47

202

65

34

37

1

171

204 107

225

1

887

272

206

29

219

83

131

33

330

143

131

223

403

524

46

202

264

97

13

118

317

58

Hampshire, and one in 1828 in Ipswich. In 1828 also Bradford Academy opened a department for girls and in 1836 became exclusively a female academy.

A growing public sentiment in favor of the higher education of women was gradually making itself felt and de. veloping a distinct class of educators in this field. Conspicuous among them were Emma Willard, Catherine Beecher, Joseph Emerson, Mary Lyon and Zilpah P. Grant. Emma Willard opened her famous seminary in Troy, New York, in 1821, continuing her work there until 1838. Catherine Beecher labored in Hartford in 18221832. Joseph Emerson was head of the school in Byfield, Massachusetts, in 1818-1824. Mary Lyon opened her Mount Holyoke Seminary in Holyoke, Massachusetts, in 1837 and there taught until the end of her life in 1849. Zilpah P. Grant was principal of the Adams Academy in Derry, New Hampshire, and the Ipswich (Massachusetts) Academy, and was also associated with Mary Lyon at Mount Holyoke Seminary.

Not long after these beginnings the higher education of women reached the collegiate stage. The movement to give women the advantages of collegiate learning and the first experiment in coëducation were made in Ohio, in the Oberlin Institute (afterward Oberlin College), chartered in 1834. At the Oberlin commencement in 1841, three women received a degree the first women to receive the

degree in arts in the United States. Antioch College followed in the footsteps of Oberlin in 1853, and most of the States which founded universities after the middle of the century granted equal privileges to men and women — Utah in 1850, Iowa in 1856, Michigan in 1862, Kansas in 1866, and Minnesota in 1868. In 1868 the University of Indiana, chartered in 1820, also became free to women. Only one of the great colleges exclusively for women was founded before the last quarter of the Nineteenth century. Vassar College, at Poughkeepsie, New York, offered instruction early in 1865.

Early attempts were made to secure a National university at the seat of Government, the intense National spirit of the period giving stimulus to the idea. Washington strongly favored the plan, which had the support also of such statesmen as Pinckney, Jefferson, Madison, John Quincy Adams, Benjamin Rush, and Joel Barlow. But the consensus of opinion. was not favorable, and after several Congressional committees had reported against the plan, it was finally abandoned. Federal interest in education was still pronounced, however, and finally took the form of aid to the individual States for that purpose. The Nation then had little cash for that or any other purpose, but had plenty of land. By the acquisition of the Northwest Territory by cession from the States, the Government had become land-rich. In the history of

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the civilized world land has always been one of the principal endowments of colleges and universities and, following these precedents, the United States initiated its policy of granting land to the individual States for educational purposes.

In the Ordinance of 1795 dealing with the newly acquired public domain, Congress voted that lot number sixteen in every township should be reserved for the maintenance of public schools. After the famous Ordinance

of 1787 had been passed, Congress again decreed that lot sixteen in each township should be reserved for purposes of education and that, for the purpose of a university, land, aggregating not more than two complete townships, should be given. The first to benefit from the operation of this law was the Northwest Territory, whose legislature in 1802 passed an act establishing a university, subsequently becoming the Ohio University, and giving to it in trust the grant of two townships of land. Since 1800 each State admitted to the Union, save Maine, Texas, and West Virginia, has received at least two townships of land for a university foundation. The following table shows the amount of land in acres thus granted to the States and territories for common school educational purposes prior to 1869:

For seminaries and universities

46,080 46,080 46,080 46,080 46,080 886,460 46,080 908,503 92,160 905,144 46,080 958,649 92,160 6,719,324 46,080 2,969,990 82,640 3,329,706 46,080 2,801,306 46,080 3,985,428 46,080 2,702,044 46,080 3,715,555 46,080 2,488,675 46,080 4,309,368 46,080 3,003,613 46,080

5,360,451

5,112,035

4,050,347

3,068,231

3,480,281

67,893,919 1,165,520

It is safe to estimate that these educational grants realized to the States close to $200,000,000 as the contribution of the National Government to the common cause. During the same period 8,000,000 acres were granted to States for agricultural colleges, technical or mechanical colleges, colleges, seminaries and universities. Special and professional schools did not come into existence before the middle of the Eighteenth century. A school of medicine, recognized as entitled to give degrees, existed in New York in 1769. A theological seminary was founded in Pennsylvania in 1778. The Medical School of Pennsylvania originated in 1765, was fully organized in 1767, and conferred its first degrees

in 1768. The first law school was opened after the peace of 1783. Medical schools were established in Harvard College in 1782, in Dartmouth in 1798, and in Yale in 1813. Thirty-three such schools were founded between 1820 and 1860. The first permanent law schools connected with colleges were established at Harvard in 1817, at Yale in 1824, and at the University of Virginia in 1826. Twelve such schools were established between 1840 and 1860. Higher industrial education began with the Rensselaer Polytechnic School in Troy, New York, in 1835, the Sheffield Scientific School of Yale in 1847, and the Lawrence Scientific School of Harvard in 1848. Ten theological seminaries were in existence between 1820 and 1829 and 49 in 1860. The first normal college for the training of teachers was opened in Concord, Vermont, in 1823; the first in Massachusetts in 1839; the first in New York in 1844. There were 20 such colleges or schools in 1860, in Maine, Connecticut, New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Illinois, Indiana, Wisconsin, Michigan, Minnesota, Kansas and California.*

