these well managed schools, because I think he would go away with a higher appreciation of the safety and practicability of public schools."

        By special acts of the Legislature, towns are permitted to vote upon

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the establishment of these schools. The funds for their support are raised by special taxation and taxation under the common-school law.

        Each school is usually divided into about ten grades, each grade having a teacher and room to itself. One year is required to complete the studies in a grade. By a uniform system of examinations pupils are advanced to higher grades. In nearly all of these schools there is a library for the benefit of the pupils and a pedagogical library for the teachers. The teachers usually meet once or twice a month to discuss methods of teaching, study approved works on pedagogy, and have review lessons on the subjects taught in the schools. Students in these schools are prepared for entrance into the colleges and University of the State. There are seventeen graded schools in the State. The secretary of the board of trustees of the Durham Graded School, Mr. S. F. Tomlinson, who has given much attention to the study of educational systems, gives it as his opinion that "Graded schools, properly conducted, are pre-eminently the schools for the towns and cities of the South; because they afford the greatest and most improved facilities to all classes alike for obtaining an education free, or for the least money."

CO-EDUCATIONAL INSTITUTIONS.

        In North Carolina the opposition to the co-education of the sexes in the higher institutions of learning is so manifest that no one would dare propose, with any hope of success, that women be admitted to the University and leading denominational colleges of the State. But co-education is making headway in the institutions for secondary instruction, and its friends claim that good results have been manifest. The rank that women are taking in some of the best of the English and American universities precludes the argument that they can not maintain themselves in intellectual competition with the sterner sex, and so the objection that their admission would necessitate the lowering of the educational standard is not valid. The expediency of their admission is an open question which the writer is not prepared to advocate; but at this time when a number of the female teachers of the State are seeking admission to the normal department of the University, endowed by the State for the express purpose of giving the teachers of the State, a large proportion of whom are women, a better opportunity for special preparation in their profession, the question is practical to all North Carolinians and is worthy of careful study.

        The following co-educational institutions, established before the War, are still in successful operation: Friend's School (Quaker), New Garden, Randolph County, established 1833 (the property of this school is valued at $40,000, and it has $23,700 in productive funds); Catawba College (German Reformed), Newton, Catawba County, 1850; Clinton Collegiate Institute, Clinton, Sampson County, 1850; Mt. Vernon Springs Academy, Mt. Vernon Springs, Chatham County, 1850; Oak Ridge Literary and Commercial Institute, Oak Ridge, Guilford County,

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1850; Anson Institute, Wadesborough, Anson County, 1854; Yadkin College (Protestant Methodist), Davidson County, 1856; Rutherford Academy, Burke County, 1858 (chartered as Rutherford Seminary in 1861, and as Rutherford College in 1870). The following have been established since the War: Weaverville College (Methodist Episcopal, South), Weaverville, Buncombe County, 1875; Concordia College (Evangelical Lutheran), Conover, Catawba County, 1875; Kinston College, Kinston, Lenoir County, 1876; King's Mountain High School, King's Mountain, Cleveland County, 1876; Moravian Falls Academy, Wilkes County, 1876; Judson College (Baptist), Hendersonville, Henderson County, 1878; Graham Normal College, Graham, Alamance County, 1880; Oakdale Academy, Oakdale, Alamance County, 1880; Gaston College (Lutheran), Dallas, Gaston County, 1882; Southern Normal, Lexington, Davidson County, 1884. Some of these institutions represent a wide area of student patronage, e.g., during the session of 1886-87 more than two hundred students were enrolled at Oak Ridge Institute, more than fifty of them coming from Virginia, South Carolina, New York, Texas, and Arizona, and the rest representing more than thirty counties in North Carolina, but a majority draw their entire student clientage from the State.

PREPARATORY MALE SCHOOLS.

THE BINGHAM SCHOOL.

        The Bingham School stands pre-eminent among Southern schools for boys, and ranks with the best in the Union. It is the oldest, the largest, and the most successful male boarding school for secondary instruction in the South, and for the past five years it has been second to no institution of similar character in area of patronage.

        This noted school was established in 1793, by the Rev. William Bingham, a native of Ireland. He was educated for the church and was graduated with distinction at the University of Glasgow. Mr. Bingham became involved in one of the many unsuccessful attempts for Irish independence, and was compelled to seek safety and freedom in another land. His dismission from the Presbytery of Belfast, of which he was a member, is dated April 14, 1788, soon after which date he sailed for America. Landing at New Castle, Delaware, he made his way to Wilmington, North Carolina, where he hoped to secure employment as a teacher. He had failed in this and was about to give up in despair, when, by a sign given in taking a drink of water, he was recognized as a Mason by some influential citizens, who thereupon exerted themselves in his behalf and secured for him the principalship of the Wilmington Academy. In 1793 he removed to Pittsborough and established the Bingham School. In 1801 he was made professor of Latin at the State University, which position he filled with credit till 1806, when he resigned to again open a private school, thinking that in this

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way he could do more to advance the cause of education than by his work in the University. The school was opened at Hillsborough, but was soon removed to Mt. Repose, in Orange County, four miles from the present location, where he conducted it till his death in 1826.

        Rev. Mr. Bingham was succeeded by his eldest son, William J. Bingham, of whom it has been said that "It is hardly possible that any other man can ever again be so pre-eminent in the State as Mr. Bingham was in his profession. He occupied a field previously unoccupied, and to remarkable opportunities he added remarkable ability. He raised teaching from an almost disreputable employment to an honorable profession; he raised tuition fees from $20 per year at the highest to $150 per year. He refused three hundred applications for admission in a single year, and though he conscientiously avoided accumulating money, he became, in spite of himself and his numerous charities, a man of comparative affluence."

        For twenty years William J. Bingham conducted the Bingham School at Hillsborough, where he established it after the death of its founder. Then it was removed to Oaks, in Orange County, where it remained until, in the winter of 1864-65, the seat of the school was fixed permanently at its present location (Bingham School P. O.) in the same county, near Mebane, 50 miles west of Raleigh, on the North Carolina Railroad.

        In 1857 he associated his sons, William and Robert, with him in the management, they having been graduated at the State University with the highest distinction.

        The school was incorporated by an act of the Legislature of 1864-65; the military feature, which had been introduced during the War, was formally ingrafted; its officers were commissioned by the State, and its pupils were exempted from duty till they were 18 years of age. Although the Confederacy was tottering to its fall, log huts were built and the cadets went regularly into camp. Soon after the War began, the present principal, then the junior teacher of the school, entered the army and remained there till the surrender at Appomattox. His father, who died in 1866, and his elder brother continued the school throughout that eventful struggle.

        William Bingham, as senior principal, conducted the school with distinguished success till his death in 1873. He was the author of a series of Latin text-books, which the publishers say are used in every State in the Union; certainly there is hardly an institution of note in North Carolina in which they are not used.

        The Bingham School has reached its greatest efficiency under its present superintendent, Major Robert Bingham.

        The log huts in which the cadets were quartered when the school was first removed to its present site have been replaced by frame buildings, with increased accommodations. The lecture halls, society halls, and barracks are excellently equipped for their specific purposes, and a

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gymnasium and bath-house, with swimming baths, have been added to the school buildings. The buildings are provided with gas.

        The motto of the school is "Mens sana in corpore sano," and physical culture receives the attention which its importance demands. "Bingham's is the only school in North Carolina, and one of only 40 in the United States, which has an officer detailed from the U. S. Army as commandant of cadets. The military feature has been found of great value as a means of physical culture and as an aid to discipline. At the same time the drill is not allowed to interfere in any degree with study, the object being to make, not soldiers, but citizens." (Cat., art. 4.)

        The Bingham School does not claim to be a cheap school, though for the advantages offered there is none cheaper known to the writer. The actual school expenses for a term of forty weeks is $272. This does not include uniform, etc.; and the necessary expenses of a student per year, all told, are from $400 to $500. Three courses are provided, viz, classical, mathematical, and commercial. A regular course occupies four years, on the satisfactory completion of which the student is given a certificate of proficiency. Major Bingham says: "It is a training school, pure and simple, not a college or a collegiate institute, though its certificate of proficiency, as indicated by the demand for its proficient graduates as teachers and the pay they command, is more valuable than a similar certificate from any other school in the South, and more valuable than a diploma from many of the colleges."

        During the session of 1886-87 there were 220 students in attendance from 15 States and the District of Columbia. The present faculty numbers 8 teachers.

THE HORNER SCHOOL, OXFORD.

        The Horner School was established at Oxford, in Granville County, in 1851, under the auspices of the present senior principal, Prof. J. H. Horner.

        For scholarship and thoroughness this school has but few equals in the State. It is a classical, mathematical, scientific, and military academy.

        Two courses of study are provided, the "classical," and the "scientific and English." Each course is arranged for four years. The requirements are as follows:

        I. The classical course embraces the studies in the schools of Latin, Greek, mathematics, English grammar and rhetoric, geography, history.

        II. The scientific and English course embraces the studies in the schools of mathematics, natural science, metaphysics, English grammar and rhetoric, geography, history.

        French, German, and book-keeping are elective studies, which may be substituted for their equivalent in the regular courses, or taken in addition to them.

        Every student, on his admission into the school, is assigned to those classes in the regular courses for which he is found qualified.


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Scheme of morning recitations.

[Daily except Friday.]
Class room No. 8.30 to 9. 9 to 9.45. 9.45 to 10.30. 10.30 to 11.15. 11.15 to 12.
1 Penmanship and book-keeping. Latin, first class. Latin, second class. English grammar, first class. Greek, second class.
2 Penmanship and book-keeping. Latin, fourth class. Greek, first class. English grammar, second class. Greek, third class.
3 Penmanship and book-keeping. English grammar, third class. Latin, third class. Geography or history, fourth class. Geography or history, third class.
4 Penmanship and book-keeping. Natural science, second class. English grammar, fourth class. Natural science, fourth class. Natural science, fourth class.
[Friday.]
1 English composition. Latin, first class. Latin, second class. English grammar, first class. Metaphysics.
2 English composition. Latin, fourth class. Greek, first class. English grammar, second class. Greek, second class.
3 English composition. English grammar, third class. Latin, third class. Geography or history, fourth class. Geography or history, third class.
4 English composition. Military tactics English grammar, fourth class. Experimental work in natural science.

        

Scheme of afternoon recitations.

[Daily except Friday.]
Class room No. 2 to 2 30. 2.30 to 3.15. 3.15 to 4. 4 to 4.45. 4.45 to 5.30.
1 Penmanship and book-keeping. Mathematics, fourth class. Metaphysics Reading and spelling. Military drill.
2 Penmanship and book-keeping. French German Reading and spelling. Military drill.
3 Penmanship and book-keeping. Mathematics, third class. Mathematics, second class. Reading and spelling. Military drill.
4 Penmanship and book-keeping. Natural science, first class. Mathematics, first class. Reading and spelling. Military drill.
[Friday.]
1 English composition. Geography, first class. History, first class. Declamation Military drill.
2 English composition. Geography, second class. History, second class. Declamation Military drill.
3 English composition. Geography, fourth class. History, fourth class. Declamation Military drill.
4 English composition. Geography, third class. History, third class. Declamation Military drill.

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        The student, besides being subjected daily to quizzes by his instructors, is given oral and written examinations at the close of each session on all the subjects studied. A report of the standing, punctuality, and deportment of each student is made out at the close of every quarter and sent to his parents or guardian. The student's standing in his class is estimated by the instructor, and marked on a scale in which the number 7 is taken as a maximum, and stands for "very good;" 6, "good"; 5, "very respectable"; 4, "respectable"; 3, "tolerable"; 2, "bad"; 1, "very bad." Students are not advanced to a higher class until they have stood an approved examination on the studies of the preceding class.

        The school is strictly military in its organization and discipline.

        The annual register for 1885-86 shows four instructors, and a student attendance of one hundred and six, from four States and the District of Columbia. The principals say that "improvements will continue to be made in our accommodations, but the capacity of the school will not be enlarged. We do not desire any considerable increase in our numbers, satisfied as we are that efficiency in the management of a school is best secured with a limited number of pupils."

OTHER SCHOOLS OF MERIT.

        Prominent among the schools deserving to be mentioned in this connection is the Raleigh Male Academy, at Raleigh, reopened by Professors J. J. Fray and Hugh Morson, both of the University of Virginia, in 1878, and which, since the death of Captain Fray, in December, 1884, has been under the efficient management of Professor Morson and Capt. C. B. Denson, two of the best known and most popular teachers in the State.

        This school has no regular curriculum. The subjects taught may be divided into the following general classes, viz:

  • I. The usual English branches, with mathematics.
  • II. The Latin and Greek languages and their literature.
  • III. The French and German languages and their literature.
  • IV. The natural sciences.
  • V. Book-keeping.

        Every pupil is required to take throughout his connection with the school orthography, penmanship, English composition, and declamation.

        The average student attendance is about one hundred.

        The writer was connected with this school as an assistant teacher in 1884, and is prepared to commend it for thoroughness and substantial work.

        The early history of the Raleigh Male Academy is thus given by President Kemp P. Battle, of the University of North Carolina, in a centennial address on "The Early History of the City of Raleigh," delivered in that city July 4, 1876:

        "The attention of the people of Raleigh was early directed to the

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subject of education. The most active man in inaugurating schools was Joseph Gales, the editor of the Register, one of the most enlightened fathers of Raleigh. The following is the list of trustees elected March 27, 1802: John Ingles, William White, Nathaniel Jones (of White Plain), Henry Seawell, Simon Turner, William Boylan, John Marshall, and Joseph Gales. Nathaniel Jones, who had donated $100, was chosen president, and Joseph Gales secretary.

