OTHER PRIVATE SCHOOLS AND ACADEMIES. From 1836, for a half century, Russell's Collegiate and Commercial Institute at New Haven held high rank, until it was given up on the death of its founder, Gen. William Russell, Yale '35. Black Hall School at Lyme, has a good record, and others on the Shore Line are the Seabury Institute at Saybrook, incorporated in 1865; the Morgan School at Clinton, the gift of Charles Morgan, incorporated in 1870 and opened two years later; the Mystic Valley English and Classical Institute at Mystic Bridge, opened in 1868 and incorporated in 1880; and the Bulkeley School in New London. This last was endowed by Leonard Bulkeley, who left the bulk of his estate for a free school for boys, to be begun when the principal with added interest should equal $50,000. The school was incorporated in 1850 and opened in 1873. The Norwalk Military Institute is a very prosperous and successful school. The Yale school at Lakeville and Mr. Taft's school at Watertown are among the more recent private schools of high grade. ROMAN CATHOLIC INSTITUTIONS. Until lately so few of this faith were in Connecticut, that the Roman Catholic schools are of recent date. But, for the past thirty or forty years, the immigration of Roman Catholics from Ireland and Canada has been so great that several large schools have been founded. Among these are the Academy of the Holy Family, begun in 1874 at Baltic, which is co-educational; the Seminary of Mount St. Joseph, at Hartford, incorporated in 1873; and the Congregation de Notre Dame, at Waterbury, opened in 1869. THE STORRS AGRICULTURAL SCHOOL. This school was founded at Mansfield and chartered in 1881. It is intended "for the education of Connecticut boys in such branches of science as may conduce to skill in agricultural pursuits." It has a twoyears' course "in general and agricultural chemistry, farm mechanics, land surveying, botany, zoology, animal physiology, practical and theoretical agriculture," etc. It receives part of the income from the land grant, an act having been passed by the Legislature in 1893 taking it away from the Sheffield Scientific School. FEMALE EDUCATION. At the time the Litchfield Law School flourished, there was a most successful girls' school on Litchfield Hill. It was conducted by Miss Sarah Pierce, and for years was preeminent. It was begun in 1792 and lived for nearly forty years, having within its walls over 1,500 pupils. The building in which it was held has since been demolished and no trace remains of this school, which is claimed to have been the first in the United States for the higher education of women.1 Among the most prominent schools for the secondary education of women are the Golden Hill Seminary at Bridgeport, the Windsor Female Seminary, and St. Margaret's Diocesan School for Girls at Waterbury, incorporated in 1875 and conducted by the Rev. F. T. Russell. Of schools no longer in existence, one of the most famous was Grove Hall, in New Haven, which, under Miss Mary Dutton, had a wide reputation. A sister of ex-President Porter was for many years head of a well-known boarding school at Farmington, Conn. The school is still prosperous, and employs the services of an excellent corps of teachers and special lecturers. 1 Harper's, LIV, 514. Litchfield Hill, by J. D. Champlin, jr. CHAPTER V. YALE UNIVERSITY. SECTION I.-FOUNDING AND EARLY YEARS UP TO REMOVAL TO NEW HAVEN. PREPARATION FOR A COLLEGE.' We have seen how New Haven's attempt to found a college in the early years failed, though hope that a college would come some day seems never to have deserted the lion-hearted Davenport. But the time had not yet come. First, the people were crushed by their unsuccessful struggle with Connecticut; then Davenport died; next, King Phillip's war exhausted the resources of the little colony; after that came the tyranny of Andros; and last, William and Mary's war. But a time for rest came in 1697 with the peace of Ryswick, and the colony had a chance to recover. The tradition of the college that was to have been founded lingered in New Haven, and when John Pierpont came to preach there and married Davenport's daughter, he took up the project and went into it with all the zeal possible. He was a man of farreaching views, settled among a people of far more than average intelligence. Though the population of the town was less than one thousand, it had sent one man in every thirty of the Harvard graduates up to that date, while from the whole State one-eighth of the Harvard men had come. Pierpont soon associated with him two others, Rev. Mr. Andrew, of Milford, and Rev. Mr. Russel, of Branford, both in the old New Haven Colony, and these three went to work to establish a college. They had many difficulties. The population of the colony in thirty-four towns numbered not over 15,000, and these were not wealthy, but were chiefly small farmers. The distance and expense of sending boys to Harvard were among the chief reasons for founding another college, though the suspicion of a looseness in Harvard's religious tenets undoubtedly moved men somewhat. Having been graduated themselves at Harvard, the projectors of this enterprise naturally enough asked for advice from Massachusetts, and from thence came a letter addressed to them by Cotton Mather. This contained a plan for 'The illustrations of Yale buildings are made from photographs taken especially for this work and kindly presented by Edward F. Ayres, Yale College, 1888, 2 Quincy Hist. Harvard University, I, 198. 3 Woolsley's Hist. Discourse, 1850, pp. 83-86. a "school of the churches," which was not adopted to any great extent, as it proposed that the college should be founded through the means of a synod of the churches-a plan not acceptable. In May, 1701, the General Court1 voted to hold its next session in New Haven, a thing which had not been done since New Haven had ceased to be the capital of a separate State. This was received with joy by the promoters of the college. They immediately set to work." Rev. James Pierpont, of New Haven; Rev. Abraham Pierson, of Killingworth; Rev. Israel Chauncy, of Stratford; Rev. Thomas Bucking. ham, of Saybrook; and Rev. Gurdon Saltonstall, of New London, addressed a letter to Secretary Addington and Judge Sewall, of Massachusetts, on August 7, asking for their advice and for a draft for a charter. They also, either then or a little later, sent instructions as to what the draft of the charter should contain.3 Whether Connecticut could give a charter was uncertain. Being itself a chartered body, would not doing so be a stretch of power without warrant? Harvard had lost its charter sometime since and had made several unsuccessful attempts to obtain another; and William and Mary, the only other college in the country, had obtained its charter from the monarchs whose names it bore. But Sewall and Addington answered favorably, giving joy to the Connecticut people. As good orthodox men they said: "We should be very glad to hear of flourishing schools and a college in Connecticut, and it would be some relief to us against the sorrow we have conceived for the decay of them in this province. And as the end of all learning is to fit men to search the Scriptures, we make no doubt but you will oblige the rector to expound the Scriptures diligently morning and evening." The draft for a charter was generally accepted, except that the founders wisely struck out all reference to religion save in the preamble.5 Others were consulted on the subject; Gershom Bulkeley, of Wethersfield, answered unfavorably, but Increase Mather wrote aiding them, and Eleazur Kimberly, Secretary of the Colony, and John Eliot, a young lawyer of Windsor, gave opinions that a charter would be valid. The last said that "to erect such a school is neither repugnant to the laws of England nor an encroachment on the King's prerogative. No act or law (according to my sense of the matter) in any of the Plantations is deemed to be repugnant to the laws of England, unless it be contrary to an act of the Parliament of England, wherein such plantation is expressed or evidently intended, and I know of no act of Parliament which says such a school may not be erected in the Plantations." This letter was sent in the last of September to Mr. Pierson at Bran 1 Dexter, Yale Annals, 1. 2 Yale Annals, 2. 3 Dexter, Founding of Yale College, New Haven Col. Hist. Soc. Colls., 5. 5 Founding of Yale College, 7. |