* Edwin G. Dexter, A History of Education in the United States (New York, 1904); Charles F. Thwing, A History of Higher Education in America (New York, 1906); H. Barnard, Report of the Commissioner of Education (Syracuse, N. Y., 1867-68); Nicholas M. Butler, Monographs on Education in the United States (20 vols., Albany, 1904); Joseph M. Rice, The Public School System of the United States (New York, 1893); A. D. Mayo, Horace Mann and the Great Revival of the American Common School 18301850, in Report of the Commissioner of Education 1896-1897, vol. i. (Washington, 1897); G. B.

269

Goode, The Origin of the National Scientific and Educational Institutions of the United States, in The National Museum Report, 1897, pt. ii. (Washington, 1901); Elmer E. Brown, The Making of Our Middle Schools (New York, 1902), and Historical Sketches of the State School Systems, in Report of the Commissioner of Education, 1876 (Washington, 1878); B. A. Hinsdale, Horace Mann and the Common School Revival in the United States, in The Great Educators series (New York, 1898); reports of the United States Commissioner of Education.

* Leonard Woolsey Bacon, A History of American Christianity, p. 230.

clared the belief that their church could not be revived again. In 1794– 95 the membership of the Methodist Church fell off at the rate of about

4,000 a year. Intemperance, due largely to the war, was increasing and sapping the vitality of the churches. During the colonial period there had been comparatively little intemperance, but by 1800 this vice had become a National evil. In 1792 there were 2,382 distilleries in the United States, but in 1810 there were 14,141 - an increase of nearly 555 per cent., while the population increased less than 100 per cent. From September of 1791 to September of 1792 the consumption of wines and spirits in the country was 11,008,447 gallons-equal to about two and a half gallons for every man, woman and child in the Republic. Immorality and desecration of the orthodox Sabbath prevailed everywhere. Free thought, engendered by French skepticism, particularly as promulgated by the powerful Encyclopedist school, undermined the influence of the Church. Men like Jefferson and Franklin were affected

by this anti-religious propaganda and had many followers. The separation of Church and State, which was ultimately to safeguard both civil and ecclesiastical institutions, was in its initial stages injurious to the Church and indirectly to the cause of religion generally. The church organizations, which had heretofore relied upon the State for both moral and material support, could not immediately adjust themselves to the changed condition which compelled them to depend upon themselves. Their influence with the people, already weakened by many events of the war, was then still further impaired by the fact that they no longer had the civil government behind them. The sentiment of the people had already been expressed in the declaration of the Congress of 1774 concerning religion, and it was again emphasized in the first amendment to the Constitution: "" Congress shall make no law respecting the establishment of religion or prohibiting the free exercise thereof." This amendment has been rightly regarded as reflecting the popular sentiment for disestablishment and the complete disassociation of civil and religious institutions. But it was more than that. Considering the prevalence of French atheistical thought at that time, it undoubtedly reflected a strong sentiment against religion in general and a desire of a considerable and influential part of the people not only to be free from its civil authority, but to keep entirely aloof from it.

*

Then, in 1796, came the revival in the West, so often compared with the famous "Great Awakening" which began about 1735 in Massachusetts and extended thence throughout New England and even to the Middle and Southern colonies. This quickening of religious thought and feeling spread also through the East, culminating there in the opening year of the Nineteenth century. In the ensuing decade revivals were numerous and widespread, and as a result the Christianity of the country was strengthened, lifted from its low estate, enlarged in membership and influence, and advanced to a position from which it grew steadily for a century thereafter.

Many significant things, all arising from a broadening of religious impulses and activities, characterized this renaissance. For nearly 200 years, the American churches had led a self-centered existence. Each had been engaged mainly in the work of institutional foundation-in making a place for its own particular doctrine -and was concerned only with the interests of its own fold. Now that each stood secure and independent in the eyes of the law, the necessity for this narrow life was to a great degree removed. To be sure, proselyting went on and denominational interests continued to be cared for, but outside that there sprang up in the Christian communions a broader humanitarian

* See Volume I., pp. 467-470 of this History.