        "One month afterwards $800 is reported subscribed, and soon an academy is built, by permission of the General Assembly, on Burke Square, one building for the males and one for the females.

        "This academy became a power in the land. It grounded the education of nearly all the boys of that day in central North Carolina. It was the pride and glory of Raleigh for a third of a century.

        "The academy began in grand style. In 1804 we read an advertisement which announces the teachers as follows: Rev. Marin Detargney (late of Princeton, and of the College of Maryland) as principal; Chesley Daniel, graduate of the University of North Carolina and late one of the tutors, assistant; Miss Charlotte Brodie, teacher of needlework.

        "Greek, Latin, Spanish, French, mathematics, with application to the system of the world, astronomy, navigation, etc., all at $5 per quarter. A less amount might be had for $4 per quarter. The English branches were $3 per quarter, and needle-work free.

        "Such array of all the sciences seems to have been above the demands of young Raleigh, and in 1810 it is announced by William White, the secretary of the board, that the trustees of the academy had engaged the Rev. William McPheeters, from Virginia, a gentleman eminently qualified for the undertaking, to become the principal of the academy and pastor of the city.

        "The leaders in the great contest with the social and political evils of the day, those who must drill the young to their full powers and enable them to cope with the active, adventurous, nothing-fearing, all-daring spirit of this age, are the teachers of the land. Our people, captivated by the eloquence of the statesman, or the brilliant achievements of the warrior, do not fully appreciate the grandeur of their calling. * * *

        "Dr. William McPheeters was one of the best of his class, painstaking, conscientious, thorough, parental and kind to the dutiful, but a terror to the truant. High-minded, brave, frank, abhorring all meanness, he not only instructed the minds of his boys, but he trained their consciences to aim at his own lofty standard.

        "He was, too, pastor of the city for several years. His ministrations in the Commons Hall were attended by all; and Episcopalians and Baptists, Presbyterians and Methodists, in their triumphs and their sorrows, on the bed of sickness and in the hour of death, found in him a sympathizing friend, a safe counsellor, a true, tried, well-armed, Great-Heart.

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        "Under this remarkable man the Raleigh Academy grew and flourished, and the Raleigh people, insensibly looking up to him as a common guide, were a united community, unpretentious, sociable, cordial to one another, and cordial to strangers."

        For a number of years this academy, previous to coming under its present management, was conducted by the Lovejoys, who during their lifetime were as noted educators as the Binghams.

        Owing to the fact that Burke Square, where the school was conducted for many years from its organization, was fixed upon as the site of the new residence for the Governor, another location for the school had to be chosen. An entire square in the north-eastern part of the city was secured, on which a large, well-ventilated, and comfortable building was erected, fully adapted to the requirements of the school. This building has been occupied since September, 1883.

        The DAVIS SCHOOL, a classical and military institution, established by Col. A. C. Davis, at La Grange, Lenoir County, in 1881, is rapidly gaining a wide reputation. In many respects it is modelled after the Bingham School. Its student attendance embraces a large number of States. The faculty is able and progressive and includes graduates from some of our best institutions. This school, as do the Bingham, the Horner, and other leading institutions of the State, maintains excellent literary societies in which the students are required to debate, declaim, and prepare essays. It also has a good cadet cornet band and orchestra.

        Other schools for secondary instruction might be mentioned in this connection, but the above are sufficient to show the characteristic features of these institutions in North Carolina.

ANTE-BELLUM MALE SCHOOLS.

CALDWELL INSTITUTE.

        This institution, named in honor of the Rev. Joseph Caldwell, D. D., first president of the State University, was instituted and managed by the Orange Presbytery. It was established at Greensborough and began the work of instruction January, 1836, the Rev. Dr. Alexander Wilson and Mr. Silas C. Lindsay being the first teachers. To these was added the Rev. John A. Gretter. Dr. Charles Phillips says: "This trio taught a school of the highest pretensions ever known in North Carolina. Its students joined the Junior class in the University."

        This institute was removed to Hillsborough sometime about 1846. It succeeded the Bingham School at that place, and was in turn succeeded a few years later by the school of Mr. Ralph Graves, father of Professor Graves, of the University.

        The Graves School was succeeded by the Hillsborough Military Academy.

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HILLSBOROUGH MILITARY ACADEMY.

        This school was founded in February, 1859, by Col. Charles C. Tew, a native of South Carolina. Colonel Tew was educated at the Citadel, the South Carolina Military Academy. Soon after being graduated he was appointed to a professorship in the Arsenal, a branch of the Military Academy, where he remained, with the exception of a year spent in study in Europe, until 1858, when he decided to establish a military academy in North Carolina. Excellent brick barracks, one mile from Hillsborough, were erected for this school.

        At the outbreak of hostilities Colonel Tew entered the Confederate army and lost his life in the service. Major Gordon, one of the assistant teachers, conducted the school during the War. After the War it was attempted to revive the institution, at first under Colonel White and then under General Colston, but upon the latter's removal to Wilmington in 1868 the school was closed, until in 1874 it was revived under Messrs. Graves and Horner, who had been conducting a school at Oxford, but in a few years, for want of satisfactory patronage and other reasons, it was again closed and has not been re-opened since.

THE NORTH CAROLINA MILITARY INSTITUTE.

        At one time this was one of the noted institutions in the State. It was located in the suburbs of Charlotte.

        The corner-stone of the main building, an imposing brick edifice, built in the Norman castellated style of architecture, situated in a campus of twenty-seven acres well shaded by oaks, was laid in 1858, and, the building having been completed, the work of instruction was commenced the following year. It is said the building was planned by General "Stonewall" (T. J.) Jackson, who at one time contemplated opening a military academy with his brother-in-law, General D. H. Hill, in Charlotte. The school was opened with General D. H. Hill as superintendent, assisted by General Lane, Col. Charles Lee, and one or two others.

        The War closed its halls. The institution was revived in 1873 by Col. John P. Thomas, of South Carolina, at one time principal of the Citadel Academy, in that State, who conducted it for several years. The building is now used by the graded school.

        Other institutions could be mentioned, but the above were the most prominent of the schools organized before the Civil War, and which have since gone down.

REV. JOHN CHAVIS,

A DISTINGUISHED COLORED EDUCATOR.

        One of the most remarkable characters in the educational history of North Carolina was a negro. His life finds no parallel in the South, nor, so far as the writer is aware, in any part of our country. To one who

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is familiar with the status of the negro in the slave-holding States in the first half of this century, the following will read stranger than fiction, but of its truth there can be no question. This man, with a history so unique, was the Rev. John Chavis, a Presbyterian clergyman and an eminent teacher. His contemporaries admired him for his noble bearing as a gentleman, revered him for his fervent piety as a Christian, and respected him for his eminent ability as a teacher and preacher.

        The Rev. Charles Phillips, D. D., LL. D., of the University of North Carolina, made an effort, several years ago, to collect materials for a sketch of Mr. Chavis, and the data for this account are drawn principally from correspondence which he has kindly placed at my service. These letters are from well-known citizens who were personally acquainted with the negro divine. He is remembered by them as an old man, after he had retired from the work of teaching, and of his early life but little is known.

        The birthplace of John Chavis can not be located with certainty, but it is probable that he was born near Oxford, in Granville County. The name is still common in the northern central section of the State. It is evident that he was born free. He studied at Princeton as a private pupil of Dr. Witherspoon, to whom, it is said, he was sent to see if a negro were capable of receiving a collegiate education. His career in after life leaves no doubt as to the success of the experiment. It is believed that he went from New Jersey to Virginia with the Rev. Samuel Davies, where he actively engaged in the work of the ministry. At the instance of the Rev. Henry Patillo he returned to North Carolina about 1805.

        Previous to his connection with the Orange Presbytery (N. C.) in 1809, he had been connected as a licentiate with the Lexington and Hanover Presbyteries in Virginia. The records of the Hanover Presbytery show that he was "riding as a missionary under the direction of the General Assembly" in 1801. In 1805 he was granted dismission from the Hanover Presbytery to join the Orange Presbytery. He united with the latter in 1809, being received as a licentiate. He ministered to churches in Granville, Wake, and Orange Counties. The late George Wortham, a distinguished lawyer of Oxford, in a letter of May 22, 1883, writes: "I have heard him read and explain the Scriptures to my father's family and slaves repeatedly. His English was remarkably pure, contained no 'negroisms;' his manner was impressive, his explanations clear and concise, and his views, as I then thought and still think, entirely orthodox. He was said to have been an acceptable preacher, his sermons abounding in strong common sense views and happy illustrations without any effort at oratory or any sensational appeals to the passions of his hearers. He had certainly read God's Word much and meditated deeply on it. He had a small but select library of theological works, in which were to be found the works of Flavel, Buxton, Boston, and others. I have now two volumes of Dwight's Theology which were

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formerly in his possession. He was said by his old pupils to have been a good Latin and a fair Greek scholar. He was a man of intelligence on general subjects, and conversed well. I do not know that he ever had charge of a church, but I learned from my father that he preached frequently many years ago at Shiloh, Nutbush, and Island Creek churches to the whites."

        Mr. Chavis opened a classical school soon after his return to his native State, and during his career as a teacher he taught in Granville, Wake, and Chatham Counties. His school was patronized by many of the most distinguished men in the State. Prominent among his pupils were Willie P. Mangum, Priestly Hinton Mangum, Archibald E. and John L. Henderson, sons of Chief Justice Henderson, Governor Charles Manly, Rev. Williams Harris, Dr. James L. Wortham, the Edwardses, the Enlows and the Hargroves. Many of his students became prominent as politicians, lawyers, preachers, physicians, and teachers. Prof. J. H. Horner, principal of the Horner School, Oxford, one of the oldest and best high schools in the State, in a letter of May 14, 1883, says: "He had a well attended classical school in Wake County. My father not only went to school to him but boarded in his family." He says that what his father knew he got at this school, and adds that, "Chavis was no doubt a good scholar and a good teacher, and hence was patronized by the best people of the country. * * * The school was the best at that time to be found in the State."

        This worthy man of God was stopped from preaching by the law enacted by the Legislature in 1832, silencing all colored preachers in North Carolina, in consequence of "the Nat Turner insurrection of the previous year." At the one hundred and twenty-fourth session of the Orange Presbytery, held in Raleigh, we find the following on the record, dated April 21, 1832: "A letter was received from Mr. John Chavis, a free man of color, and a licentiate under the care of the presbytery, stating his difficulties and embarrassments in consequence of an act passed at the last session of the Legislature of this State, forbidding free people of color to preach: Whereupon, Resolved, That presbytery, in view of all the circumstances of the case, recommend to their licentiate to acquiesce in the decision of the Legislature referred to until God in His providence shall open to him the path of duty in regard to the exercise of his ministry." From this time till the death of Mr. Chavis, in 1838, when about seventy-five years old, we find the presbytery making provision for his support. In 1838 we find this record: "Presbytery resolved to continue the support of the widow of John Chavis." In 1842 it was reported to the presbytery that she no longer needed pecuniary aid from that source, and the case disappears finally from the records. After being debarred from preaching, Mr. Chavis published a sermon entitled "The Extent of the Atonement," which was sold for his benefit, at 15 cents per copy, and widely circulated. John Chavis is described as of dark brown complexion, without any admixture of white

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blood in his veins. He was a robust, corpulent man, with large, round clean-shaven face, expressive of benevolence and its kindred virtues. His stature was about 5 feet 7 inches in height. He was always neat in dress and usually wore a suit of black home-spun, with spotless linen and a nicely-tied white cravat. In his latter years his woolly hair was as white as driven snow, adding to the dignity of his appearance.

        He frequently visited his former pupils, by whom he was well received, heartily welcomed, and kindly entertained. Mr. Paul C. Cameron, a distinguished friend of the University, and probably the wealthiest man in the State, in a letter of April 24, 1883, writes: "In my boyhood life at my father's (Judge Cameron) home I often saw John Chavis, a venerable old negro man, recognized as a free man and as a preacher or clergyman of the Presbyterian Church. As such he was received by my father and treated with kindness and consideration, and respected as a man of education, good sense, and most estimable character." He says it excited the wonder of the slaves to see one of their race so pleasantly received by their master. Mr. Cameron further says: "He seemed familiar with the proprieties of social life, yet modest and unassuming, and sober in his language and opinions. He was polite--yes, courtly; but it was from his heart and not affectation. I remember him as a man without guile. His conversation indicated that he lived free from all evil or suspicion, seeking the good opinion of the public by the simplicity of his life and the integrity of his conduct. If he had any vanity, he most successfully concealed it. He conversed with ease on the topics that interested him, seeking to make no sort of display, simple and natural, free from what is so common to his race in coloring and diction. * * * I write of him as I remember him and as he was appreciated by my superiors, whose respect he enjoyed."

        Such, in brief outline, was the life and activity of one of nature's noblemen.


                         "His life was gentle; and the elements
                         So mixed in him, that Nature might stand up,
                         And say to all the world, 'This was a man!' "

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CHAPTER VII.

EDUCATIONAL EFFORTS OF THE FRIENDS.

FIRST SETTLERS.

        Friends and Baptists, who were, as a rule, fugitives from ecclesiastical oppression, were the first to make North Carolina their permanent home. New England Puritans and Virginia Churchmen were equally zealous in adopting and enforcing measures to maintain their respective creeds, and their restrictions and persecutions forced many good people to seek homes where liberty could be had to worship God according to the dictates of conscience. In Carolina such a refuge was found.

