Lawrence High School - Lawrencian Yearbook (Falmouth, MA)

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Lawrence High School 7 WELCOME We, the class of 1937, welcome our parents, friends, and teachers to our graduation exercises here this evening. We wish to express our sincere thanks and our appre- ciation to our parents for their guidance and understanding and to the members of the school com- mittee for providing us with the opportunity, and we hope in the years to come that we may, by our actions and accomplishments, prove the trust that you have put in us. L. Benton Stevens, Class President. INTRODUCTION AND BIOGRAPHY One hundred years ago this month, on June 30, Horace Mann, the father of American public schools, accepted the position of first Secretary of the Massachusetts Board of Education. At that time, the few scattered schools in Massa- chusetts bore no relation to state control. It was Mann’s task to bring these schools under state supervision and to found institu- tions for higher education. Horace Mann advocated the supervision of studies, improvement in social studies, and the study of foreign languages and mathematics in the public schools: in brief, to make education democratic as well as classical. In order to understand why Mann so earnestly desired to ef- fect reforms in the public schools, we must briefly trace his early life. This well-known educator was born on May 4, 1796, at Franklin, Massachusetts. He was reared in a stern, Puritanical home in a period of reform. When Horace Mann was thirteen years of age, his father died, leaving the young boy to a life of poverty. It was neces- sary for him to help earn money to support his mother and smaller sisters and brothers. Although this experience taught the boy the value of hard work, it also impaired his health. It is interesting to note that he forgot neither his childhood ideals nor trials, for he stressed, in later life, both religion and health. Until he was fifteen years of age, he did not attend school more than ten weeks in a year. He did find time, however, to read all the books of interest in the small library in Franklin. A teacher of classics, who noticed his desire for education, urged him to go to college. After six months of extensive prepara- tion, he entered Brown University at the age of eighteen. In 1819 he was graduated with first honors. After he left college, he tutored, next entered law, and then became a statesman. In 1827 he was elect- ed to the Massachusetts House of Representatives, and, later, to the State Senate. He was subsequently made President of the Senate. Mann was intensely interested in public school education. On June 30, 1837, he gave up law and states- manship to become the champion of the cause of public education. Though the educational depart- ment suffered drawbacks during the Panic of 1837, Mann’s work led to a revival of public education through- out our country. Largely through his efforts, the first public normal school was es- tablished in Lexington, in 1839, with Cyrus Pierce of Nantucket as its first principal. In 1843, when he was on the verge of physical collapse, Mann sailed for Europe. While there he visited the public schools in Ger-