The Female College
Part 2 in a series on schooling for my ancestors
It’s a question we don’t even think about today. Why should you send a daughter to school? Once she knows how to read and write, why do more? In the early nineteenth century, those were legitimate questions.
Oh - and we’re not talking about a finishing school where the daughters of the wealthy received an “ornamental” education, with lessons in dance, music, painting, “fancywork” (embroidery) and French. We’re talking about an education equal or similar to what her brothers received - science and Latin and math and rhetoric. A “female seminary movement” swept the country, especially after 1830, establishing women’s schools providing education largely on par with men. (Seminary then did not have the religious meaning that it does today. ) An important part of the seminary movement was creating endowments for the women’s schools, just as men’s colleges had. Subscription schools sprang up and died with the death or a move of the teacher. Leaders of female seminaries were anxious for the kind of permanence that male colleges had, outlasting their founders. The schools tended to be headed by ministers who worked to raise funds to establish a permanence.
By the 1850s the question of why to extend advanced education to women (white middle-and upper-class women, that is) was pretty much settled. The purpose of this higher education, for most young ladies, was to uphold the morals of the country as a better wife and mother. In her separate sphere, she was to powerfully influence society with her naturally nurturing ways, gently leading and guiding men and boys to better behavior and Christian discipline. This was regarded as especially important as the country expanded westward, and in many circles there was anxiety that the U.S. not become a Catholic nation. The “Angel in the Home” - and in the schoolroom - would inculcate Protestant beliefs and values.
It was no longer controversial that she should study the same subjects as her brothers, as she needed a developed mind to best guide the next generation. There was also social capital to sending one’s daughters on to academies. After all, they weren’t open to everyone, nor were they something everyone could afford.
But there were contradictions. There was a new anxiety in an increasingly capitalist economy. She should be able to support herself if need be, in the few professions open to her - as a teacher or missionary. An 1861 ad for Ohio Female College rather grimly said the school was “fitting our daughters for the sober realities of life,” and promised, “EDUCATION - the richest patrimony for our daughters, and the only fortune many of them can obtain.” Good character and the accompanying good reputation was the most valuable thing a woman could have. Advanced schooling gave them this “fortune.”
Interestingly, I heard basically the same arguments for women going to college when I was a little girl – not the moral part, but to make oneself a better mother and more interesting companion for a husband. Additionally, it was a “backup plan” for those not fortunate enough to have a man support them. I distinctly remember reading an article in about 1972 in one of my mother’s magazines - Ladies Home Journal, Family Circle or Women’s Day that it was wise to get a college degree to have “something to fall back on” if widowed. The possibility of not being able to “snag” a husband also made a college degree desirable since one would be better able to support oneself. A college degree was like a form of insurance.
My third great-grandfather, Myron Fitch Barbour, chose to send his children on to advanced education, including his daughters. His sister and many of his cousins made the same decision - their girls would be educated. Without a public school system, this meant being fortunate enough to have the discretionary income to send a daughter to boarding school. As a successful real estate dealer, he had the discretionary income. Myron chose two “colleges” for his girls. (Schools increasingly used the names college and seminary to denote seriousness, separating themselves from the finishing school academies prevalent in the past.) Following is information about them, and a school his cousin sent his daughter to.
Ohio Female College -
In 1862 Sylvia Sophia Barbour was enrolled in the “Janitor” class, as the freshmen class was then called. (The line-up was janitor, templar, junior and senior.) She had just turned nineteen. On the cover of a pamphlet about the school, its purpose was clearly stated: “Educating competent teachers for the increasing millions of the West so soon to govern the nation.”
Founded in 1846 near Cincinnati, the school was on 23 acres in an area that became known as College Hill due to other ‘colleges’ in the area. Like nearly every boarding school, it offered a preparatory department for those not quite ready for advanced coursework, and a four-year degree. In 1862 there were eight buildings. The main one was three stories high with 97 apartments (dorm rooms), crowned by an observatory “embracing a horizon nearly fifty miles in diameter.” The building was steam heated and each room was “brilliantly lighted by gas.” They were supplied by filtered rain water from a faucet in each closet (there were 77 “closets”), with drainage - so there was no bucket-carrying to bring water in or dispose of it. There were eight rooms for hot or cold baths or showers. This must have seemed luxurious as few girls came from homes with steam heat, water closets and showers.
