BUREAU OF EDUCATION

N. H. R. DAWSON, Commissioner

CIRCULAR OF INFORMATION NO. 4, 1888

CONTRIBUTIONS TO AMERICAN EDUCATIONAL HISTORY.

EDITED BY HERBERT B. ADAMS

"Your institution has taken a strong root, and will flourish; and I feel some degree of pride in reflecting that a century hence, when this nascent village [Athens] shall embosom thousand of the Georgian youths, pursuing the paths of science, it will now and then be said The that you gave this land, and I was on the forlorn hope.”—PRESIDENT MEIGS: Letter to Governor Milledge, May 11, 1808.

"It [the University of Georgia] was the creation of no one man or set of men; it was the gift of no political party; it was the offspring of no religious or denominational sect; it drew its life and being from the State by whom it was created. It was of the people, by the people, and for the people."-CHARLES Z. MCCORD: Address to Alumni, 1885.

"Had we carried out the views of her early patriots, and the framers of our first Consti tution, Georgia would now have a system of education equal, if not superior, to that of any State in the Union."--PRESIDENT CHURCH, in 1845.

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"I regard the education of the children of the State as the grand object of primary importance, which should, if necessary, take precedence of all other questions of State policy. Educate the masses and inculcate virtue and morality, and you la, broad and deep, in the hearts of our people, the only sure foundations of republican liberty and religious toleration; the latter of which is the brightest gem in the Constitution of our country."— GOVERNOR BROWN: Message of 1858.

"It is not population we want. But we do want a population educated to know how to use their mind and muscle. It is not capital we want. But we do want the wisdom of science and art to know how to use the capital we have. It is not resources we want. Providence has given us more than we know what to do with. Nor, indeed, are we wanting in those higher qualities which ennoble the private and the organic life of a people. What we most need in this critical period is that educated intellect which can direct our energies and discipline our immense power so as to lift up the Commonwealth, and fortify it, at all points, against the inroads of threatening evils.”—CHANCELLOR LIPSCOMB, in 1873.

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TIBLVIA

ENOX LIBRARY

NEW YORK

LETTER.

DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR,

BUREAU OF EDUCATION, Washington, D. C., October 10, 1888.

The Honorable the SECRETARY OF THE INTERIOR,

Washington, D. C.

SIR: The present monograph was prepared by Mr. Charles Edgeworth Jones, of Augusta, Ga., a son of the historian of that State, and late graduate student of Johns Hopkins University. The work was undertaken by my direction under the supervision of Dr. Herbert B. Adams, editor of the present series of Contributions to American Educational History, and authorized by your predecessor.

Mr. Jones discusses the history of education in the State of Georgia. The inquiry has been carefully prosecuted, and all available sources of information appear to have been intelligently utilized.

The paper opens with a sketch of the educational advantages afforded by the few schools which existed during the colonial epoch.

The formation and conduct of academies after the Revolutionary War are next considered. Among the more prominent were the academies of Sunbury and of Richmond County, which exerted a marked influence at that early period, and constituted the most important factors in the education of the sons of the infant Commonwealth.

The author then addresses himself to a review of the elementary education afforded in the rural schools, the teachers of which were supported by the tuition derived from the attending scholars. Carefully, and with an exhaustive analysis of the laws and constitutional provi sions bearing upon the subject, are the rise, development, and decadence of the 66 poor school system" noted.

Prior to the late Civil War steps had been taken to establish a system of common schools accessible to all white children between the ages of six and eighteen. They were, however, interrupted by the War, and it was not until some five or six years after the cessation of hostilities that the present system of public schools was inaugurated. With the opportunities presented by this system for the instruction of the youths of the State this paper deals fully.

Having discussed these preliminary topics, Mr. Jones turns his attention to the history and present status of higher education in Georgia,

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