        George Fox, the founder of the Society of Friends, began preaching in England in 1647, and nine years later the first Friends to come to America settled in Massachusetts. Driven thence by hostile legal enactments, some fled to Virginia, but finding no more cordial reception there, they journeyed further south. Martin, in his history of North Carolina, under date of 1660, says: "The Legislature of Virginia having passed laws unfavorable to the Quakers, a number of whom had fled thither from the persecuting spirit of New England, many families sought an asylum on Albemarle Sound."

        The first permanent settlement in the province was made about 1660 at Durant's Neck, in what is now Perquimans County, in the northeastern part of the State, by a small colony of Friends, which soon became and has since remained the nucleus of a large settlement of that sect. Hawks says that "The oldest land title in North Carolina, and that which we think was actually the first, is still on record. It is the grant made by Cistacanoe (Kilkocanen?), king of the Yeopim Indians, in 1662, to Durant, for a neck of land at the mouth of Little and Perquimans Rivers, which still bears the name of the grantee. In 1663 Berkeley confirmed this grant by a patent under his own signature." It has been established that this George Durant was a Friend, and here we find him purchasing land from the rightful owner as did that more illustrious follower of Fox, William Penn, at a later day. This grant of the Indian king antedates that given by Charles II to the Lords Proprietors by several months.

        From the time of the first settlement till the transfer of the province to the Crown in 1729, it is estimated that the Friends numbered at least

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one-half of the population. In 1671-72 the colony was visited by William Edmundson and George Fox, and it is probable that an organization of the Society of Friends was established about that time, it being the first religious body organized in the State. Dr. Nereus Mendenhall claims that it antedates the Penn organization in Philadelphia by some ten years. The first Quarterly Meetings established were the Eastern, previous to 1689, and the New Garden, in 1688. The earliest of the preserved records of the Yearly Meeting date from 1708.

        It is worthy of note that it was in this State that the Friends first became influential in the administration of civil affairs. One of the best of the early Governors of North Carolina was a Friend, John Archdale, a Proprietor, whose administration began in 1795. By his wisdom, prudence, and sagacity, quietude and peace were brought to the hitherto badly governed and consequently turbulent colony.

        With a population consisting of so large and representative a proportion of this sect, one of whose fundamental doctrines is freedom in civil and religious affairs, it is not to be wondered that the Old North State has such an honorable history in her efforts for independent self-government. And with the well-known record of the Friends for zeal in promoting education, it would be a matter of surprise if their history was not intimately connected with the educational advancement of the State. So it has been, but unfortunately no care was taken to preserve the records of their early educational undertakings. The Friends here, as elsewhere, have it as a part of their discipline that no child shall grow up among them without the rudiments of a good education. They have ever maintained schools, when practicable, whose influence has been widely felt beyond the limits of the Society. Since 1750 the Friends have constituted but a small proportion of the population of the State, the Society at this time numbering less than seven thousand members, yet they have been a potential factor in providing for the educational upbuilding of the people, especially since the late Civil War.

        The oldest Friends' schools in North Carolina still in operation were established in 1833, and their history will next be considered.

FRIENDS' BOARDING SCHOOL.

        This institution is located at New Garden, six miles west of Greensborough, in Guilford County.

        New Garden was settled by Friends early in the eighteenth century and soon became the center of a large community of that sect. For a number of years the Yearly Meeting, the highest authority in discipline and other matters relating to the Society of Friends in the State, was held there, but since 1881 High Point, a neighboring town, owing to better railroad facilities has been the seat of that assembly.

        For detailed information concerning the school the writer is indebted to Prof. L. Lyndon Hobbs for the use of an address which he delivered

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at a student's reunion at New Garden on August 23, 1883. This address was prepared with great care, and it is so admirably adapted to the purposes of this sketch that it is followed with closeness and freedom.

        "This institution," says Professor Hobbs, "had its origin in a deep religious concern for the education of the members of the North Carolina Yearly Meeting and for the promotion of the Society of Friends. No less powerful motive than a religious one could have sustained the worthy men and women who, fifty years ago, struggled against poverty and indifference for the establishment of a school for their own children and for those of future generations."

        Steps preliminary to the establishment of the school were taken at the Yearly Meeting in 1830. Subordinate meetings were directed to report the following year upon the character of the schools attended by the children of Friends, and also to give the number of Friends' children of school age, and of these the number not in school.

        At the next session of the Yearly Meeting the subordinate meetings reported as directed. Their report is thus recorded: "There is not a school in the limits of the Yearly Meeting that is under the care of a committee either of monthly or preparative meeting. The teachers of Friends' children are mostly not members of our Society, and all the schools are in a mixed state; which brought the meeting under exercise for a better plan of education, and Dougan Clark, Jeremiah Hubbard, Nathan Mendenhall, Joshua Stanley, and David White were appointed to prepare an address to the subordinate meetings on the subject of schools."

        The following extract from the address, which was adopted, bears witness to the high estimate which the Friends place upon education: "We believe that the Christian and literary education of our children, consistent with the simplicity of our profession, is a subject of very deep interest, if not of paramount importance, in supporting the various testimonies that we profess to bear to the world, and even the very existance and continuance of the Society."

        A committee was appointed to receive subscriptions of funds for the establishment of a boarding school. The amount secured that year amounted to $370.55. Another committee was appointed later to digest a plan relative to purchasing a suitable farm on which to locate the school and beginning work, and to report the same at the next annual meeting. In 1832 a plan was submitted and about $1,200 were subscribed for putting it in operation.

        This plan proposed the purchase of a small farm with buildings necessary to accommodate forty or fifty boarding pupils. It was provided that the institution should be located near a meeting-house, and not on a public road. The farm was to have a sufficient orchard of fruit trees to furnish fruit for the students and be suited to the pasturage of cattle for the benefit and convenience of the institution. Care was to

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be taken that this farm should be watered by a constantly running stream, located in a healthful neighborhood, and "be somewhere within the limits of New Garden, Deep River, Western, or Southern Quarterly Meetings."

        The school was to be under the management of a committee appointed by the Yearly Meeting, consisting of two men and two women from each of the above-mentioned Quarterly Meetings. This committee was empowered to decide upon location and to appoint the superintendent and teachers. So far as the writer can learn this is the first time it was ever seriously proposed to appoint women for such duties in North Carolina.

        All the students were to be boarders; not even those from the immediate neighborhood were to be received as day scholars. No girls under ten or boys under twelve years of age were to be admitted. It was expressly stated that "none but members of the Society of Friends and the children of members should be admitted, and none for a shorter time than three months." This provision, however, was soon done away with, and the only requirement for admission was evidence of good character.

        The instructors were to teach studies approved by the committee, be present with the pupils at their meals, and lodge in their bed chambers with them.

        In addition to regulations regarding the observance of the Sabbath, the following are some of the general rules to be observed by the children: "Upon awaking in the morning you should endeavor to turn your minds inward and wait upon your great Creator, the author of all your blessings, and think of his great loving-kindness to the children of men in sending his beloved Son into the world that whosoever shall believe shall have everlasting life.

        "During the hours of recreation you should observe moderation and decency in all your conduct, carefully guarding against everything that would vex or provoke each other to wrath, and avoid throwing sticks, stones, etc., calling nick-names, or mocking one another or the aged or the deformed. * * * The boys are not to indulge themselves in the dangerous practice of climbing trees.

        "You are neither to borrow, lend, buy, nor exchange without leave. When strangers speak to you, give modest, suitable answers, with your faces turned towards them.

        "In the evening after supper you are again to collect together, and after the calling of your names retire to your bed-chambers in as much stillness as possible, avoiding conversation, folding up your clothes neatly and putting them in their proper places. And you are tenderly and affectionately advised to conduct and close the day with remembering your gracious Creator, that being the best preparation for quiet repose."

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        Each monthly meeting within the limits of the Yearly Meeting was to select one man or woman who would be willing, when sufficiently educated, to teach in primary or monthly meeting schools, to be educated at the boarding school at the expense of the monthly meeting or from the general fund of the Yearly Meeting, if the parent or guardian should not be able to pay the board and tuition fee.

        In 1833 the school was located on the site it still occupies, and through the influence of George C. Mendenhall, a prominent Friend and a member of the State Senate, the General Assembly of that year granted an act of incorporation.

        The Friends, while neither strong in numbers nor wealth, made substantial progress towards placing the institution, which for several years had been an object of solicitous care, on a firm basis. They admitted and deplored the fact that their "members are generally very deficient in literary knowledge," but now they rejoiced in the dawn of a brighter day.

        In accordance with the original plan, the trustees purchased a small farm, and in 1834 Elihu Coffin, a descendant of Admiral Coffin of Revolutionary fame, donated a tract of land containing seventy acres, adjacent to that first purchased, to be used for the benefit of the school. Mr. Coffin was one of the original trustees, and his gift was one of the first and largest that came to the institution.

        Interest in the struggling school was not confined to the limits of a single commonwealth, for the Yearly Meetings of several States not only gave words of encouragement but also liberal contributions for constructing and furnishing the necessary buildings. The Friends in England have also manifested a lively interest in the institution since its incipiency. The following contributions are worthy of special note. As early as 1834 English Friends had contributed $2,000 for the erection of buildings. In 1837 Joseph John Gurney, of England, gave $500, one-half of which was to be applied as the trustees saw fit and the balance to be used in aiding the children of Friends who were not able to meet the expenses of their education. This was the beginning of the fund to aid students. Through the donations of English Friends "early provision was made to defray the expenses, wholly or in part, of ten children at the school. This assistance was given for several years at a period in the school's history when, but for this aid, the attendance would have been discouragingly small." George Howland, of the New England Yearly Meeting, contributed $1,000 in 1839, and subsequently gave another thousand. Of the early friends and benefactors, Roland Green, of Rhode Island, was one of the most ardent. Liberal contributions have been received from members of the New York, Philadelphia, and Baltimore Yearly Meetings; Francis T. King, a noble philanthropist of Baltimore, alone contributing about $10,000.

        Professor Hobbs says that, "Of the members of the North Carolina Yearly Meeting no one, perhaps, exerted a greater influence for the school at home and abroad than Nathan Hunt. An eminent minister

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of the Gospel, ardently interested in the education of the young people of our State, he used his extraordinary eloquence to aid the effort which was being made for the establishment of a higher institution of learning. Through his influence many large donations were made."

        The necessary buildings having been completed, the school was opened August 1, 1837. Fifty students were in attendance the first day--twenty-five boys and twenty-five girls. This equal representation of the sexes fitly symbolizes the equal advantages which they have enjoyed here throughout the entire history of the institution, notwithstanding the opposition shown in the State to the co-education of the sexes.

        The first superintendents were Dougan and Asenath Clark, two well-known and accomplished Friends. The contract under which they were employed, a most formal instrument, begins thus: "This indenture, made on the 18th day of the 2nd month, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and thirty-seven, between Dougan Clark and Asenath Clark, his wife, on the first part, and Nixon Henly and others, trustees of New Garden Boarding School, in the county of Guilford and State of North Carolina, on the other part, witnesseth: That said Dougan and Asenath Clark, his wife, for and in consideration of the interest they feel in the promotion of the objects of the said boarding school, together with the further consideration of the covenants here contained, have undertaken, promised, and agreed, and by these presents do undertake, promise, and agree, etc."

        The first teachers were Jonathan L. Slocum, of Providence, R. I., principal of the boys' school; Catharine Cornell, principal of the girls' school; Harriet Peck and Nathan B. Hill. All of the instructors but the last-named were from New England. Mr. and Mrs. Clark served the institution for nearly six years.

        During the first term the average attendance was sixty-eight. The Yearly Meeting fixed the charge for board and tuition at $65 per year.

        Among the early rules adopted by the trustees were the following, which at this time will cause a smile, though at that time they were enforced with all seriousness: "It is the united judgment of the committee that the boys should have their hair cut smooth and decent." "No more frock coats to be admitted into the school."

        For a decade preceding the Civil War the institution was much embarrassed financially, and in 1860 the sale of the property was proposed; but Friends, North and South, rallied to its support and it was decided that the school should be maintained. During that period many of the North Carolina Friends were emigrating to free soil; and in this time of political commotion New Garden suffered. The school was continued without interruption throughout the War on a gold basis.

        In 1867, the trustees, encouraged by the Baltimore Friends, decided to make the school more efficient. The buildings were refurnished, the corps of teachers was increased, and a permanent endowment fund,

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now amounting to $23,700 in invested securities, was inaugurated. During the present year an effort is being made to increase the endowment to $50,000. Several handsome subscriptions to that end have already been made and it is more than probable that the hoped-for amount will be obtained.

        The institution has now three large and well-ordered brick buildings for class-room and dormitory purposes,--Founder's Hall, 126 by 40 feet, three stories; King Hall, 100 by 60 feet, with a front projection 16 by 40 feet, three stories; and Archdale Hall, 90½ by 42 feet, two stories.

        The school is provided with a good library, and connected with it are two well-conducted literary societies.

        Two courses of study, the "literary and scientific" and the "classical," each extending over four years, are provided. Special normal instruction is given. Diplomas of graduation, but not degrees, are conferred on those completing a course. The academic staff now numbers seven. The charges per academic year for board, tuition, and washing are $150.

        Since its establishment more than 3,000 boys and girls have studied at New Garden. Their influence has been widely felt in North Carolina and in several States of the West, many of them having become teachers and preachers.

