Eastern High School - Echo Yearbook (Baltimore, MD)

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THROUGH THE YEARS AT THE EASTERN HIGH SCHOOL radical and twofold suggestion, approving the construction of two Female High Schools, and the Board promptly proceeded to secure buildings and teachers and to make other necessary arrangements for getting them started. iAt this point, that is practically at the very start, the stories of the eastern and the western school diverge, each becoming a separate and individual thing though containing many of the same details, educational matters of equal importance for both. Perhaps or; a Great Occasion a hundred years hence iiEastern,i and uVVest- ernii will again together make a single recordJ A home for the new higher school to be established in the eastern part of the cityii- east of Jones, Fallsi,-was a prime consideration, and thereby hangs a little tale. It seems that a school house standing at Front and Pittiink Streets in 1843 and housing what was concisely described as uFemale No. 3ii had at first seemed also a possible and inexpensive home for the eastern Female High School, for Female No. Bis roof was in a decayed conditionii and would soon require renewal, and the erection of a second story would not increase the costs a great deal? However, by the early part of 44 either Female No. 3 had deteriorated with tremendous rapidity or the Board had made a more thorough examination of its condition, for a modification of the original plan was called for: the erection of a brand-new building on the Front-and-Pitt-Street corner uthat would accommodate Eastern Female High School and Female No. 3? And at once the Building Committee of the Board iMessrs. Mon- monier, Sollers, and Tonerl contracted with Mr. William H. Hooper to put the new plan into effect. Meanwhile the Board concerned itself with securing a competent principal, who must also at first be a full-time-and the only- instructor, for the number of expected first candidates for admission iThe cityis boundaries in 1844 were, briefly, as follows: Northern-Boundary Avenue, now North Avenue Eastern-a straight line along what is now the Edison Highway to the Patapsco at the Lazaretto Light Westetn-a straight line extending in a slightly southwesterly direction from the present North Avenue and Payson Street to Gwynns Falls, at what is now the western edge of Carroll Park golf course Southern-determined by the course of Gwynns Falls as it flowed into the Patapsco :MThe name iiPittfi from the famous English statesman of the 18th century, was presently changed to Fayette? in honor of the admired French patriot and American soldier, La Fayette. This is only one of the many Baltimore streets that reflect city or state or national history. E31

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THROUGH THE YEARS AT THE EASTERN HIGH SCHOOL 1843, it was to the effect that females who may have manifested superior abilities and attained suitable acquirements in the Primary School? are as deserving as males of the opportunity to obtain a more liberal English educationii and should therefore be given itfk And the Board, its conviction now screwed to the point of making a definite recommendation to the Council, concluded a section of its Fifteenth Annual Report with this passage: We earnestly recommend this subject to the consideration of the Council as one of very great importance in completing our system of education, and well calculated to give it new impulse. BEGINNINGS: PLANS AND ACTION Moreover, in this same Report the Board pointed out that not one, but two such schools were equally necessary, and suggested the general location of each. And why two schools? The answer was partly given in the next Report: because females were of. course far less robust than males and therefore far less able to endure the difiiculties of pedestrian travel presented by long distances and bad weather, aggravated no doubt, though these points are not enumer- ated in the record, by hard walking ldue to unpaved streets, high stepping-stones, and the likel and the proper attire of the day for young misses ltight, stiff bodices, long heavy skirts, pantalets cover- ing the shoe-tops, shawls, eth : As females are more delicate than males, and cannot attend school at a remote distance, especially in inclement weather, con- venience seemed to require two schools, one in the east and the other in the west. Thus either the eastern or the western school owed its origin-at least at this timbto the greater delicacy of the female! For early the next year-a memorable time in the annals of the sister schools-the City Council did consider favorably the Board,s akNot also a iiclassicalii education, it will be noticed, as in the case of the males of the first High School-the times were not ready for that idea-but at least a more liberal English education? and that was much. All credit to the wise and resolute members of the Board of 1843! The names of these members are as follows: John F. Monmonier, David Irelan President H. S. Sanderson William Rusk John Wilson J. B. Emery T. O. Sollers Elijah Stansbury, Jr. Hugh A. Cooper Stephen Collins A. H. Penington Samuel Harris M. Toner iZJ

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THROUGH THE YEARS AT THE EASTERN HIGH SCHOOL would not be large, and expense must be considered. No details of their efforts in this direction are available except the result to be announced presently. But what were the provisions in regard to the first pupils, the reason for all the other action? A number of these applied equally to all the higher schools and were made part of the Boardis policy when it established the High Schooli, in i 39. Perhaps the most important one had to do with those eligible for entrance. Certainly the passage in which this provision is formu- lated lafter it had been in force for some dozen yearsl is significant as an illustration of democracy at work in the school system; These schools are not confined to any portion of the community; it is intended that pupils shall be gathered from every section of the city, and that all classes and conditions of life shall partake of their benefits. Such regulations, therefore, have been adopted for admission as will not exclude any one on account of his or her position in society. lReport of 1851i In terms of the history of iiEasternfi the Boardis pronounce- ment meant that all young females living in the corresponding sec- tion of the city could take advantage of the opportunity for ua more liberal education,, by complying with certain requirements that had no regard to their social position. These were four in number: ill pupils must be twelve years of age; lZl they must have had at least one year in a Female Primary School lthis was before the two classes, Primary and Grammar, had been madel; Bl they must be of good moral character; Ml they must pass a satisfactory examination in Reading, Spelling, Grammar, Parsing, Geography, and Arithmeticfk Another general provision concerned costs, and will doubtless surprise most readers of these annals, unless they have read the Prologue with care. So that the ufree schoolsii might not seem like ucharity schoolsi, the Board had required from the time of the earliest ones established the payment of a so-called tuition fee of $1.00 per quarter or the presentation of the Boardis certihcate excusing from payment, and this was still the custom when the Female High Schools were established and was to be continued in them. Books and stationery lvery little of the latter at the 3kA different requirement in Ml for the males is one of those straws which show the way of the wind: their examination also included iiAlgebra as far as the extraction of the Square Root? l 4 1