Fort Wayne Normal School - Annual Yearbook (Fort Wayne, IN)

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JVSTIN N. STVDY Sll1VCI'1l'lTCl'ldCl1t uf Schools, 1886-IQI7

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HISTORY N THE YEARS of reconstruction following the Civil VVar, the school officials of many cities felt a serious need for raising the professional standard of their teachers. It was in 1867, a few months before the founding of the City Normal at Indianapolis and the year before the founding of the State Normal at Terre Haute, that the school board of Fort VVayne, upon the recommendation of the Superintendent of Schools, James H. Smart, decided to establish a training school and to employ teachers for the school at a cost not to exceed S1,S00. The reasons for the founding of the school are set forth at length by Superintendent Smart, Dr. -lohn S. Irwin, secretary, and O. P, Morgan, president of the Board, in the Fifth annual report of the Board of Education published in 1868: The importance of profes- sional schools for the education of teachers is fully recognized by the leading educators of the country. The business of teaching, like any other, must be learned. Proficiency can be acquired only by systematic study and training .... VVe cannot depend upon other cities altogether, for our experience has shown that others can draw from us as well as we can draw from them. Our only recourse has been the establishment of a City Training School, in which graduates of our High School, and others who may be admitted, may have special instruction, training and practice in the business in which they propose to engage. lt is notable that because of the establishment of its training school Fort Wayne was able to secure teachers who had a high school education and were trained for teaching at a time when only a very small percentage of teachers had even so much as a high school education. How well the school authorities believed they succeeded is shown by the following state- ment by O. P. Morgan in the commencement address of 1868: The school is no longer an experiment, it is an institution that should be maintained as a part of our school system. Dr. ,lohn S. Irwin, later Superintendent of Schools, but at that time Secretary of the Board, in a historical sketch of the city government, wrote: The wisdom of the measure was rapidly manifested in the higher ability of the teachers, the broader, more accurate, and more solid character of their work, and in the rapidly growing reputation of the school amongst prominent educators. The school was continued until 1886, when, as Dr. Irwin stated, for pressing reasons then existing, -the Beard discontinued it forlthe- time being. So great were the advantages of the school in many ways that its reorganization is greatly to be desired. In 1896 ,lustin N. Study became Superintendent. He found the teaching body recruited from the High School graduates largely without any professional preparation. To convert the corps of teachers into a body of trained teachers was his first concern. He states ,Clleport of 1902J: He who manages a system of schools must get his results from a shifting, unstable corps of teachers, even under the best circumstances. Some years ago, I made a careful investigation of a certain city in this state. The investigation covered a period of twenty-five years. The result showed an average of less than five years, and yet in no place in the state perhaps are conditions more favorable for continued and continuous service .... This is the result reached by other investigators and five years may be considered a fair average of service taking the country overp and yet it is with this kind of a shitting force that the superintendent of schools must obtain his results. l'The corps of teachers might have been made professional by rigidly demanding as a pre-requisite to appointment a normal school diploma, but this had not been done, nor is a course practicable in a community as large as Fort Wayne. Graduates from the High School must form a large proportion of the teaching force in any large system of city schools. Many, who have natural qualifications for teaching, have not the means at com- mand to enable them to go abroad to take the normal school course of study. It is wise economy to furnish the professional training, absolutely essential to good work, at home, and then rigidly exclude from the elementary schools all untrained teachers by refusing to employ any one who has not completed the training school, or a normal course of study or who does not come with skill gained by successful experience elsewhere. In recent years the State of Indiana has increased its facilities for the training of all teachers so that conditions have changed from what they were when the Normal School was re-established. In the opinion of the school authorities the emergency requiring the city to train its own teachers no longer exists. Accordingly the school is to be officially closed in September, 1922. . The first school was located on the first floor of the building on East Wayne street which has recently been known as the Old High School Building. The entire High School was housed on the second floor, and the gymnasium was located on the third floor. This