        Referring to the influence of the institution, Professor Hobbs says, "Its effects have not been confined to the limits of the State. Many of her children have found homes in the West, where they have won distinction as teachers in high schools and colleges, as ministers of the Gospel, and as substantial conscientious farmers.

        "When Kansas Yearly Meeting was organized, an aged and esteemed Friend, John Clark, of Indiana, was asked why it was that in all the Western Meetings, with rare exceptions, they chose for clerks either Carolinians or their immediate descendants. After a moment's reflection he replied, 'It is because they can do no better, for they would if they could.'"

        The address above quoted closes as follows: "Inestimable as are the benefits which the founders and supporters of the boarding-school have conferred upon their fellow-men through an unbroken period of forty-six years, in view of the thorough improvements for the accommodation of pupils and the additions to our facilities for instruction, what has been accomplished may be regarded as the infancy and youth of an institution which is now entering upon its manhood; and this day may be a happy fulfilment of the prophecy of Jacob Green, a well-known Friend from Ireland, who, at a meeting of the trustees in 1839, uttered these words: 'This institution will do good to your children's children. It is the Lord's work and will prosper in your hands.'"

        This prediction of Jacob Green is now on the point of being realized in a fuller sense than was anticipated at the time of its utterance. At

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the students' reunion in 1883, Francis T. King said that he was encouraged to believe that in the near future, instead of New Garden Boarding School, the institution would bear the more imposing title of "Guilford College of North Carolina." The writer is informed that at a recent meeting of the trustees it was decided to change the name to Guilford College, and that the next General Assembly of the State will be asked to amend its charter and confer upon it all the privileges usual to colleges. It was proposed that the institution be christened King College, but through the preference of Mr. King it received the historic name, Guilford.

        Steps are now being taken to secure an endowment sufficient to equip and maintain this school for a high grade of collegiate work. The institution has strong and influential friends, not only in North Carolina but in other States, and it bids fair to become one of the first colleges in the State.

BELVIDERE ACADEMY.

        This school is situated at Belvidere, Perquimans County, near the seat of the first settlement made in the State. The following sketch of this well-known Quaker institution was prepared for this work by Josiah Nicholson, a prominent Friend and citizen of eastern Carolina:

        "The Society of Friends, at their Quarterly Meeting held at Little River, 8th month 31, 1833, entertained a proposition to establish a school (at that time there were no organized schools in the Albemarle district of the State), and a committee was appointed to take the subject into consideration, select a place, erect the buildings, employ a teacher, and put the school in operation.

        "The committee purchased a lot at Belvidere and proceeded to erect a two-story building thereon, in which, on the 30th of 11th month, 1835, school was opened under the instruction of Edward S. Gifford, of Massachusetts.

        "This school, though at first intended only for Friends' children, was in the second year opened for others besides Friends, by their conforming to the rules of the school.

        "It has continued uninterruptedly from its organization, fifty years ago, up to the present time, and to-day enjoys a fair patronage."

        There was a semi-centennial celebration of this school on December 24, 1885, and the following is an extract from the speech of Hon. Jonathan W. Albertson, made on the occasion:

        "I have feebly pointed to some of the influences which have been fermenting within the last fifty years. For all that time, with trifling intermissions, this school has been open, its light shining, and it has contributed no trifling share to the thought of the age. All honor to these old walls! and all honor to that band of enlightened men who foresaw the needs of the young and prepared an alma mater to bring up children furnished forth for the battles of the century!

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        "For fifty years a stream of young men and women has left these doors and gone into the world, bearing with them the lessons taught them here, and here they were always taught what was right. Like a stone dropped into the water, the circling influence is felt to the extremity of the earth, and I have traced the pupils of Belvidere, some to where the surf beats upon the far Pacific shore, some to the land of the Montezumas, and some linger amidst the orange groves of Florida. The cities of the Atlantic sea-board claim some, some dwell in the mighty valley of the Mississippi, and some have not wandered far from the 'old school house.' Many of them, I know, are abreast of the age, and all are, consciously or unconsciously, imbued with its spirit.

        "I was here when these doors were first opened, and at the length of fifty years I return to greet my alma mater.

        "Many who were with me here when these doors first opened have passed beyond the river. I remember many of the lost ones. Of those who remain, I ask that we give a kind thought to the absent, living and dead; and now clasping your hands across the chasm of fifty years, I bid you all hail and God speed."

BALTIMORE FRIENDS.

        North Carolina has reason to be grateful to the "Baltimore Association of Friends to advise and assist Friends of the Southern States" for its noble and successful efforts for the material and intellectual upbuilding of the State during the dark period succeeding the Civil War. At first the work of the association was confined to Friends occupying that section of the State devastated by Sherman in his march to the sea, but soon the limits of the charity were broadened until they embraced a large part of the State's territory and population without regard to differences in religious belief.

        Then, too, unlike other aid associations then operating within the State, only help was given to the white race, and it was given in such a way as to elevate and not pauperize. The leaders in the movement believed that the best way to help the people was to put them in a condition to help themselves, and with this as a working principle their efforts met with success.

        It is interesting to note the origin of this association. Soon after the outbreak of the War between the States, Friends from North Carolina occasionally passed through Baltimore on their way to the West to seek homes on free soil, where they would not be constantly menaced by the horrors of war. Many of these received assistance from individual Friends in Baltimore, but towards the close of the War the demands were so frequent and the exigencies so pressing that the Baltimore Friends decided to co-operate in giving aid, and this led to the formation of the association. The immediate cause leading to its organization is thus stated by Mr. Francis T. King: "One Sunday morning towards the close of the War, two men appeared in front of the Friends' meeting-house on Courtland Street, and quietly waited on the pavement till services

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were over. As the members were coming out of the building, the two strangers informed several of the congregation that there were some North Carolina Friends at one of the city wharves in destitute circumstances. A committee at once repaired to the locality, and found there fifty persons of all ages and conditions whose homes had been ruined by the passage of Sherman's army through the section in which they lived. They had obtained permission to go to their friends in the North-west. Their sufferings excited the warmest sympathy of the Friends, and steps were at once taken for their comfort. But the charity did not stop there. Permission was obtained from President Lincoln to send a vessel load of provisions and agricultural implements to the Friends in North Carolina. Several hundred more Friends soon after this passed through Baltimore on their way West, and they, too, received assistance. The temporary aid thus extended became an established permanency, and the "Baltimore Association to aid Friends in the South" was formed in 1865. Since the War this association has expended about $150,000 in North Carolina in educational and agricultural work."

        The association discouraged emigration from the State, and returned to their former homes some of the families that had gone West.

        The following extract is taken from the first annual report of the association, made October 23, 1866:

        "Whilst thus engaged in aiding our brethren and endeavoring to relieve their physical wants, we soon discovered that there were even stronger claims upon us to educate their children, many of whom, from the need of their labor at home, the scarcity of books, and the conscription of teachers, had lost four years of instruction, the period of a country child's school life.

        "One of our number (Francis T. King) again visited North Carolina at the time of the Yearly Meeting in the eleventh month, 1865, and there met in consultation our friends Joseph Crosfield, of England, Samuel Boyce, of New England, and Marmaduke C. Cope, of Philadelphia, and conferred with the education committee of North Carolina Yearly Meeting. After carefully considering the whole subject, the association concluded to appropriate $5,000 to the boarding school (New Garden), $2,500 to be expended in repairing the school buildings and in refitting the furniture and school apparatus, and $2,500 to pay the board and tuition at the school of the children of Friends, who had suffered most by the War, which has since been done. Secondly, to establish primary schools in every Friends' neighborhood, under the direction of our association, and to appoint a competent superintendent to devote his whole time to their supervision. * * *

        "We are satisfied that the most useful pecuniary aid to families that we can now render, and one that will be most general in its application and permanent in its results, is to assume the expense and oversight of the schools (except the boarding school), until our Friends recover from the effects of the War and we succeed in establishing a system which will sustain itself. * * *

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        "The subject of improved agriculture has claimed the attention of our board, and our president, Francis T. King, has been directed to confer with North Carolina Friends at the time of their Yearly Meeting, next month, and submit to us a plan for accomplishing this very important object; without it, it will be impossible to prevent the emigration of many young people whose energy and ambition have been stimulated."

        The educational work of the association was commenced about the close of 1865 by assuming charge of twelve schools, numbering about six hundred students. In 1867 the number of schools had increased to thirty-eight, with two thousand one hundred and forty-three pupils. A graded course of instruction covering a period of four years was introduced and the necessary text-books were furnished the schools. The North Carolina Friends furnished the school-houses, boarded the teachers, and provided fuel, in return for which their children received free tuition. The children of those who did not belong to the Society of Friends were received at the rate of $1 per month.

        In the summer of 1866 the association established a normal school to prepare teachers for the primary schools, which was continued from summer to summer, during the vacation of the other schools, until the State Normal was established. Capable instructors were secured from the North to direct the Normal. Tuition was free, and teachers of all denominations from various sections of the State attended. The aim of the Baltimore association was to prepare North Carolina teachers to teach in North Carolina schools, and in that way to secure the sympathy and co-operation of the people of the State. This it succeeded in doing.

        At one time the association had under its management fifty-six schools, numbering about thirty-two hundred pupils, of whom only thirteen hundred were the children of Friends.

        The following table, prepared by Mr. John C. Thomas, the secretary of the association, shows the amount spent for educational purposes, not including the sums appropriated to the model farm and subscriptions of members of the association to the boarding school:

Baltimore Association of Friends to aid Friends in the South.

AID TO EDUCATION IN NORTH CAROLINA.

        
1866 For New Garden school, in repairs, apparatus, and tuition of 36 scholars . . . . . $4,817.50
1866.For 30 primary schools and 1 normal School, and aid to new schoolhouses . . . . . 4,710.36
1867.For New Garden School . . . . . 1,332.73
1867.For 38 primary schools and 1 normal school . . . . . 11,327.12
1868.For 40 primary schools and 1 normal school (about) . . . . . 13,000.00
1868.For New Garden School (about) . . . . . 1,000.00
1869.For New Garden School (about) . . . . . 500.00
1869.For primary schools and 1 normal school (about) . . . . . 10,000.00
1870.For primary schools and 1 normal school (about) . . . . . 4,500.00
1870.For New Garden School (about) . . . . . 300.00
1871.For primary schools and 1 normal school . . . . . 3,150.00

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1872.For primary schools and 1 normal school . . . . . $2,575.00
1873.For superintendent's services . . . . . 825.00
1874.For superintendent's services . . . . . 500.00
1875.For superintendent's services . . . . . 400.00
1876.For superintendent's services . . . . . 1,200.00
1877.For superintendent's services . . . . . 800.00
1878.For 36 primary schools and superintendent's services . . . . . 1,953.09
1878.For New Garden scholars . . . . . 232.00
1879.For primary schools and superintendent's services . . . . . 1,254.17
1880.For primary schools and superintendent's services . . . . . 1,023.90
1881.For primary schools and superintendent's services . . . . . 544.00
   $65,944.87

THE MODEL FARM.

        The model farm, established in 1867 near High Point, in Randolph County, was one of the greatest educational factors introduced into the State by the association.

        The president of the association in his annual report for 1867, after referring to the low and unremunerative state of agriculture in North Carolina and the fact that many of her citizens were emigrating, says: "To educate and enlighten her people without at the same time demonstrating the possibility of greater returns to labor, would still further tend to depopulation. Our work, so general in its character, could not fail to stimulate Friends to desire improved agriculture. There has been a continual pressure upon us to establish a model farm and to place among them a practical farmer, who with improved farming implements, artificial manures, the introduction of grasses, selected seed and stock, could demonstrate to their eyes the great neglected wealth of the soil, awaiting only the call of improved cultivation; and who, by the establishment of agricultural clubs within the limits of each quarterly meeting, should stimulate a spirit of inquiry and enterprise which would be rewarded by the best practical results. We have accordingly purchased the farm of that honored and devoted servant of Christ, the late Nathan Hunt, at Springfield, on the dividing line of Guilford and Randolph Counties."

        The farm contained 200 acres and cost $4,400. An experienced farmer was secured and the farm was supplied with the most improved farming implements and stocked with the best cattle. The farm proved a great success. A wide-spread interest in agriculture was awakened, leading to the formation of many farmers' clubs. W. A. Sampson, who had charge of the farm, gave occasional lectures before these clubs on agricultural topics. The farm soon became recognized as a practical agricultural school, and was visited frequently by farmers from distant parts of the State.

        A department was established for the sale and distribution of improved stock, agricultural implements, and seeds. In a few months after the farm was established two tons of clover-seed were distributed at cost. To this and the farm together the association appropriated about $24,000. The farm, however, soon became self-sustaining.

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        The emigration of Friends was stopped, their numbers began to increase, and they are now numbered among the most cultured, prosperous, and enterprising citizens in the State.

PHILADELPHIA FRIENDS.

        The Philadelphia Friends have been doing much to elevate and advance the moral and educational interest of the colored people in North Carolina since the War.

        The following statement in regard to the work of "The Friends' Association of Philadelphia and its vicinity for the relief of colored freedmen," was prepared for this chapter by the treasurer of the association, Mr. Richard Cadbury:

        The Friends' Association of Philadelphia and its vicinity for the relief of colored freedmen was founded in the eleventh month, 1863. Its purpose, as tersely stated in the preamble to its constitution, "shall be to use every means in its power to further the object indicated in the title and preamble."

        The work then begun extended over a wide area and embraced a great variety of objects, and any statement, therefore, of what was done in one branch and in one State must necessarily be imperfect, as the details would have to be almost entirely estimates.

