the best enlightened in the community began an agitation of the school question, and supervision was demanded. In Massachusetts, where the urban civilization had made most progress, this agitation resulted in the formation of a state board of education in 1837, and the employment of Horace Mann as its secretary (June, 1837). Boston had been connected with Providence, Worcester and Lowell by railroads before 1835, and in 1842 the first great trunk railroad had been completed through Springfield to Albany, opening to Boston a communication with the great west by the Erie canal and the newly completed railroad from Albany to Buffalo. This was the beginning of the great urban epoch in America that has gone on increasing the power of the city to this day. The number of cities containing 8,000 inhabitants and upwards, was, in 1790, only six; between 1800 and 1810 it had increased to 11; in 1820 to 13; in 1830, 26; in 1840, 44; in the fifty years between 1840 and 1890 it increased from 44 to 443, or 10 times the former number. The urban population of the country in 1790 was, according to the superintendent of the census (see Bulletin No. 52, April 17, 1791), only one in 30 of the population; in 1840 it had increased to one in 12; in 1890, to one in three. In fact, if we count the towns on the railroads that are made urban by their close connection with the large cities, and the suburban districts, it is safe to say that now one-half of the population is urban. Horace Mann came to the head of education in Massachusetts just at the beginning of the epoch of railroads and the growth of cities. He attacked with unsparing severity the evils of the schools as they had been. The school district system, introduced into Connecticut in 1701, into Rhode Island about 1750, and into Massachusetts in 1789, was pronounced by him to be the most disastrous feature in the whole history of educational legislation in Massachusetts. Horace Mann extended his criticisms and suggestions to the examination of teachers and their instruction in teachers' 1 institutes; to the improvement of school buildings; the raising of school funds by taxation; the creating of a correct public opinion on school questions; the care for vicious youth in appropriate schools. He discarded the hide-bound text-book method of teaching and substituted the oral discussion of the topic in place of the memorizing of the words of the book. He encouraged school libraries and school apparatus. Horace Mann's influence founded the first normal school in the United States at Lexington (afterwards moved to Framingham), and a second one founded at Bridgewater in the fall of the same year (1839). Inspired by the example in Massachusetts, Connecticut was aroused by Henry Barnard, who carried through the legislature the act organizing a state board of commissioners, and became himself the first secretary of it (1839). In 1849, Connecticut established a normal school. In 1843, Mr. Barnard went to Rhode Island and assisted in drawing up the state school law under which he became the first commissioner, and labored there six years. These were the chief fermenting influences in education that worked a wide change in the management of schools in the middle and western states within the past fifty years. Superintendents of city school systems began in 1837 with Buffalo. Providence followed in 1839; New Orleans in 1841; Cleveland in 1844; Baltimore in 1849; Cincinnati in 1850; Boston in 1851; New York, San Francisco and Jersey City in 1852; Newark and Brooklyn in 1853; Chicago and St. Louis in 1854; and finally Philadelphia in 1883. State superintendents began with New York, 1813; New York was followed by 16 of the states before 1850. From 1851 to the civil war, eight states established the office of state superintendent; since then, nineteen other states, including 10 in the south, that had no state systems of education previously. Normal schools in the United States increased from one, beginning in 1839 in Massachusetts, to 138 public and 46 private normal schools in 1889, with an attendance of upwards of 28,000 students preparing for the work of teaching. This would give a total of some twelve thousand a year of new teachers to meet the demand. It may be assumed, therefore, that less than one-sixth of the supply of new teachers comes from the training schools specially designed to educate teachers. The history of education since the time of Horace Mann is very largely an account of the successive modifications introduced into elementary schools through the direct or indirect influence of the normal school. PART VI APPENDIXES APPENDIX I- Total number of pupils and students of all grades in both public and private schools and NOTE. The classification of states made use of in the following table is the same as that adopted by the United States census, and is as follows: North Atlantic Total number of pupils and students of all grades in both public and private schools, 1897-98-Continued a Including pupils in preparatory or academic departments of higher institutions, public and private, and excluding elementary pupils, who are classed in ¿ This is made up from the returns of individual high schools to the bureau, and is somewhat too small, as there are many secondary pupils outside the com- c Including colleges for women, agricultural and mechanical (land-grant) colleges and scientific schools. Students in law, theological, and medical departments e Including schools of dentistry, pharmacy, and veterinary medicine. f Mainly in schools or departments of medicine and law attached to state universities. g Non-professional pupils in normal schools are included in columns 4 and 5. h Private normal schools are, with few exceptions, scarcely superior to the ordinary secondary schools. i There are, in addition to this number, 21,687 students taking normal courses in universities, colleges, and public and private high schools. North Atlantic Division... South Atlantic Division.... |