Part 5

The hindrances encountered again indicate the slow growth of public sentiment. It was desired that the ancient and some of the modern languages should be studied, but it was necessary to wait ten years before Latin could appear in the course, because “the views of the community would not allow it.” As an optional study it was pursued in classes every year after the first. So French, which was taught from the very first year, became a part of the course only in 1877, after the lapse of forty years.

As time has passed, the thorough work done, and the steadily expanding course of study have won to the institution devoted friends, who have added generously to its grounds, its buildings, and its funds. Once the State has been asked for aid, mainly for payment for a gymnasium, and a grant of $40,000 was obtained in 1867.

The triple strain of study, labor, and economy, under the stimulus of lofty aims, might well have given cause, in those early days, for anxiety on the score of health, but statistics were tabulated in 1867 which showed the comparative longevity of graduates of eight institutions, covering a period of thirty years. The colleges noted were “Amherst,” “Bowdoin,” “Brown,” “Dartmouth,” “Harvard,” “Williams,” and “Yale.”

Exclusive of mortality in war, the record of “Mount Holyoke Seminary” was more favorable than any other except that of “Williams College,” which fell two and one-half per cent. below it in mortality, while “Dartmouth” exceeded it by more than thirty-eight per cent.

It has been the theory of “Mount Holyoke Seminary” that she must have every advantage that the state of education will allow. She must be a college _in fact_, whether or not she take the name.

In this she reversed the theory of many of the 400 institutions in the United States, which easily take the name of college first. Recently her advanced course of study, pursued by 200 pupils, seemed to justify her adding to her powers and to her dignities, and in 1888 the Massachusetts Legislature granted a charter “authorizing Mount Holyoke Seminary and College to confer such degrees and diplomas as are conferred by any university, college or seminary of learning in this Commonwealth.”

Educational institutions, which have taken form and gathered impetus from Mount Holyoke Seminary, are to be found not only from ocean to ocean in the United States, including the “Cherokee Seminary,” founded by John Ross in the Indian Territory in 1851, but in Turkey, in Spain, in Persia, in Japan, and in Cape Colony, South Africa.

After display of so great administrative ability as appeared in Miss Lyon and her successors, it strikes one as still another mark of the traditional reluctance to recognize true values, that close upon half a century from the founding of the institution had passed before the name of a woman appeared in the list of trustees. Meantime every principal of the seminary had been a woman, every resident physician had been a woman, and every anniversary address had been made by a man.

The debt which the public owes to a few individuals who have used lavishly, for its benefit, their own great endowments, whether of brains or of money, before this same public was conscious of its own highest needs, is distinctly traceable in the kindergarten, kitchen-garden, industrial school, college, and university movements of the present day. Truly, many of these to whom much has been given have read their duty in the light of the scripture, “Of him much shall be required.” When values are once demonstrated to the people, they are ever ready to carry on important work with liberality.

While recognizing the importance of the many lines of educational effort, if we sought to learn which has done most to give a solid basis of thoroughness to woman’s education, and, secondarily, to general education, during the middle part of the present century, we should find the answer in the Normal Schools. While other institutions have contributed greatly to increase the scope of woman’s study, these have added thereto the important consideration of methods.

As a part of the thrifty policy which the States have shown when dealing with the education of girls, they have furnished Normal School instruction with the especial view to getting skilled labor in return.

Perhaps there is nothing which would insure so great care in instilling first principles. The result has certainly been to make their invaluable influence felt from the cities to the remotest school districts.

The story of the establishment of these schools is another story of personal struggle against more than indifference, and indifference itself may justly be regarded as a solid substance.

The interest in Normal Schools in America, which was aroused by Prof. Denison Ormstead in 1816, and was advocated by De Witt Clinton, by Gallaudet, and by Horace Mann, grew to fervor in the Rev. Charles Brooks of Medford, Mass., who caught his inspiration from Dr. Julius, of Hamburg, who was sent to the United States by the King of Prussia to study our public institutions. In 1865 Mr. Brooks rode in his chaise over two thousand miles to present the subject, at his own cost, to the people. He held conventions and presented the topic in pulpits as “Christian Culture.” He says, “My discouragements were legion.”

The leading paper in Boston and in New England expressed its sense of the absurdity of the movement by admitting a caustic communication, which ended by representing Rev. Mr. Brooks with a fool’s cap on his head, marching up State Street at the head of a crowd of ragamuffin young men and women, who bore a banner, inscribed, “To a Normal School in the clouds.” Mr. Brooks was, however, invited to speak on the subject before the House of Representatives, and “some members of the Legislature called the new movement by funny names.”

