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JUSTICE COOLEY'S DESCRIPTION

of the legislative Council, whose duties were similar to those of the first State Superintendent.

The main features of the Territorial system were incorporated, with some changes and improvements, into the State system by Superintendent Pierce.

The actual state of elementary education and of educational affairs, as late as 1836, is well pictured by Justice Thomas M. Cooley."The schools at the time State government was established were still very primitive affairs. There were as yet no professional teachers. Some farmer or mechanic, or perhaps a grown-up son or daughter, who had had the advantages of the common schools of New York or New England, offered his or her services as teacher during the dull season of regular employment, and consented to take as wages such sum as the district could afford to pay. A summer school taught by a woman, who would be paid six or eight dollars a month, and a winter school taught by a man, whose compensation was twice as great, was what was generally provided for. But in addition to wages the teacher received his board, "boarding round" among the patrons of the school, and remaining with each a number of days determined by the number of pupils sent to school. If we shall incline to visit one of these schools in the newer portion of the State we shall be likely to find it housed in a log structure, covered with bark, imperfectly plastered between the logs to exclude the cold, and still more imperfectly warmed by an open fire-place or by a box stove, for which fuel is provided, as the board for the teacher is, by proportional contributions. The seats for the pupils may be of slabs set on legs; the desks may be other slabs laid upon supports fixed to the logs which constitute the

THE PRIMITIVE SCHOOL

19

sides of the room. The school books are miscellaneous, and consist largely of those brought by the parents when emigrating to the territory. Those who write must rule their paper with pencils of their own manufacture, and the master will make pens for them from the goose-quill. For the most part the ink is of home manufacture. There are no globes: no means of illustration; not even a blackboard. * * * Such in many cases was the Michigan school. Better school buildings were now springing up, but as a rule nothing could seem more dreary or dispiriting than the average school district. Nevertheless, many an intellect received a quickening in those schools which fitted it for a life of useful and honorable activity. The new settlers made such provision for the education of their children as was possible under the circumstances in which they were placed, and the fruits of their labors and sacrifices in this direction were in many cases surprising.' "*

*Cooley's Michigan, pp. 315-317.

CHAPTER II.

CONSTITUTIONAL PROVISIONS AS TO EDUCATION.

Michigan owes a large debt of gratitude to ISAAC E. CRARY and JOHN D. PIERCE. More than any other two men, they were instrumental in laying the foundations of her educational system, and in giving direction to its early development. By native endowments and by academic culture they were admirably fitted for the work. Mr. Crary was a native of Connecticut, born in 1804. He graduated from Washington (now Trinity) college at Hartford in its first class, 1829, with the highest honors. He came to Michigan in 1832, was delegate to Congress from the Territory, and the first Representative of the State in Congress. For several years he was a resident of Marshall in Calhoun county.

John D. Pierce was a native of New Hampshire, born in 1797. He graduated from Brown University, Rhode Island, with an excellent reputation as a scholar, in 1822. While in college he taught school three months in each year to secure means to defray his expenses. After leaving college he studied one year in the Princeton Theological Seminary, then became pastor of a church in Oneida county, New York, where he remained four years. He was Principal of an academy in Goshen, Connecticut, during the following year. In the spring of 1831 he was commissioned by the Congregational Home Mission Society to act as a missionary either in Illinois or Michigan as he might choose. In July of that year he located in Marshall, Michigan, and continued

INCEPTION OF THE SCHOOL SYSTEM

བ

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his missionary labors until he was appointed Superintendent of Public Instruction in 1836. A year after he settled in Marshall, Mr. Crary became a resident of the same place. Circumstances brought them into close relationship, and into intimate acquaintance and friendship. Like most of the men in the Territory at that period they were both young and filled with enthusiasm and hopefulness of that time of life, and with the spirit of enterprise which characterized the new-comers in the Territory. It was the day of great expectations and of far-reaching plans.

.

Late in his life, writing of that period, Mr. Pierce said, in substance, "when I came to Michigan, in 1831, the census just taken, including what is now the State of Wisconsin, showed a population of 32,000; of this number 30,000 were in Michigan proper. The census was again taken in 1834, and the population had increased to 87,000. Soon after, the Legislative Council of the Territory provided for a convention to frame a State constitution, the time of meeting being May, 1835, and the place Detroit. Naturally the coming convention and the new constitution were subjects of much earnest discussion. Mr. Pierce writes: "It was

at this period in our history that the Michigan School System had its inception and origin. Gen. Isaac E. Crary, a graduate of an Eastern college, and a warm friend of education, was for a year or two an inmate of my house. The condition and prospects of our new State were often the subject of discussion, and especially of schools of various grades, from the highest to the lowest. About this time, COUSIN's report on the Prussian system, made to the French minister of Public Instruction, came into my hands, and was read with much interest. Sitting one pleasant after

22

CONSTITUTION OF 1835

noon upon a log, on the hill north of where the Court House at Marshall now stands, Gen. Crary and myself discussed, for a long time, the fundamental principles which were deemed important for the convention to adopt, in laying the foundation of a new State. The subject of education was a theme of especial interest. It was agreed, if possible, that it should make a distinct branch of the government, and that the constitution ought to provide for an officer who should have this whole matter in charge, and thus keep its importance perpetually before the public mind."

CONVENTION AND CONSTITUTION OF 1835.

Mr. Crary was elected as a delegate to the convention and was appointed chairman of the committee on education. The ideas evolved in the discussion on the log in Marshall, took form in the article on education in the constitution. Unfortunately the prceedings and debates of this convention have not been preserved in such form as to be accessible. Superintendent Shearman, in his report for 1852, writes: "There was no debate in relation to the importance of making suitable provision for Public Instruction. A committee was appointed to draft an article, of which Isaac E. Crary of Calhoun, was chairman. It was reported on the second day of June, 1835, and was accepted substantially as it came from the hands of the committee. As reported to the convention, the article provided for a Secretary of Public Instruction. When the article came up in the convention, Judge Woodbridge remarked that he had read it, and although it was new and not to be found in any other constitution, yet he was inclined to give it his support, if