        The first school founded by this association in North Carolina was at Greensborough, Guilford County, in the eleventh month, 1865.

        At the meeting of the executive board held in the sixth month of that year, the instruction committee reported that they "are desirous of procuring the services of an interested friend to locate and superintend schools in North Carolina and Western Virginia." Yardley Warner was soon after appointed to visit North Carolina to prepare the way for establishing schools, and in the ninth month report was made that "Nereus Mendenhall has been appointed superintendent of schools in North Carolina, and nine teachers selected to act under his care." In the twelfth month report was made that the following schools were in operation: Greensborough, 7 teachers; Salisbury, 4 teachers; Deep River, 1 teacher; Goldsborough, 3 teachers.

        In the second month, 1866, report was made that over 3,000 children were being educated in the North Carolina schools. In the fourth month, 1866, the following schools were in operation: Goldsborough, 5 teachers; Hillsborough, 2 teachers; Durham, 1 teacher; Mebanesville, 1 teacher; Centre, 3 teachers; New Garden, 1 teacher; Greensborough, 3 teachers; Jamestown, 1 teacher; Deep River, 2 teachers; Sandy Ridge, 1 teacher; Oak Ridge, 1 teacher; Bruce's Cross Road, 1 teacher; Morehead's Mill, 1 teacher; Thomasville, 1 teacher; Charlotte, 3 teachers; Salisbury, 3 teachers; Lincolnton, 1 teacher; Mud Lick, 1 teacher; Madison, 1 teacher; Walnut Cove, 1 teacher.

        During the year 1869, 29 schools were maintained in North Carolina with about 40 teachers. In addition to those in the above list (some of which had been discontinued) there were schools at Hopewell, Lexington,

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Salem, Mount Vernon, Cedar Grove, Company Shops, Warrenton, Boone Hill, and 10 small schools in Rowan, Iredell, and Davies Counties, under the care of a special superintendent.

        This is probably the highest point reached, both in the number of schools and scholars. A reasonable estimate would place the average enrolment of these schools for a number of years at 2,000.

        In 1871 there were 16 schools, 26 teachers; in 1878, 13 schools, 21 teachers; 1881, 4 schools, 11 teachers.

        At the present time 2 schools are maintained by the association,--Goldsborough, 6 teachers; Salem, 2 teachers; besides some assistance given to the schools at Greensborough and Rutherfordton.

        It is proper to state that in very few instances, even from the beginning, has the entire expense of supporting any school been borne by the association. The Freedmen's Bureau, the Peabody Fund, local taxation, the colored people themselves, and many of the white people, have all aided in the work.

        It is difficult to estimate the amount of money expended in North Carolina for education. In 1869, probably $10,000 is within the mark; in the last fiscal year $750. Including, under educational purposes, bibles, tracts, etc., I think $60,000 within the mark, as the money expended by the association from its own contributions since 1865.

NEW YORK FRIENDS.

        The Bible School and Missionary Board of New York Yearly Meeting of Friends has been doing important educational work in North Carolina among colored people since 1874, and among white people since 1878. The chairman of the board, Mr. Robert M. Ferris, has kindly furnished the following statement in regard to their educational undertakings in this State:

Schools for colored people.

Years--winter. Number of schools. Number of pupils. Amount expended.
1874-75 . . . . . 1 45 $100.00
1875-76 . . . . . 5 170 243.00
1876-77 . . . . . 11 435 635.00
1877-78 . . . . . 16 695 1,246.00
1878-79 . . . . . 10 401 1,016.59
1879-80 . . . . . 16 755 1,613.60
1880-81 . . . . . 15 546 1,502.64
1881-82 . . . . . 15 615 1,225.95
1882-83 . . . . . 16 689 1,362.82
1883-84 . . . . . 17 764 1,5 [illegible] 2.1 [illegible]
1884-85 . . . . . 19 788 1,969.00
1885-86 . . . . . 15 552 1,492.00
1886-87 . . . . . 8 348 1,786.79
      $15,785.54

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        Nearly all these schools are in Randolph and Guilford Counties. In connection with the above schools, Sabbath schools are generally held; girls' sewing schools in connection with some, temperance organizations with many, and mothers' meetings for general instruction in family duties in connection with a few. With very few exceptions the teachers are professing Christians, and in most cases active workers. A superintendent, paid by the board, visits the schools from time to time. These schools draw a certain amount of public money, which is sufficient to maintain them for two to three months. The money from the Friends extends the time upon an average about five months, and makes it possible to secure a much better grade of teachers. The teachers are always selected and engaged as approved by the Board's superintendent, and the schools send reports to New York every month. Appropriations for physical relief, clothing, etc., are not included in the above report.

        

Schools for white people.

Years--winter. Number of schools. Number of pupils. Amount of money.
1878-79 . . . . . 5 175 $100.00
1879-80 . . . . . 12 485 320.00
188 [illegible] -81 . . . . . 9 343 294.00
1881-82 . . . . . 11 513 200.00
1882-83 . . . . . 11 278 260.00
1883-84 . . . . . 15 625 257.15
1884-85 . . . . . 11 484 275.00
1885-86 . . . . . 11 495 125.00
      $1,831.15

        The above schools were among Friends mostly in Randolph and Guilford Counties.

        The Friends have several excellent self-supporting schools in the State, and they were never more zealous than now in promoting education.

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Illustration

MAIN BUILDING--LIVINGSTONE COLLEGE.

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CHAPTER VIII.

HISTORY AND STATUS OF EDUCATION AMONG THE COLORED PEOPLE.1


        1 This interesting and valuable chapter was prepared for this monograph by Prof. S. G. Atkins, of Livingstone College, one of the foremost institutions in the State for the education of the colored people. The writer is thoroughly conversant with the status of his race, and what he says is worthy of careful attention.

        From what can be gathered from tradition and observation, it does seem that the colored people of North Carolina have, during the last hundred years, partaken of that hearty and independent spirit which has characterized their white masters and fellow-citizens of the same soil.

        And while the above remark would not necessarily suggest educational progress, it is a fact that education has its most ready growth and development, with its attendant fruits, in an atmosphere pregnant with the spirit of thrift and independence. Hence the colored people of North Carolina for a long time have been the most noted of the race in the South for their ardent desire for education and for their zealous perseverance in trying to secure the same. This is confirmed in that so many, before the War, betook themselves to the States in the Union which would allow them an education. Hence, further, the fact that the emancipation found the North Carolina colored people so well prepared to receive its concomitant blessings, especially those of education. This will be confirmed by the following notes on the educational institutions of which North Carolina negroes can boast:

        I. The oldest, and one of the most representative, of the colored schools in the State is the Shaw University, for both sexes, at Raleigh.

        This school had its origin in the formation of a theological class of freedmen in Raleigh, December 1, 1865, taught by Rev. H. M. Tupper, of Massachusetts, who, with his wife, had arrived in Raleigh the 10th of the preceding October. The work was commenced under the auspices of the "American Baptist Home Mission Society." The school has developed with great rapidity, being commenced as the "Raleigh Institute," and successively changing its name, until now as the Shaw University it occupies several acres of land situated in one of the most desirable parts of the city, upon which have been erected five large handsome brick buildings. I suppose its property may not truly be estimated at less

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than $200,000. It has six different departments--viz, college, scientific, normal, theological, medical, and industrial--in successful operation. A reference to the course of study shows that the amount of work done at Shaw is adequate to efficiency on the lines indicated by the courses. Special mention might be made of the medical department, whose Faculty includes some of the most eminent members of the medical profession in our State. The indications are that its appliances will soon be all that is necessary for thoroughly preparing the student for his special work. Further points will be noted in the tabular chart.

        II. The second institution, in order of date, for the colored people in North Carolina is the Biddle University, at Charlotte, for young men. This institution was organized in 1867, under the auspices of the Presbyterian Board of Missions for Freedmen. Its advancement has been steady, until its property is valued at $70,000, and its scope of work covers three departments of instruction, viz, theological, college, and preparatory. In the college and preparatory departments, either one or both of two courses are pursued, a classical course and a scientific course. The preparatory is antecedent to the college.

        The courses in the college department lead to the degrees of A. B. and B. S.; and it might be added that the character of work done at Biddle is no whit behind, if not superior to, that of any college for the race in the State. (See tabular chart.)

        III. The third institution of learning, in order of date, founded in North Carolina for the education of the colored people is the St. Augustine Normal School and Collegiate Institute, for both sexes, at Raleigh, founded by the Rev. J. Britten Smith, D. D., and under the auspices of the Protestant Episcopal Church. St. Augustine Normal School and Collegiate Institute was incorporated July, 1867, and opened January, 1868. Its threefold object is to afford young men and women superior advantages for obtaining a thorough academic education, to train and equip teachers for efficient service, and to prepare young men for the holy ministry. The scope of its work embraces four departments, viz, theological, collegiate, normal, and preparatory. The course in the theological department includes instruction in the prayer-book and Bible, Christian evidences, systematic divinity, ecclesiastical history, and homiletics. The course in the collegiate department embraces history, ancient and modern; mathematics to trigonometry; and so much of the sciences and classics as is necessary to make the student master of the more important facts and theories of science, and to lay the basis of a thorough scholarship in the Greek and Latin languages. In the normal department the course is arranged with special reference to the wants of teachers in the public schools. Those desiring to enter the institute, who are not prepared to pass examinations for admission to the academic or the normal department, are

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Illustration

LIVINGSTONE COLLEGE--MEN'S DORMITORY.

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Illustration

LIVINGSTONE COLLEGE--WOMEN'S DORMITORY.

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admitted to classes in the preparatory department. (See tabular chart.)

        IV. The fourth institution, in order of date, founded in North Carolina for the colored people is the Scotia Seminary, for young ladies, at Concord. Scotia Seminary was chartered in 1870. It was founded by Rev. Luke Dorland, D. D., and is under the auspices of the Presbyterian Board of Missions for Freedmen. Its scope of work embraces three departments, viz, industrial, preparatory, and seminary. The seminary department embraces two courses of study, viz, a normal and scientific. The object of the normal course is to give a thorough preparation for teaching. The scientific course is intended to give some advantages not afforded by the normal course, and to bring the standard of Scotia up to that of similar institutions elsewhere. This course includes the sciences, ancient and modern literature, and mathematics to geometry. (See tabular chart.)

        V. The fifth institution of learning, in order of date, founded in North Carolina for the education of the colored people is the Bennett Seminary, for both sexes, at Greensborough. It was opened in 1873. Its establishment was largely due to the prayers and labors of the Rev. Matthew Alston (colored), at whose earnest representations the Freedmen's Aid Society of the Methodist Episcopal Church founded the institution. The Bennett Seminary embraces five courses of study, viz, a college course, a normal course, an English course, a theological course, and an instrumental music course. The college course has not, I think, as yet been put into operation, but the other courses are similar, in character of work done, to similar courses of the institution previously noted. (See tabular chart.)

        VI. The sixth institution, in order of date, established in North Carolina for the training of colored youth is the first high school founded by the State for the education of its colored citizens. It is known as the State Colored Normal School at Fayetteville. It was established by the State board of education, under an act of the General Assembly of 1876-77, for the training of teachers for the colored schools of the State. It receives an annual appropriation of $2,000 from the State. It might be remarked that the colored people of Fayetteville gave the land upon which the building in which the normal school is conducted was erected. The building was erected by the Freedmen's Bureau.

        The State has since established four similar schools, at Salisbury, Goldsborough, Franklinton, and Plymouth. The design of these schools is:

        1. Thorough instruction in all the branches required to be taught in the public schools of the State.

        2. To present the best methods of teaching these branches and governing the schools.

        The courses of study are adapted to these ends. (See tabular chart.)

        VII. Among the youngest of North Carolina negro colleges is the

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Livingstone College, for both sexes, at Salisbury, incorporated in 1879, opened in 1880, and under the auspices of the A. M. E. Zion Church.

        This institution was incorporated in 1879 as "Zion Wesley Institute," chartered in 1884 as "Zion Wesley College," and name changed in 1887 to "Livingstone College." Its progress has been marked. It is now only in its eighth year, and has property valued at $75,000. Its Faculty numbers fourteen instructors. Its scope of work includes five departments, viz, preparatory, normal, collegiate, theological, and industrial departments.

        The work of the preparatory department is represented by a grammar school course of four years, which serves as preparatory to the normal course.

        The normal course is designed to prepare efficient teachers. It is, probably, more purely normal than the course of any similar department in the State. The college department offers an academic course, which includes instruction in the sciences, mathematics, and belles-lettres. The theological department comprehends two courses, a classic-theological and an English-theological.

        The industrial department offers instruction in needle-work, printing, carpentry, and cooking.

        This institution is unique in that it is directed, controlled, and officered entirely by negroes.

        One of its most hopeful inspirations is the generous encouragement given by white friends, both at the North and in the South. (See tabular chart.)

        VIII. The last institution to be named under this head is the "Franklinton Literary and Theological Christian Institute," for both sexes, at Franklinton. This school was founded in 1880 by the Christian Church at the North. It is now in its eighth session. Its curriculum embraces four departments, viz, a preparatory, an intermediate, a normal, and a theological. The scope of the courses of these departments is not so extensive as that of similar departments in the schools previously mentioned; but the Franklinton Literary and Theological Christian Institute is doing an effective work for good among the colored people of the State. (See tabular chart.)

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Tabular chart, showing statistics, etc., of colored high schools in North Carolina.