But educators like George B. Emerson, and thinkers like Rev. William Ellery Channing, and statesmen like Horace Mann lent their aid, and, stirred by Mr. Brooks, support was given in public speech by Hon. John Q. Adams and Daniel Webster.

Mr. Mann was Secretary of the Board of Education upon its organization in 1837, and, in his first report, recommended that the Legislature establish Normal Schools. A donation of $10,000 being made by Mr. Dwight to stimulate this interest, a State appropriation was made, and a Normal School for girls was opened at Lexington, Mass., in 1838. Later, others were opened, some of which admitted boys also, but for the first twenty years, eighty-seven per cent. of the graduates were girls. These schools are now widely scattered through the United States. The history of that at Oswego, N. Y., is of especial interest.

The first systematic effort for the physical development of women was made in 1861 in Boston. A “Normal Institute for Physical Culture,” was established by Dr. Dio Lewis, aided by the president and some of the professors of Harvard College. At the outset the young women pupils were found lamentably deficient in respect of physical development. Later, Dr. Lewis stated that “in every one of the thirteen classes which were graduated, the best gymnast was a woman. In each class there were from two to six women superior to any of the men.” Dr. Walter Channing, one of the professors, often spoke with enthusiasm of the physical superiority of the women to the men. From the graduates of these classes instruction in light gymnastics was widely introduced into schools throughout the country. Now the well-appointed gymnasium is a prominent feature of the leading colleges to which women are admitted, and the erection and endowment of this department is a favorite form of benefaction from the alumnæ.

Prof. Huxley says, “No system of education is worthy the name, unless it creates a great educational ladder, with one end in the gutter and the other in the university.” Such was the intuitive feeling of our ancestors, even in the Colonial days, with regard to boys. When, however, in the course of centuries, conviction came to a few that what had been for one sex only was, in fairness, due to the other as well, the atmosphere of the older States did not prove bracing enough to sustain so utopian a theory, and the ambitious daughters of New England were obliged to follow those who, transplanted to the virgin soil of Ohio, had opened Oberlin College, offering such opportunities as it could furnish without distinction of race, and with but limited discrimination against sex.

Something more remarkable than the hungry young mind seeking mental food at disadvantage, was witnessed in 1853, when the full mind and earnest spirit of the leading New England educator, Hon. Horace Mann, eager to inaugurate the best methods of the higher education in a co-educational college, found his only chance by leaving his native New England, to build an institution from its very foundation, in a section remote from literary association. The pathos is deepened that his life was sacrificed in the contest with obstacles.

Following this magnetic leader; again a few New England girls turned westward, and gained, at Antioch College, Ohio, what the East still denied them. Twelve years later, and two hundred and forty years after Harvard was established for boys, private beneficence endowed “Boston University” on a co-educational basis, and in 1869 a college in Massachusetts was opened to girls for the first time.

In place of the reply which Harvard College made to girls who asked admission to its vacant seats, “We have no such custom,” was heard the cheering, “Welcome to all we have to offer!” and the old habit of keeping something of the best in reserve for the male sex, which has been so persistent in State, and municipal, and institutional economy, and which made the restricted sex feel an unwelcome pensioner on somebody’s bounty, has never characterized Boston University. As a result, the report of the University for the year 1879–80, shows that already over thirty-seven per cent. of the regular classes in the College of Liberal Arts were women, and, in encouraging contrast to many colleges from which women are excluded, it adds, “no rowdyism or scandal has brought discredit on the institution.”

In a few cases institutions for the higher education of women have been established in university towns or cities, and have availed themselves of the opportunity afforded for instruction by professors of the neighboring university, and have been granted, under restrictions, use of the libraries, museums, etc., connected with it. Each of these differs from the other in respect of its relationship to the university. The first established was that at Cambridge, Mass., in 1879, under the direction of “The Society for the Collegiate Instruction for Women,” which has, unfortunately, come to be known by the misleading title of “The Harvard Annex.” Applicants for admission to the most advanced work of the institution are required to pass the same examinations which admit young men to Harvard College, and these examinations are conducted in different parts of the country by local committees, under the auspices of The Society for the Collegiate Instruction for Women. Certificates of proficiency thus gained admit the student to classical and scientific courses at the collegiate institution, corresponding to those given to young men at Harvard College.[4]

EVELYN COLLEGE.

Evelyn College, Princeton, N. J., founded under similar circumstances in 1888, differs from the institution at Cambridge, having been formally authorized to confer degrees and to exercise all the functions of a college for the higher education of women.[5]

It offers classical and scientific courses corresponding to those of the neighboring university; also elective and post graduate courses.

