SUNY at Fredonia - Fredonian Yearbook (Fredonia, NY)

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School for a period of twenty-nine years. During his leadership the school enjoyed an unusual professional reorganization and development. In 1899 the gymnasium unit was added to the Normal School building. The most unfortunate and disastrous single event in the history of the Normal School was the burning of the original Normal School build- ing in December, 1900. The gymnasium unit was the only part of the structure saved. Instruction was transferred to the local churches and the city building during which time the State of New York erected the present Normal School building on the site occupied by the original structure. ' Dr. Myron T. Dana, who had been a member of the faculty for twenty-five years, became the third principal of the Fredonia State iNormal School. He took office on September 1, 1906, and gave sixteen years of untiring professional leadership to the School. This period in the history of the Normal School was marked by the enlargement and an equipment of a suitable library, the extension and equipment of the Manual Training Department, the organization and housing of a modern professional School of Music and the organization and housing of a modern professional School of Drawing. A separate high school department was also organized. Up to this time normal students did much purely academic work, reciting in some of the same classes with those registered as academic pupils, but an order had been issued by the State Department of Education making the work of the Normal School strictly professional and requiring a full four year high school course for admission. - Dr. Howard Griffith Burdge was appointed Principal of the Fre- donia State Normal School on September 1, 1922, and remained its leader for the following six years. This six year period was marked by an increase in the normal school enrollment from two hundred to six hundred and fifty studentsg the establishment of a complete health ser- vice for students, with a doctor of medicine, a school nurse, a teacher of physical education and a teacher whose major time is devoted to diag- nosing health conditions- and setting up rerhediali treatments to alleviate these conditionsg the development of amodern'departm'ent of Public r x may , .

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Uhr Miatnrg nf Thr Elirrhnnin Nnrmal Srhnnl ' The Village of Fredonia, a community known for its interest in art, music and education, has been the seat of the Fredonia State Normal School for sixty-two years. The legislative act of 1866 permitting the the establishment of our additional state normal schools created an incentive for the people of Fredonia to secure the placement of one of these schools in their community. The citizens, therefore, agreed to give a site and a building providing the State would establish one of these schools in their village. The purchase of the site and the con-- struction of a new building cost Fredonia 35100,000, which was a heavy financial burden for the Fredonia of those days. However, early Fre- donians gladly assumed this financial obligation in order to continue the educational prestige that the Fredonia Academy had brought this com-- munity for several decades. The completion of the Normal School brought about the closing of the Fredonia Academy. The Principal of the Fredonia Academy took over the educational leadership of the State Normal School until the regularly appointed Board of 'Trustees could secure the services of that type of educational leadership needed for the new institution. Dr. John W. Armstrong, a professor in the Oswego State Normal School, who had acquired an eminent reputation, was appointed Principal of the Fredonia Normal School in 1869 and the school was opened under his charge on the eighth of September of that year. Dr. Armstrong remained as principal until the time of his death, August 1878. His teacher training program graduated a type of teacher that enjoyed unusual success in the public schools of this great state which brought, to the institution an unusual professional leadership. The wisdom and untiring eiforts of the men who followed Dr. Armstrong have made it possible for Fredonia to continue its high rank among the professional schools of the country. Dr. Francis B. Palmer succeeded Dr. Armstrong on October 24- 1878, and remainedas the educational leader of the Fredonia Normal iii

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School Music whose graduates supervise and teach music in the public elementary and secondary schools of the Stateg the development of a modern department of Public School Art whose graduates supervise and teach art in the public elementary and secondary schools of the Stateg the estaiblishment of a well arranged cafeteria under the supervision of the Health Department that serves noon day lunches to the studentsg the reorganization of the training school so that normal school students assigned to the School of Practice and the School of Observation can have practical experience with materials and methods used by the pro- gressive schoolsg and the removal of the High School Department to the new Fredonia Junior and Senior High School. Pending the selection of a new principal, the Normal School was very ably and successfully administered for a year by the Director of Training, George G. McEwen. Then Dr. Hermann C. Cooper was ap- pointed. Under his leadership the Normal School goes forward to a still greater degree of progress and achievement. X Y A A F101