Name of institution. Location. Date of organization. Incorporated. Chartered. By whom founded. Endowment. Income. Number of instructors. Number of students. Average attendance. Name of president or principal.
Shaw University Raleigh 1865 1875 1875 H. M. Tupper, D. D. $5,000   23   400 H. M. Tupper, D. D.
Biddle University Charlotte 1867   1877 Presbyterian Board of Missions. 8,000   10 133   W. F. Johnson, D. D.
St. Augustine Normal School and Collegiate Institute. Raleigh 1867 1867   J. Britton Smith, D. D. 50,000   7 140   Rob't B. Sutton, D. D.
Scotia Seminary Concord     1870 Luke Dorland, D. D. 1,600 $11,500 13 213 175 Rev. D. J. Satterfield.
Bennett Seminary Greensborough 1873     Rev. Matt. Alston, (col.)     4   150 Rev. W. F. Steele, B. D.
State Colored Normal School. Fayetteville 1877     State of North Carolina.   2,000 3 126   Rev. E. E. Smith, A. M.
State Colored Normal School. Salisbury       State of North Carolina.   1,500 3 120   Rev. J. O. Crosby, A. M.
State Colored Normal School. Franklinton       State of North Carolina.   1,500 3     S. A. Waugh, A. M.
State Colored Normal School. Goldsborough 1887     State of North Carolina.   1,500 2     Chas. N. Hunter.
State Colored Normal School. Plymouth       State of North Carolina.   1,500 3     H. C. Crosby, A. M.
Livingstone College Salisbury 188 [illegible] 1879 1879 North Carolina Conference A. M. E. Zion Church.   10,000 14 161 125 Jas. C. Price, D. D.
Franklinton Literary and Theological Christian Institute. Franklinton 1880     The Christian Church at the North. 3,000   6 238 100 Rev. Geo. Young.

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OBSERVATIONS.

        This sketch might include a number of private high schools and academies not referred to above, among which should be mentioned the Kittrell Normal and Industrial School at Kittrell, the Whitin Normal School at Lumberton, the Albion Academy at Franklinton, the Yadkin Academy at Mebaneville, the Winton Academy at Winton, the M. E. Academy at Asheville, and the Congregational High School at Wilmington. These schools are doing an important work in the State in supplying the communities in which they are with a higher order of instruction than would ordinarily come to them. To the schools just mentioned might be added excellent graded schools in a number of towns in the State. These graded schools are subject to the same provisions as are the other graded schools referred to in the monograph.

        It might be remarked that the industrial departments of the colleges are doing an important work, and are proving themselves admirably adapted to the needs of the lately emancipated race. These departments cover a wide field of operations, including carpentry, printing, cabinet-making, needle-work, shoemaking, tailoring, blacksmithing, and cooking.

        The Bennett Seminary has recently added to its departments the Kent Home, a model home, "put up and opened in order to teach girls and young ladies how to make a perfect Christian home." In it are taught sewing and mending, dress and garment making, housekeeping and cooking, nursing, and laundry work. Other seminaries in the State contemplate having, if they have not already begun, similar departments.

        It is the opinion of those most interested in and nearly connected with the work of education among the colored people that there can be no permanent advancement of the race on æsthetic and literary lines without improving and perfecting the home life. It is my opinion that the mission of the schools among us can never be fully served apart from making the females in the race to be good housekeepers--makers of perfect Christian homes. The industrial departments of most of the colleges above referred to are maintained by appropriations from the John F. Slater fund.1


        1 North Carolina has received from the Slater fund the following amounts for the years given: 1883, $2,000; 1884, $740; 1835, $4,400; 1886, $3,600; 1887, $4,200; apportioned for 1887-88, $5,300.

        The same remarks in general that would apply to the public schools of one race in North Carolina would apply to those of the other race. The North Carolina public schools are as yet inefficient, but have made and are making progress. True of one race, true of both. The same hindrances impede in the case of both, with perhaps one exception. To this one exception I wish to refer. It is the great want (not absolute) of qualified teachers among the colored people. To my mind it is just now the only practicable way of improving our public school

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system. I mean the preparation of teachers through normal training schools. It can hardly be expected that the State will soon be able to materially lengthen the school terms (an average of 2½ to 3 months), the shortness of which causes chiefly the inefficiency already referred to, but the State can arrange to have better teachers.

        There are just two ways--both of which should go together, one of which must obtain--to make the public schools passably efficient. They are school terms of full length, and teachers with full preparation. The one would afford the time; the other would furnish the means. The former is almost indispensable, the latter is entirely so. And since the latter is more practicable, I would say that schools and departments for preparing teachers are the great needs of our public school system at present, especially among the colored people of the State. It is a pleasing circumstance to note that the State is striking out on this line, and we are led to hope that our schools will soon be furnished with such teachers as will make the schools all they should be.

        The last observation I wish to make appertains to the attendance in the colored schools of the State. In all the schools, high, intermediate, and primary, the attendance is increased this year by from 15 to 30 per cent., in some cases it is nearly doubled. This is significant. This fact can not arise from any lax tendencies in the management of the schools, for the schools have rather raised their standards, broadened their scope of work, and made more circumspect their discipline. These observations taken all in all, it seems to me, teach that the North Carolina negro is making his way slowly, but truly to the position of a useful, intelligent, Christian factor in the body-politic of this progressive, intelligent, and Christian commonwealth.

S. G. ATKINS.

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CHAPTER IX.

THE PUBLIC SCHOOLS.

ORIGIN OF THE SYSTEM.

        North Carolina was one of the first States to make constitutional provision for both the common and the higher education of her citizens. The heroes of 1776 recognized that liberty and enlightenment were complements of each other, and that the surest safeguard to democratic government is education; so in the initial Constitution of the State it was declared "That a school or schools shall be established by the Legislature for the convenient instruction of youth, with such salaries to the masters, paid by the public, as may enable them to instruct at low prices; and all useful learning shall be duly encouraged in one or more universities."

        The above, then, is the foundation of the public-school system; but such was the financial condition of the State in the early years of its history that a half century elapsed before the fair promise of the Constitution was realized, even in a measure, in so far as it related to common schools. The University, which was chartered in 1789, and began the work of instruction in 1795, was doubtless instrumental in educating public sentiment to the importance of a State system of schools.

        Not until 1816 did the public authorities take any action on this question. In that year Governor Miller, in his message to the General Assembly, called attention to the need of public schools, and recommended that some action be taken looking to their establishment. The Legislature appointed a committee, with the Hon. Archibald D. Murphey as chairman, to report upon the subject of "affording means of education to every one, however indigent." Judge Murphey has been called the father of our public-school system, and well does he deserve this title.

        On December 19, 1816, Judge Murphey, in behalf of the committee, submitted a report urging the establishment of "a judicious system of public education." This report, which he drafted, is worthy of close study. The first part is devoted to a learned dissertation upon the benefits of education and the needs of the State University. Following this are suggestions for a school system. "This general system," says the report, "must include a gradation of schools regularly supporting each other, from the one in which the first rudiments of education are taught to that in which the highest branches of the sciences are cultivated.

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It is to the first schools in this gradation that your committee beg leave to draw the attention of the Legislature at this time, because in them will be taught the learning indispensable to all--reading, writing, and arithmetic. These schools must be scattered over every section of the State, for in them education must be commenced, and in them it will terminate as to more than one-half of the community. They will be the most difficult of organization and the most expensive to the State; but they will be the most useful, inasmuch as all the citizens will be taught in them, and many of the children are destined never to pass to any other."

        No action was taken at this session of the Legislature, and Judge Murphey was made chairman of a committee to investigate the subject more fully and report at the next session. He was much interested in this subject, and before submitting his report in 1817 he not only made a careful study of education in the New England States, but also visited Europe to examine the Continental school systems. The result of his study and observations are embodied in the report of the committee, a voluminous but well-written and eminently suggestive document.

        A comparison with the reports as published in the records of the General Assembly for 1816 and 1817 shows that their main provisions are excellently summarized in the following extract from the admirable historical sketch of the North Carolina State school system in the Report of the Commissioner of Education (U. S.) for 1876:

        "The report (of 1816) went on to suggest that from the youth educated in these schools at State expense teachers should be selected for schools in which they might be qualified to teach, and that discreet persons should be appointed in each county to superintend and manage the concerns of the sectional schools which should be established, to designate the children who should be educated in whole or in part at the public expense, and to apply the funds which should be consecrated to the purposes of these schools. It closed with a recommendation that the two houses should appoint three persons to digest a system of public instruction, founded upon the general principles which had been stated, and to submit the same to the next General Assembly.

        "The house concurring with the senate on this motion, a committee was appointed, with the same gentleman as chairman, which made an elaborate report at the session of 1817. This new report recommended the formation of a fund for public instruction, and the constitution of a board to manage the fund and carry into execution the plan of public instruction contemplated. This plan was one which was meant 'to make the progress of education natural and easy,' beginning with primary schools, in which the first rudiments of learning were to be taught, and proceeding to academies, in which youth were to be instructed in languages, ancient and modern history, mathematics, and other branches of science, preparatory to entering the University, in which instruction should be given in all the higher branches of the sciences and the principles

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of the useful arts. An institution for the deaf and dumb was also included in the plan.

        "For the elementary instruction to be given it was proposed to divide each county in the State into two or more townships, and to have one or more primary schools established in each township, which should provide a lot of ground of not less than four acres, and erect thereon a sufficient house, and vest it in the board of public instruction. For secondary training this board was to divide the State into ten academic districts and have an academy erected in each district; the State to meet one-third of the expense of the erection and the site, and furnish one-third of the sum required for salaries of teachers, on condition of their instructing a certain number of poor children free of charge. As to the superior instruction which was meant to crown the whole, the Legislature was urged to provide the needed funds for sustaining and carrying forward the then struggling University. For knitting the whole together came the board of public instruction to be constituted, which was to consist of the Governor of the State as president, and six directors, to be appointed by the General Assembly. This board was to have power to locate the several academies to be established; to determine the number and titles of the professorships therein; to examine, appoint, and regulate the compensation of the professors and the teachers; to appoint, in the first instance, the trustees; to prescribe the course of instruction and discipline according to the general rules which should be first fixed by law; and to provide some just mode of advancing from the primary schools to the academies, and from the academies to the University, as many of the most meritorious children educated at the public expense as the proceeds of the funds for public instruction should suffice to maintain and educate."

        The writer just quoted adds that "No better, more compact, or more connected scheme for the formation of a State system of instruction could well have been devised at that quite early day. The main fault in it was that it undertook too much, viz, to 'maintain' as well as 'educate' the children of the poor--an undertaking quite beyond the means of a State yet sparsely settled, and with the burdens of a recent war still weighing on the people. It was the expense which this portion of the plan involved that seems to have killed the project, for though the bill met with favor from the Legislature, was ordered to be printed, and put into a form for passage, the consideration of the large sums it would annually require to carry out its liberal provisions induced a pause, and that pause was fatal to it. Instead of eliminating from it the one specially impracticable feature and trying to work out the practicable ones, its advocates desired and urged its passage as a whole, and so friends fell from it and it failed."

PROVISION FOR PUBLIC SCHOOLS.

        No further legislative action was taken on this question till 1825. In that year "a fund for the establishment of common schools" was established

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by the General Assembly "consisting of the dividends arising from the stocks then held or afterwards acquired by the State in the banks of New Berne and Cape Fear, the dividends arising from the stocks owned by the State in the Cape Fear Navigation Company, the Roanoke Navigation Company, and the Clubfoot and Harlowe's Creek Canal Company, the tax imposed by law on license to retailers of spirituous liquors and auctioneers, the unexpended balance of the agricultural fund, all moneys paid to the State for entries of vacant lands, and all the vacant and unappropriated swamp lands of the State, together with such sums of money as the Legislature may hereafter find it convenient to appropriate from time to time."

        Hon. S. M. Finger, superintendent of public instruction of North Carolina, in a recent address on public education said:

        "From those sources it might seem that a large fund would soon have been accumulated, but the generosity of the State as shown by act of Assembly, at Fayetteville, 1789, cut off what, under the above-recited provision, would soon have yielded a magnificent school fund. I refer to the act ceding to the United States all her territory now included in the great State of Tennessee. I recite the preamble giving the reasons for the cession of this magnificent domain, and as indicative of the character of our people at that early date.

        "'Whereas the United States in Congress assembled have repeatedly and earnestly recommended to the respective States, owning or claiming western territory to make cession of part of the same as a further means, as well of hastening the extinguishment of the debts, as of establishing the harmony of the United States; and the inhabitants of the said western territory being also desirous that such cession should be made in order to obtain a more ample protection than they have heretofore received. Now this State being ever desirous of doing ample justice to the public creditors, as well as establishing the harmony of the United States and complying with the reasonable desires of her citizens:

        "'Be it enacted, etc.' The act goes on to recite the manner of making the deed, and various conditions of the grant, among which is this:

        "'Provided, always, That no regulations made or to be made by Congress shall tend to emancipate slaves.'

        "The deed was made February, 1790, for the reason stated in the preamble above recited, and the grant was accepted by Congress on the 2d day of April of that year. Thus it was that North Carolina parted with this valuable domain, because Congress requested it to be done as a means of paying the public debt, which had been incurred by the thirteen original States in their common struggle for independence. Thus it was that North Carolina surrendered what would have yielded her a magnificent school fund, under such legislation as that of 1825, above recited. This action on the part of North Carolina was in marked contrast with the action of Connecticut in reference to her public lands.

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Connecticut, instead of contributing her public lands to the payment of the common debt of the country, held her 'western reserve' for her own uses and from it laid the foundation of her school fund."