By resolution of the Board of Trustees of Princeton College any help may be given to Evelyn College by the Princeton Faculty which does not interfere with their duties in the University, and the use of the libraries, museums, etc., is granted.

COLUMBIA COLLEGE IN RELATION TO THE HIGHER EDUCATION OF WOMEN.

The first college for women to confer degrees upon graduates of an affiliated college is Columbia College, New York City. As the aim of this paper is rather to trace the growth of educational opportunity than to tabulate results, the various steps which led to the opening of Barnard College, New York City, in 1889 are given, as typical of the progressive nature of movements for opening the doors of established colleges to women. While many still regard it as wise to discriminate between the sexes in respect of opportunities, while others would instruct them equally but separately, there is apparently an increasing number of these who would apply to colleges, in general, what the late far-sighted President Barnard of Columbia said of that under his charge. “I regard the establishment of an annex as desirable only considered as a step toward what I think must, sooner or later, come to pass, and that is the opening of the College proper to both sexes equally.”[6]

Efforts to gain for young women the advantages of Columbia College, New York City, have been made at intervals since 1873, when several qualified young women applied for admission to the college, and one, a graduate of Michigan University, for admission to the medical school. A plea in their behalf was made before the faculty by Mrs. Lillie Devereux Blake, on the ground that the charter of the College declared that it was “founded for the education of the youth of the city,” and “youth” includes both sexes. President Barnard and several of the faculty favored the admission of women as students, but the committee on education decided that any action was inexpedient.

In December, 1876, a memorial was presented to the Board of Trustees of Columbia College by “Sorosis,” a well-known woman’s club, of the city, asking that young women should be admitted to the college classes. The memorial was laid on the table by a unanimous vote.

Up to 1879 women were informally admitted to the lectures of certain professors, during regular class hours. This was forbidden in 1879, not from any harm resulting, but because it was discovered that the statutes forbade any but regularly matriculated students to attend lectures. This law had no reference to women, but the trustees declined to change the letter of the law and women were banished. Three years later a motion made in the board that the statutes should be so changed as not to prohibit the attendance of women, conditionally, on certain courses of lectures was lost. But from 1886 women have been admitted to lectures given on Saturday mornings, and two hundred ladies have listened weekly, and many more have desired admittance.

In 1883 an association was formed in New York to promote the higher education of women. A petition signed by 1400 persons, many of them of highest distinction in public and private life, and indorsed by President Barnard of Columbia, asked that the benefits of education at Columbia College be extended to qualified women with as little delay as possible, by admitting them to lectures and examinations. In June of that year, 1883, the trustees of Columbia College resolved that a course of collegiate study, equivalent to the course given to young men, should be offered to such women as may desire it, to be pursued under the general direction of the faculty of the College.

This resolve was, however, restricted by regulations which seemed to contradict both its spirit and its letter, since it narrowed the opportunity of women to that of getting the required instruction where they might, except at Columbia, which would, however, admit them to examinations to prove whether or not they had done so. As these examinations were not limited to the subjects as treated in the courses of lectures, as were the corresponding examinations of matriculated students of the University, they were more difficult. In spite of the great difficulties to be encountered, and the very limited advantage to result, many young women were attracted by the offer. In 1888 twenty-eight girls were availing themselves of this opportunity for examination tests of proficiency. In 1885 the trustees of Columbia resolved to grant the degree of Bachelor of Arts to women who had pursued for four years a course of study fully equivalent to that for which the same degree is conferred in the school of arts. Those who had secured this degree, or its equivalent (elsewhere), might study for higher degrees under the direction of the faculty of the College.[7]

BARNARD COLLEGE.

So manifest became the public demand for collegiate and post collegiate instruction,—from graduates of the city Normal School (which had 1600 pupils), from the pupils of the best class of private schools, where, sometimes, not less than one fourth were preparing for admission to some college,[8] and from graduates of other colleges,—that a movement was made, in which the efforts of leading men and women in New York City were conspicuous both for their unflagging zeal and for their judicious methods, to secure necessary funds to found and, at the outset, to maintain a college for women whose professors and instructors should be those of Columbia, and upon whose graduates Columbia College should confer the same degrees as upon her own. The woman who first approached the Trustees of Columbia College with a plan to found an affiliated college for women was Mrs. Annie Nathan Meyer, who had been one of the first young women to take advantage of the course of examinations offered by Columbia College. After the appeal for an affiliated college was made it was discovered that had such a plan, supported by the proper persons, and bearing likelihood of success, been brought before the Board, it would have met with approval some years before. The former petitions had, however, asked for co-education, and at first there was considerable opposition to the “annex movement,” as it was called, on the part of those whose battle-cry might have been almost said to have been “Co-education or no education.”

