Baltimore City College - Green Bag Yearbook (Baltimore, MD)

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DDDQhDZTHE'GREEN'BAGZgQDQBD School History THE YEAR 1932 finds City College lacking only seven years of rounding out a full century of existence. The period embraced by the years 1839-1932 has seen many important civic and national improvements, and has not left the institution without a history of its own. The school has experienced several changes of buildings, name, curricula, policy, faculty, and the other things that make up a school, until it is now as difficult to identify the new building as City College from a picture of the first building as it would be to identify a full grown man from a picture taken of him while he was yet a babe. Ninety-two years ago, in Baltimore City, the Mayor and City Council passed a resolu- tion, addressed to the Commissioners of Public Schools, for the establishment of a high school in which the higher branches of English and classical literature should be taught. With this statement City College was ofhcially born. The school, known as the Male High School, opened its doors to the youth of Balti- more in October, 1839. The first head of the school was Dr. Nathan C. Brooks, who occupied the position of President from 1839-1849. The school was housed in a building next to the old Holliday Street Theater, and one won- ders whether the Collegians of ninety-three years ago ever cut classes to sit in the gallery and gaze at the attractions of the day. However, our instructors inform us that the young men of that time were too busy with their mathematics, astronomy, writing and drawing, music, and mental, moral, political, and natural sciences. Besides, boys of their high moral character would never think of indulging in such breaches of scholastic etiquette. In 1849, Dr. Francis Waters took over the president,s chair, left vazant by the resignation of Dr. Brooks. The Eastern and Western Female High Schools having been established in 1844, the school was, in 1850, denominated the Central High School of Baltimore. The departmental system of study was adopted in 1851, and provisions were made for eight departments; namely, Belles Lettres and History, Mathematics, Mental, Moral, and Political Science, Ancient Languages, Modern Languages, Music, Graohics, Drawing and Writing. These studies were arranged in two courses; the English and Class- ical. On November 27, in the same year, the first public commencement of the school was held, and seven years later in accordance with the ordinance of the Mayor and City Council, Peabody prizes were distributed to those members of the class who had made good scholastic records. At the time, Dr. Thomas D. Baird was president, having succeeded Pro- fessors John A. Getty and George Morrison, whose combined terms were only four years. In 1855, the City College Alumni, Rto strengthen the bonds of union of the graduates and former students, to perpetuate the affections they cherish for the institution, to foster the prosperity of the CoIlege by giving their support and sympathy to its facu1ty and officers? came together to found the Baltimore City College Alumni Association. Five years later, upon the death of Professor Elliott, Professor Francis A. Soper became president. There was a general desire at the close of the Civil War to raise the standard of the school to a collegiate basis and to extend its usefulness in the community, especially to HOWARD STREET BUILDING pnnn.1.9.3i2.ap9p21

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m 2 THE - GREEN . BAG 2 m those students who might have a professional career in view. Accordingly, in 1865, the course in English was dropped and every student was required to study Latin. In conformance with the idea of extension to a collegiate basis, the course was lengthened to five years in 1866, and examinations were given preparatory to the entrance of the student. It was with this change that the Baltimore City College was given its present name. K , , This effort to make the school a sort of junior college did not turn tour so well, and in 1870 the course was once more reduced to four years. However, from 1877 to 1900, the hve-year course again held sway. In 1900 the Board of School Commissioners ordered that the cut- riculum was to be based on a four-year course of study instead of a five, and could be composed of a number of optional subjects. Examination of students promoted from grammar school had already been discontinued in 1893. Meanwhile a number of changes had been made in the site of City College. The old building on Holliday street was burned in 1873, and for the next two years the Collegians of that day were taught in the Brooks School on Courtland street. For sixteen years after the institution of the five-year course, collegiate ideas held sway at City. The first approaching change appeared in 1893 in which year the entrance examina- tions were discontinued. At the turn of the century the School Commissioners voted the adoption of a four-year curriculum. to consist of several required subjects and several optional ones. DR. WILBUR F. SMITH And so, at the beginning of the 20th century, City College became a college in name only. No longer would students toil over astronomy, belles lettres, mental and moral philosophy, psychology, political economy, etc. While the curriculum was in the course of change, the building on Howard street, fig- uratively speaking, died and was reborn; or, more simply, it collapsed in 1892, the reason for this behavior being the digging of a railroad tunnel beneath the building. For the next seven years the school was housed at Fayette and Greene streets, and at Dolphin street and Pennsylvania avenue. In September, 1899, the school moved back into a new building on the former Howard street site, and there it remained for twenty-nine years. After an interval of several years, it became evident that the size of the Howard street building was inadequate, and steps were taken to secure more room. First a store on Eutaw street served as an annex; students passed between it and the main building by means of a passageway over the alley between Howard and Eutaw streets. In 1914, the annex was removed from the store and placed in more academic surroundings. For seven years it was housed in the old Front Building at Hopkins. In 1921, for a few months, it came to rest in another building just back of the Front Building. Mean- while at City the assembly hall had been neatly ' sliced into twelve classrooms; the attic and basement DR. FRANK R. BLAKE also echoed the voices of reciting pupils. However7 all these efforts to provide space for the overflow of students proved futile. zzannp 1.9.3.2.5npp