        The following State officials were appointed to manage the school fund: the Governor, the chief-justice of the supreme court, the speaker of the senate, the speaker of the house, and the State treasurer, with their successors in office. These were constituted a body corporate and politic under the title of "The president and directors of the literary fund." They were empowered to hold property, and to dispose of and improve the same, for the promotion of learning and the instruction of youth. In 1836 the constitution of the board was changed, and it was made to consist of the Governor and three others to be appointed by him biennially.

        In 1837 the literary fund was largely augmented by the transfer of $1,433,757 by the General Government to North Carolina, being this State's share of the surplus deposit fund. That sum, less $300,000, was added to the literary fund, increasing this fund to more than $2,000,000. The Legislature of that year directed the president and directors of the literary fund to digest a plan for common schools suited to the condition and resources of the State, and to report the same at the next session of the General Assembly. The State was now ready to carry out the educational provisions of the Constitution, and to inaugurate a system of common schools which would, to some extent, meet the needs and requirements of the people.

PUBLIC SCHOOLS ESTABLISHED.

        On December 4, 1838, the president and directors of the literary fund made their report to the General Assembly in accordance with the resolution which was passed by that body at its previous session. The principal provisions of this report and the workings of the system before the late Civil War are thus given in the Report of the Commissioner of Education (U. S.) for 1876: "It proposed to have the State divided into 1,250 school districts, each to have a school-house erected in it, as pleasantly situated and as neat and commodious as possible; to have a normal department organized in the State University for the training of teachers for the schools; to have the income of the literary fund, amounting then to about $100,000 annually, distributed among the districts at the rate of about $240 for each, to aid in the maintenance of schools, and to be supplemented by a local tax of twice that amount, levied by the county court; and, finally, to have five superintendents of schools for each county and three committee-men for each school district." The scheme provided only for common schools, and left academies to succeed these at no long interval, and colleges and universities in due time to crown the whole.

        "The adoption or rejection of this system it was proposed to submit to a vote of the people; and on the 8th of January, 1839, a little more

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than one month after the submission of the report, the Legislature, under the lead of Mr. W. W. Cherry, chairman of the committee on education, passed an act to divide the State into school districts, six miles square, and to refer to the people the question of the establishment and maintenance of schools in these. The establishment of a school for teachers was passed by. In counties where the vote should be in favor of common schools the county court was to select five superintendents for the county, whose first duty was to divide the county into school districts, for each of which three committee-men were to be chosen 'to assist the superintendents in all matters pertaining to the establishment of schools' within their districts. The court was also to see to the levying of a tax sufficient to build a school-house for fifty scholars in each district, and the further tax above referred to for meeting the State allowance to each school, which tax, however, most mistakenly was cut down in 1844 to one-fourth of what had been recommended.

        "Nearly every county in the State voted for the schools and the school-tax proposed, and at the next session of the Legislature in 1840, a law embodying the main features of the report was passed, and the new school system was at once set in operation. It was modified somewhat in 1844, especially by an allowance of an increase of the school districts, diminishing, in proportion to that increase, the amount of school money to be paid to each, and also, by express allowance, the amount of local tax to be collected. In 1852 a State superintendent was appointed, The census of 1850 gave the number of schools as 2,657; of teachers. 2,730; of pupils, 104,095; the income being $158,564, most of it from local taxes and from public funds. In 1860 there was a slight advance upon these figures as to schools, teachers, and pupils, and an increase of the income to $268,719, the greater part still from taxation in the counties and from the income of the literary fund."

        In order that the reader may have an idea of the progress of education in North Carolina during the twenty years preceding the War the following school statistics of the census of 1840 are given. It must be remembered that the common-school system had not gone into operation at this time. In 1840 there were 2 colleges (including the University), 141 academies and grammar schools, 632 primary and common (county) schools, making a total of 775 educational institutions. The number of students in attendance was as follows: at colleges, 158; at academies, 4,398; at other schools, 14,937; making a total of 19,483.

        The following comparative statistics are gathered from an article in the North Carolina Journal of Education of February, 1858, prepared by Rev. Calvin H. Wiley, D. D., superintendent of common schools.

        The average length of the schools of Maine at that time was four months and three weeks; of New Hampshire, five months; of North Carolina, four months. Maine and New Hampshire distributed about 70 cents per capita for white population; Connecticut and Pennsylvania, about 95 cents; New York and Ohio, about $1; Virginia, about 8 cents;

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North Carolina about 50 cents. North Carolina had a larger school fund than Maine or New Jersey (by $1,500,000), or Maryland or Virginia (by $600,000), or Massachusetts (by $500,000), or Georgia (by $1,700,000). North Carolina and Georgia were about equal in white population, yet the former had 2,000 more common schools than the latter, more than 100 more academies, and as many colleges. North Carolina had more colleges than South Carolina, more academies by 100, and nearly three times as many children at school. Virginia had 340,000 white population more than North Carolina, yet the latter had as many colleges, as many academies, and 500 or 600 public schools more than Virginia. Kentucky had 200,000 white population more than North Carolina, yet the latter had as many colleges as the former, as many academies, more common schools by 1,000, and as many children at school. The same is substantially true in the comparison between Tennessee and North Carolina. It should also be remembered that at that time North Carolina had but few towns of any consequence and no large cities.

        Dr. Wiley, after stating the above facts, adds: "Upon a calm review of the entire facts, it is neither immodest nor unjust to assert that North Carolina is clearly ahead of all the slave-holding States with her system of public instruction, while she compares favorably in several respects with some of the New England and North-western States."

        The public-school system had reached its highest efficiency at the outbreak of the War. As a result of that conflict the permanent school fund was almost entirely destroyed, and the public schools were closed until about 1870.

PUBLIC SCHOOLS SINCE THE WAR.

        The War not only swept away the school fund, but at the same time left the country impoverished. The freeing of the negro added largely to the school population of the State and increased the difficulty of the educational problem. The negroes numbered about three-eighths of the whole population. Major Finger, in the address before referred to, said:

        "The problem then was how the five eighths, impoverished as they were, owning all the lands, but essentially nothing but the lands, could educate themselves and also the three-eighths of paupers recently made citizens. I do not think that any civilized people ever had thrust upon them a more difficult problem than the South had, for it applied to the whole South, in the formation of safe political society out of such material. Of course, general education was seen to be a necessity. Our people, recognizing the necessity, with that wonderful adaptability which characterizes them, did not fold their hands in tame submission to what seemed to many inevitable political, social, and material destruction, but they went earnestly to work to educate."

        In the State Constitution which was adopted in 1868, it was provided

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that "The General Assembly at its first session under this Constitution shall provide by taxation and otherwise, for a general and uniform system of public schools, wherein tuition shall be free of charge to all the children of the State between the ages of six and twenty-one years." The Constitution, as it now stands, contains, among others, the following provisions relating to public education: "The General Assembly shall levy a capitation tax on every male inhabitant in the State, over twenty-one and under fifty years of age, which shall be equal on each to the tax on property value at $300 in cash.

        "The proceeds of the State and county capitation tax shall be applied to the purposes of education and the support of the poor, but in no one year shall more than 25 per cent. thereof be applied to the latter purpose.

        "Each county in the State shall be divided into a convenient number of districts, in which one or more public schools shall be maintained, at least, four months in every year; and if the commissioners of any county shall fail to comply with aforesaid requirements of this section they shall be liable to indictment.

        "The proceeds of all lands that have been or hereafter may be granted by the United States to this State, and not otherwise appropriated by this State or by the United States; also all moneys, stocks, bonds, and other property, now belonging to any State fund for purposes of education; also the net proceeds of all sales of swamp lands belonging to the State, and other grants, gifts, or devises that have been or hereafter may be made to the State, and not otherwise appropriated by the State, or by the term of the grant, gift, or devise, shall be paid into the State treasury; and, together with so much of the ordinary revenue of the State as may be by law set apart for that purpose, shall be faithfully appropriated for establishing and maintaining in this State a system of free public schools, and for no other uses or purposes whatsoever."

        It is also provided in the Constitution that the clear proceeds of all penalties and forfeitures and of all fines collected in the several counties for any breach of the penal or military laws of the State shall be appropriated in the respective counties for maintaining free public schools.

        The above provisions are the basis of the present system of public schools. The expenses of these schools are met, for the most part, by the taxation on polls and property. The State board of education holds about 1,000,000 acres of swamp lands, but there is not much prospect that these will be a source of income for many years yet. Before the War some $200,000 were expended in attempts to drain them, but without success. The State has no large fund for educational purposes, and what has been done for schools since the War has been accomplished mainly by taxation, and unless the General Government comes to the assistance of the States, and distributes the surplus so rapidly accumulating

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in the treasury, the people must still rely upon their own efforts for the further promotion of public education.

        As has been stated, the public schools were re-opened in 1870, and though they have not yet reached any marked degree of efficiency, yet there has been steady improvement since that time. The disbursements for these schools have been as follows: In 1871, $177,497.94; in 1872, $173,275.62; in 1873, $196,675.07; in 1874, $297,090.85; in 1875, no report, about the same as in 1874; in 1876, $334,163.14; in 1877, $319,813; in 1878, $324,827.10; in 1879, $326,040.35; in 1880, $352,882.65; in 1881, $409,658.88; in 1882, $509,736.02; in 1883, $623,430.98; in 1884, $640,245.20; in 1885, $630,552.32.

        The following statistics1 for 1886 will give an idea of the present status of public schools: Number of public school-houses for whites 3,443; for colored, 1,592; total, 5,035; value of public-school property for whites, $449,824.60; for colored, $203,281.79; total, $653,106.39; number of public schools taught, for whites, 4,115; for colored, 2,223; total, 6,338; average length of school terms, for whites, 11¾ weeks; for colored, 12 weeks; enrollment of whites, 188,036; of colored, 117,562; total, 305,598; average attendance of whites, 117,121; of colored, 68,585; total, 185,706; average salary of public-school teachers per month, white, $25.05; colored, $22.52½.


        1 Gathered from report of the Superintendent of Public Instruction of North Carolina, for 1885-86.

        The following is a summary of the receipts for public schools in 1886: Poll-tax, $253,261.49; property tax, $258,799.85; special poll-tax, $7,110.48; special property tax, $20,618.83; special poll-tax under local acts, $1,184.98; special property tax under local acts, $6,820.17; fines, forfeitures, and penalties, $22,876.22; liquor licenses, $83,002.75; auctioneers, $32.66; estrays, $14.38; other sources, $16,950.60; making the total receipts for the year, $670,672.41. Funds which came in afterwards increased this total to $671,115.65. The amount expended in 1887 was $653,037.33.

        Major Finger says that "the General Assembly now levies a tax of 12½ cents on every $100 of property and 37½ cents on each poll for schools; and at least 75 per cent. of all other poll-taxes, whether levied in the revenue law or by the county commissioners, must be appropriated for schools. All these moneys so appropriated are collected by the sheriffs of the respective counties, and by them turned over to the county school officers. If the fund accumulated in each county is not sufficient to maintain schools for a period of four months the statute requires the county commissioners, in accordance with the provision of the Constitution above cited, to levy a special tax for that purpose. Our supreme court has recently decided in the case of Barksdale vs. Commissioners of Sampson County that this requirement is constitutional only within the limits of 66⅔ cents on property and $2 on the poll, but that

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special taxes for special purposes under special acts of Assembly are not to be included."

        Many of the larger towns, under special acts of the Legislature, have excellent graded schools, each employing from six to fourteen teachers. In 1886 there were seventeen of these schools in the State. They are supported principally by voluntary taxation.

        According to the school census for 1886 the total number of children in the State of school age (between the ages of six and twenty-one years) was 547,308; of these there were 338,059 white and 209,249 colored children. The total enrollment at the public schools was 305,598; at private schools, about 30,000. When it is taken into consideration that many of the younger children of school age do not attend school and many stop their education before the age of twenty-one, it will appear that a large proportion of the children are in school.

PEABODY FUND.

        North Carolina has received large benefactions from the Peabody Fund, which have been appropriated to public, normal, and graded schools, and to the holders of the Peabody scholarships in the Nashville Normal College. This State has now fourteen scholarships at that institution, each yielding $200 per annum. Appointments are made for two years by the State superintendent of public instruction. Only those are appointed who expect to make teaching a profession, and who guarantee to teach at least two years in North Carolina.

        The appropriations from the Peabody Fund to this State, from 1868 to 1887, inclusive, have been as follows: 1868, $2,700; 1869, $6,350; 1870, $7,650; 1871, $8,750; 1872, $8,250; 1873, $9,750; 1874, $14,300; 1875, $16,900; 1876, $8,050; 1877, $4,900; 1878, $4,500; 1879, $6,700; 1880, $3,050; 1881, $4,125; 1882, $6,485; 1883, $8,350; 1884, $6,075; 1885, $5,430; 1886, $5,500; 1887, $5,500--making a total of $143,315. This noble charity has been of great advantage to the State.

PRESENT PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM.