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OUR Y ESTERDAYS 7 building is now only a memory, as the School Board sold the property and a recent lire began the work of destruction, VVhen re-established, the school was located at its present site on the corner of Rivermet avenue and Oneida street. The name was changed in 1907 to the Fort VVayne Normal School. The grade school in which the students take their observation and practice teaching is now known as the Normal Training School. PRINCIPALS AND TEACHERS The Normal School of greatest influence in the Middle West in 1867 was the Oswego Training School, established in 1861 at Oswego, New York. Two graduates of this school were employed in the new school at Fort Wayne. The principal was Mary H. Swan. The Fifth Annual Report of the Board of Education in 1868 gives the name of Lena S. Funelle as critic teacher while the report of Miss Swan in the same volume gives the name of Mary L. Hamilton. According to Mrs. Jay Moderwell, who, as Martha Jones, was a member of the class, Miss Hamilton held the position the First year. She later became Mrs. Norman Hoisirrgton. Mrs. Moderwell also contributes the following: Miss Swan, our principal and teacher of methods, was young, a graduate of Oswego Normal in 1867, and charming in every way, bright, dignihed, and pretty. As I told you, ue enjoyed immensely the frequent visits of the Superintendent whose interest in his pet scheme and its attractive head never ceased. His sight was poor but he appreciated the bright eyes of Miss Swan. Miss Swan resigned in 1869 to become Mrs. James H. Smart, the wife of the superintendent of schools. Critic teachers of the early history were Lena S. Funnelle, 1868-715 Jennie Snively, 1871-'73, Mary Elizabeth Simmons, 1873-'74, Fannie S. Hassler, 1874-'76, Martha jones, 1876-'81, and Sarah Updegraf, 1881-'86. Miss Snively died in 1873. Miss Funnelle was later known as Mrs. VVilliam W. Rope, and Miss Updegraf as Mrs. jason McVay of Co- lumbus, Ohio. Miss Julia A. Werner was principal 1869-'70, She was succeeded by Leonora I. Drake, 1870-'76, Miss Werner became Mrs. joseph M. Lanson and Miss Drake, Mrs. Roger But- terfield of Grand Rapids, Michigan. Mrs. Butterfield died during the summer of 1920. Ada E. Remmel was principal, 1876-'81, She is now Mrs. G. E. Benson. Miss Martha jones, a graduate of the class of 1868 and later a graduate of Mt. Holyoke, was employed as principal from 1881 to 1886, after which she became Mrs. Jay Moderwell. Mrs. Moderwell has since mingled with the teachers of Fort VVayne and given her assistance in the work of the public schools. We appreciate having a personal message from her in another part of this book. Jessie L. Montgomery became principal of the school in 1897. Miss Montgomery was a graduate of the Indiana State Normal School and had been a critic teacher in the State Normal College at Ypsilanti, Michigan. After five years of service in the Normal School here, she resigned on account of her mother's ill health. Later she specialized in dramatic literature and taught in the Alberti School of Pantomine in New York. She is now in charge of the Junior High School department of the Normal Training School at VVinona, Minnesota. Since 1902, Miss Flora Vtlilber has been principal of the Normal and Training School. Her fine qualifications together with her untiring devotion to her work have all contributed to the high standard which the Fort VVayne Normal School has maintained. She has grad- uated from the Michigan State Normal College with the degrees of Bachelor and Master of Pedagogies, also from the Oswego State Normal with a special diploma for critic teaching. She has taken the degrees of B. S. and A. M. in Education from Columbia University. This excellent training has been rounded hy a year of study and travel abroad and summer work in various universities. Miss Wilber taught in the Michigan State Normal College be- fore coming to Fort Wayne. Many bits of literature in the archives of the school express the loyalty of the students who cherish the memories of the pranks for which they were rebuked and the achievements for which they were praised by one who had their interests very closely at heart. The great irifiuence that the Oswego Normal and Training School extended thvough- out the West in the training of teachers is well illustrated in Fort Wayne. Not only was the school organized by Oswego graduates, but several of its teachers in the following years, Miss Funnelle, Miss Werner, Miss Simmons and Miss Wilber, were graduates of the same institution. In the city schools Miss Sarah I. Pyne, later Mrs. D. N. Foster, and Miss Annie E. Klingensmith, primary supervisor for several years, were graduates of the Oswego Normal. The present faculty of the Normal School consists of twelve members. This includes four city supervisors, Members of the faculty also act as critic teachers in the Training School. There are two advantages in this arrangement. The first is the close welding of theory and practice which results when the Normal teachers have classroom work with children. The second is that when each teacher gives only a part of her time to each school, the work can be divided in such a manner that specialists may be secured in each subject, and a common difficulty of small schools is avoided, that of giving a variety of courses to each teacher whether she is fitted to teach them or not.