But the wiser policy prevailed, and it was acknowledged by the majority that “those co-educationalists who ignore the annex project are butting their heads against a stone wall when a nicely swarded path lies before them.”[9] Barnard College received official sanction from the Trustees of Columbia College, March, 1889, was chartered by the Regents of New York State, July, 1889, and formally opened October, 1889. Barnard College was appropriately named in grateful tribute to the late President Barnard of Columbia College.

The great void that it was to fill appeared in many ways,—among others in the fact that the botanical and chemical laboratories which it established were the only ones in the city open to women.

The trustees of Barnard, one half of whom are women, hope to find much of its usefulness in the encouragement and provision for graduate work which it will offer to the hundreds of women who are gathered in New York, in the pursuance of some profession.

VASSAR COLLEGE.

The late Matthew Vassar, “recognizing in woman the same intellectual constitution as in man,” resolved to give a fair chance to girls for a liberal education, under conditions in every way favorable to health. To this end he erected college and dormitory buildings in the midst of a lawn of two hundred acres, at Poughkeepsie, N. Y., with careful provision for pure air, good water, abundant sunshine, and good sewerage. He provided a gymnasium and provided for out of door sports. He instituted a professorship of physiology and hygiene, and made its incumbent “resident physician” and supervisor of sanitary arrangements.

In September, 1865, the institution received, upon examination, about 350 young women as students to a course of study and mode of life determined by the trustees, who believed that “the larger the stock of knowledge, and the more thorough the mental discipline a woman attains, the better she is fitted for any womanly position, and to perform any womanly duty of home and in society,” a position which the subsequent experience of this and kindred institutions has abundantly illustrated.

Up to 1890, Vassar College has conferred the degree of A.B. upon between 800 and 900 graduates.

It has included in its corps of professors several women of distinguished ability—of whom we may name the late Prof. Braislin of the department of mathematics, and the late Prof. Maria Mitchell, who had not only a national, but a European reputation, as an astronomer. From the opening of the institution till near the time of her death, in 1889, she was the head of the department of astronomy and in charge of the excellent observatory. Three women are serving on the Vassar board of trustees, and three on standing committees.

SMITH COLLEGE.

Smith College was founded in Northampton, Mass., by Miss Sophia Smith, of the neighboring town of Hatfield. Finding herself in possession of a large fortune to dispose of she took counsel with her pastor, Dr. John M. Green, as to the best use to make of it. He conferred, in her behalf, with the leading representatives of education, and the general opinion of the time was voiced by Dr. Edward Hitchcock. When Dr. Green asked him, in 1861, “Would you dare to endow a college for women?” he said, “No! The matter of woman’s higher education is still an experiment.” Prudence seemed to compel further deliberation. Strong efforts were made to secure the fund for established colleges, and other schemes of beneficence were considered, but by 1868 Miss Smith and Dr. Green, to whom she had continuously turned for counsel, had come to the conviction that in no other way could the money be so well invested for the benefit of human kind, as in founding a college which should give young women opportunities for education equal to those which established colleges offered to young men. The plan was at once developed, and the college at Northampton is to-day Miss Smith’s noble monument.

Its high aim has been well sustained, and more than five hundred students are named in the Annual Report of 1889.

Two thirds of the faculty are women, to whom, however, the title of professor is not accorded. This is not thought to imply lack of competency to fill the positions usually so designated. Neither can the current report be credited, that the President does not consider it altogether womanly to bear such title, since Smith College conferred upon Dr. Amelia B. Edwards, the English Egyptologist, the honorary degree of LL.D., and only the highest courtesy could be intended.

WELLESLEY COLLEGE.

Wellesley College, Wellesley, Mass., fifteen miles from Boston, was founded in 1875 by the benefaction of Henry F. Durant. The purpose of the trustees was “the establishment of a college in which girls should have as good opportunities for higher education as the best institutions afforded to young men, and to do so with due regard to health.” They held that “it is not hard study but violation of law that injures health.”

The college is beautiful for situation, with extensive grounds, like an English park, varied by oak woods and elm-shaded avenues, and including Lake Waban, which furnishes ample facilities for rowing and skating. Thousands of rhododendrons and other flowering shrubs have been set to brighten the grounds, and the spring turf blossoms in crocuses and snowdrops.

Amid all this seductive beauty, suggestive of dreaming, rise noble structures, of solid and elegant proportions, dedicated to successful work. Within them the practical and the æsthetic are charmingly combined. Music has its temple, art has its ministry, science its every facility, and the air of a happy home life broods over all.