        The Constitution provides for a "State board of education," consisting of the following State officials, viz: Governor, secretary of state, treasurer, auditor, attorney-general, and superintendent of public instruction. This board has full power to legislate in relation to free public schools and the State educational fund. Any action which it may take, however, is subject to change or amendment by the General Assembly. The superintendent of public instruction is the head of the system of public schools, and has general supervision in their management.1


        1 State superintendents.--The first superintendent of common schools was the Rev. Calvin H. Wiley, D. D., 1852-65. While occupying this position he prepared a "North Carolina Reader," giving the history of each county in the State, with an account of the soil, climate, etc. It also contained selections from the writings and public addresses of eminent North Carolinians. It is an excellent work, and before the War was used in the public schools. On the reconstruction of the system in 1870, under the law of April 12, 1869, the Rev. S. S. Ashley was made State superintendent, 1870-72. His successors have been Alexander McIver, 1873-75; Stephen D. Pool, 1875-77; John C. Scarborough, 1877-85; Sidney M. Finger, 1885-.
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        Each county has a county board of education and a county superintendent of education. The county board consists of three men, elected biennially by the commissioners and justices of the peace of the county. This board has the general management of the public schools in the county and lays off the school districts, the convenience of each neighborhood being consulted in the division. In each of these districts there is a school committee, consisting of three persons, whose duty it is to provide school-houses, employ teachers and give orders for the payment of the sums due for their services, and take at a stated period a census of the children within the school age. The compensation of teachers of the first grade is left to the committee; teachers of the second grade receive $25, and those of the third grade $15 per month. The schools for the two races are separate. The school districts for the two races may be the same in territorial limits or not, according to the convenience of the parties concerned. Major Finger says that "these districts are irregular in size, but not many of them contain an area of more than 4 miles square, and many are much smaller, so that, except n the very sparsely populated sections of the State, there is annually a school in easy reach of every child."

        The county superintendent is elected by the county board of education, the county commissioners, and the justices of the peace, for a term of two years. The county superintendent has the general over-sight of the schools in his county, and examines all applicants for positions as teachers. The census reports and school statistics are reported to him by the district committees, and he makes an annual report to the State superintendent of public instruction. His salary is decided by the county board, but is not to be less than $2 nor more than $3 per day for the time in which he is necessarily engaged in the discharge of his duties, provided his salary shall not exceed 4 per cent. of the school fund apportioned in the county.

        The studies required by law to be taught in the public schools are spelling, defining, reading, writing, arithmetic, English grammar, geography, elementary physiology and hygiene, and the history of North Carolina and of the United States.

NORMAL INSTRUCTION.

        In 1885, in accordance with the Constitution of the State, the General Assembly established a "normal department" in the University of North Carolina, which is open to young men preparing to teach, free of tuition, on condition that they sign a pledge to teach at least one year after leaving the institution.

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        There are now in the State eight normal schools for the whites and five for the negroes.

        In 1876 the Legislature established the University Normal School for the whites and the Fayetteville State Normal for the negroes, making an annual appropriation for each of $2,000. In 1881 four additional normal schools for each race were established, each school receiving an annual appropriation of $500. In 1885 the University Normal was discontinued, and the annual appropriation of $2,000 which this school had formerly received was divided equally between four white normal schools which were established at that time. In 1887 an additional appropriation of $1,000 was made to each of the four colored normals which were established in 1881, making the total appropriation to each $1,500. The annual appropriations for the white normals amount to $4,000, and the annual appropriations for the colored normals amount to $8,000.

        The normals for the whites are in the nature of teachers' institutes, and are held annually at convenient points in the State for a period of one month. As these are held in the summer, during the vacation of the other schools, the best teachers in the State are secured to teach in them, as well as noted teachers from other States.

        The colored normals are established at fixed points and are regularly in session eight or nine months during the year. They annually supply a large number of teachers for the colored schools.

        The statutes of the State provide for county teachers' institutes for both races; many of the counties hold them one or two weeks during each summer. The State superintendent of public instruction says that these normal schools and county institutes have had a fine effect in elevating the standard of common-school teachers.1


        1 In addition to the public schools, the State makes excellent provision for the education of the deaf, dumb, and blind of both races.

FEDERAL AID.

        The State has a well-appointed system of public instruction, but is hampered on every hand by want of funds. The financial condition of the people does not warrant an increase of taxation sufficient to meet the educational needs of the State. When it is remembered that the white population bears the burden of taxation not only for their own children but also for those of the negro race, it can be seen how onerous is this charge.

        Superintendent Finger makes an earnest appeal for national aid to education. He says:

        "The State has done well in the revival of her public schools, and she will continue to struggle on, carrying her burden, earnestly looking forward to the time when the Congress of the United States will open the doors of the Treasury and extend aid. North Carolina and other Southern States gave to the United States vast domains which were used to pay a common debt, a debt of the original thirteen States, and in the course of events it turns out that the United States frees the slaves of

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the South, and makes them citizens and voters while in a condition of extreme ignorance. Twenty-two years have elapsed since the close of the War; almost another generation has been raised up since the South laid down her arms; it is too late to look back now and engage in crimination and recrimation; it is surely time for the United States to lend a helping hand to the South in carrying her burden.

* * * * * * *

        "Surely the Government that could find warrant in the Constitution to free the negroes and make them citizens can also find authority to distribute from its overflowing Treasury funds to educate them for the proper discharge of the duties of freemen and citizens."

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Illustration

THE ATLANTIC HOTEL AND TEACHERS' ASSEMBLY BUILDING, MOREHEAD CITY, N. C.

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Illustration

FRONT ELEVATION. SIDE ELEVATION.
NORTH CAROLINA TEACHERS' ASSEMBLY BUILDING, MOREHEAD CITY.

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CHAPTER X.

THE NORTH CAROLINA TEACHERS' ASSEMBLY.

HISTORY AND INFLUENCE OF THE ORGANIZATION.

        In studying the present dynamics of education in North Carolina the writer has observed no one force more powerful for good than the North Carolina Teachers' Assembly, which, in the opinion of the State superintendent of public instruction, is doing more to further the educational advancement of the State than all other agencies combined.

        This organization was originated by that earnest and progressive friend of education, Eugene G. Harrell, editor of The North Carolina Teacher. He conceived the idea in August, 1883, and it at once became popular throughout the State. Owing to his wise and energetic management the movement has been a success from the first, and through its agency, the teachers of the State have been brought into closer relations than ever before. It bids fair to revolutionize the school system of the State, or rather to systematize the schools, for it is a misnomer to speak of a school system as existing in North Carolina.

        The first session of the Assembly was held in June, 1884, at the Haywood White Sulphur Springs, one of the favorite resorts in "the land of the sky," that part of our country so beautifully pictured by Miss Fisher (Christian Reid). The next two annual sessions were held at Black Mountain, some 7 miles from the famous Mount Mitchell, the highest peak east of the Rockies.

        The last session convened at Morehead City, on the Atlantic coast, one of the most popular of Southern watering places. The presidents, elected annually, have been as follows: 1884, Prof. J. J. Fray, of the Raleigh Male Academy, whose death the State mourned before the close of that year; 1885, Dr. R. H. Lewis, of Kinston College; and 1886 and 1887, Professor E. A. Alderman, of the Goldsborough Graded and High School. Mr. Harrell has been unanimously continued as secretary since the organization. The growing interest is manifested by the attendance, which, for the four sessions of its history, has been as follows: 365, 620, 720, and 1,765. The present membership numbers about 3,000, and includes teachers from every known educational institution in the State. All teachers, and all friends of education who are recommended by the county superintendents of public schools, are eligible for membership. The annual dues are $2 for males and $1 for females.

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        The exercises of the Assembly consist in the discussion of educational topics at the day sessions by the members, and lectures in the evening by distinguished educators of this and other States who are especially engaged for this purpose. Sometimes, in place of the lecture, a musical and literary entertainment is substituted. After the lecture or entertainment there is usually a dance for the benefit of those who enjoy that pastime. At both the mountain and seaside sessions many little excursions for pleasure and recreation are made. The close of the session is generally marked by a grand excursion. At the close of the last session the teachers made a trip to Baltimore and Washington, where they were tendered a special reception by President Cleveland. A trip to New York, Niagara Falls, and other points of interest has already been planned for the coming year. These trips are always mapped out with wise forethought and are made both pleasant and profitable.

        The Assembly has been permanently established at Morehead City, and an "Assembly building" is now being erected, at a cost of $2,750, the funds for this purpose having been given by a few friends of the organization; Mr. Julian S. Carr, of Durham, who has endeared himself to the people of his State by many noble benefactions to education, alone giving $1,750 of the amount. The building when completed will be a handsome, two-storied structure. The following description of it is taken from the North Carolina Teacher for October, 1887: "The hall is on the second floor, 40 by 80 feet, 15 feet pitch, well lighted and ventilated. On the same floor is the secretary's office, and the reading-room and library, each 15 by 18 feet. The first floor has a passage 10 feet wide, the entire length of the building, and on either side are four rooms, each 15 by 18 feet. These rooms include special ones for teachers' bureau, visiting editors, parlor, office, and committees; the others are to be used for an educational exposition, exhibiting all classes of school furniture and conveniences for educational work.

        "The Assembly hall will be seated with folding settees, and well furnished with globes, maps, charts, slate blackboards, and everything needed in our assembly work, and it will not be long before the teachers of North Carolina will have not only the most pleasant place in the South for an annual gathering, but will also have one of the best assembly rooms to be found in America."

        The officers of the Assembly are making arrangements for a park, embracing 50 acres of land, on Bogue Sound, about 5 miles from Morehead City, and will run a small steamer regularly between those places for the pleasure of the members.

        The teachers of North Carolina now have a delightful summer home for rest, recuperation, and enjoyment, of which they may well be proud.

        Through the influence of the Assembly, "reading circles," with a prescribed course of reading, and local "teachers' councils," are being

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established throughout the State. The organization has been well termed "The North Carolina Chautauqua."

IN CONCLUSION.

        Never in North Carolina was the educational outlook brighter than at present. Since the revival of the University in 1875 there has been manifest progress in every department of education. The public schools have been made more efficient; the graded school system has been introduced in the principal towns; the endowments of several of the denominational colleges have been largely increased, their curricula made more thorough, and their standard of graduation raised; normal schools and teachers' institutes are conducted at convenient points, the State and counties making provision for their maintenance; and at the last session of the Legislature (1886-87) provision was made for the immediate establishment of a college of agriculture and the mechanic arts, to which the State, besides granting the interest from the land-scrip fund, amounting to $7,500 per annum, guarantees a liberal income from certain specified taxes. All the young men of the State who can successfully pass the entrance examination will receive free tuition. This college has been established at Raleigh, and it is expected that the work of instruction will begin in the fall of 1889. The interest now so manifest in all that pertains to the intellectual advancement of the Old North State promises grand results for the future.

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APPENDIX.

LIST OF THE PRINCIPAL WORKS CONSULTED IN THE PREPARATION OF THIS MONOGRAPH.

        [NOTE.--Those sources from which the writer has derived the greatest help--personal interviews with those who are or have been prominent in the educational work in the State, correspondence, pamphlets, newspaper articles, school catalogues, etc.--it would be impossible to enumerate here. He would, however, make special acknowledgment to Rev. J. Rumple, D. D., for information concerning the early Presbyterian schools; to President Kemp P. Battle, LL. D., forassistance in collecting materials for the sketch of the University; to Rev. Charles Phillips, D. D., for many important facts relating to education previous to the late War; to Hon. S. M. Finger, for statistics of the public schools; and to Hon. William L. Saunders, for advance sheets of the first four volumes (1662-1754) of the Colonial Records, and other favors.]

  • Colonial Records of North Carolina. Edited by Hon. William L. Saunders, Raleigh.
  • History of Carolina. By John Lawson, Gent., surveyor-general of North Carolina. London, 1714; Raleigh, 1860.
  • The Natural History of North Carolina. With an account of the trade, manners, and customs of the Christian and Indian inhabitants. By John Brickell. Dublin, 1737.
  • History of North Carolina. Two vols. By Hugh Williamson. Philadelphia, 1812.
  • History of North Carolina. Two vols. By F. X. Martin. New Orleans, 1829.
  • History of North Carolina. Two vols. By J. H. Wheeler. Philadelphia, 1851.
  • History of North Carolina (1584-1729). Two vols. By F. L. Hawks. Fayetteville, N. C., 1857.
  • History of North Carolina. Two vols. By J. W. Moore. Raleigh, 1880.
  • Sketches of North Carolina. By W. H. Foote. New York, 1846.
  • History of the Moravians in North Carolina. By L. S. Reichel. Salem, N. C., 1857.
  • History of the German Settlements in North Carolina. By G. D. Bernheim. Philadelphia, 1872.
  • Eastern North Carolina. By L. C. Vass. Richmond, Va., 1886.
  • The Old North State in 1776. By E. W. Caruthers. Philadelphia, 1854.
  • History of Rowan County. By J. Rumple. Salisbury, N. C., 1881.
  • Sketches of Western North Carolina. By C. L. Hunter. Raleigh, 1877.
  • Reminiscences and Memoirs of North Carolina and Eminent North Carolinians. (Part III.) By J. H. Wheeler. Columbus, Ohio, 1884.
  • North Carolina in the Colonial Period. By Daniel R. Goodloe. (Introduction to Wheeler's Reminiscences, Part III.)
  • Life of Rev. David Caldwell. By E. W. Caruthers. Greensborough, N. C., 1842.
  • Life of Macon. By Edward R. Cotton. Baltimore, 1840.
  • Centennial of Methodism in North Carolina. By L. S. Burkhead. Raleigh, 1876.
  • Princeton College during the Eighteenth Century. (Biographical sketches of graduates.) By S. D. Alexander, New York, 1872.
  • History of the College of New Jersey. Two vols. By John Maclean. Philadelphia, 1877.
  • De Bow's Industrial Resources of the South and West. New Orleans, 1852.
  • Public Acts and Laws of North Carolina. Beginning with Davis's Revisal. Newbern, 1752.
  • Trustees' Journal of the University of North Carolina. (Manuscript.)
  • The standard histories of the English Colonies in America and of the United States.

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