The fall session was sixteen weeks long and Sylvia studied algebra, general history, and any incidentals that Myron paid extra for, such as music, drawing, modern language or bookkeeping. If she continued in the spring term, it was 24 weeks long. In this session, algebra and general history would be completed and she would take botany and general rhetoric. The school was non-sectarian but Sunday church attendance was mandatory as was daily chapel with a short lecture on the day’s Bible reading, singing and prayer.
A decade before her arrival, the college invested in $1,000 worth of laboratory equipment and had a refracting telescope. “A new and beautiful omnibus has been purchased for the exclusive use of the school,” an ad promised. “The omnibus will go out daily for the health of the pupils and this, together with the pleasant rambles under the care of teachers, will give them exhilarating exercise so much needed in connection with severe study.” Seven new pianos were also purchased. Tuition and board was $175 at this time.
The general rules when Sylvia was there stated that young ladies were to rise at an early hour at the ringing of a bell and have their rooms in order before breakfast.A teacher would inspect the room daily. “All boisterous and unladylike deportment is forbidden and will meet with decided reproof.” They were not allowed to attend picnics or parties except when teachers joined them. Needless to say, there were to be no gentlemen callers.
Because the railroad arrived in 1861, Sylvia and her sister Lida could easily travel to the school. The Barbours’ other daughter Ella was an invalid in her early twenties and probably did not attend school. School attendance in this era was sporadic, and it was rare for more than one-third of students to return from one term to the next. To attend two years in a row was even rarer. However in some cases girls were being taught by private tutors at home, or they studied on their own, following the “college” course as a means of self improvement and character development. But even with one session of attendance, for the rest of their lives they had the prestige of seminary attendance, and the network of friends they made outside their hometown.
Nearly a decade after Sylvia, Myron’s cousin, George Franklin Sadd, sent his daughter Laura Theresa, to Ohio Female College. She attended in the college’s last days, 1870 and 1871. In 1868 the college suffered a devastating fire that destroyed the main building. By that time, there were 28 pianos, which were saved because they were on the lower floors and the fire broke out on upper floors. The school rebuilt, and the Sadds evidently felt confident enough to Laura there. Tuition was $250.
Although it seemed to recover, the school nevertheless closed in 1872; the reason uncertain. The property was purchased by a group of doctors as a private psychiatric facility.
Fort Wayne College - Founded in 1846 as Fort Wayne Female College, the school opened in 1847. It was on a three-acre campus housed in a four-story brick building with stone trimmings. The chapel was said to seat an impressive 1,000. There were accommodations for 100 to board. In 1850 it opened a “Collegiate Institute for Men,” which Myron sent his son Lucius to. In 1852 it boasted 178 students.
The school became co-ed and changed its name to Fort Wayne College in 1855.
In 1860 tuition for one term - March 21st to June 20th - was $8 for college classes, $6 for academic - roughly equivalent to high school, and $3 for the primary department. Boarding was $1.75 a week; each room came furnished with a bed, bedding, a stove, a stand, chairs and a pail. "Boarders furnish their own lights." This was for the girls only. Boys boarded in private homes.
Under no circumstances were the young ladies boarding at the school to go to the post office, and they could go to town only once a week and only when accompanied by a faculty member. Church attendance was required at the church of the parents' choice. Any behavior prohibited on the Sabbath in "well-bred Christian families," including walking on the streets for any reason other than getting to and from church, was "totally forbidden." Lights were out at 9:45 p.m.
As at the other schools, the college used a system of demerits for any infraction. They advertised "mild but decided" government, with a kindly parent-like supervision.
Myron’s brother-in-law Richard Adams, who was married to his sister Nancy, served on the board and naturally they sent their children to the school.
In 1890 Fort Wayne College merged with a medical college in the city and was renamed Taylor University after a Methodist minister. Taylor University still exists today, though it moved to Upland, Indiana.
Western Female Seminary -
Western Female Seminary was founded in 1853 as the “Mt. Holyoke of the West,” in Oxford, Ohio with a donation of 30 acres. Its principal/president, Helen Peabody, was a graduate of Mt. Holyoke Seminary and the first teachers were all Holyoke graduates. The school had one building, which was typical for the time, but it was an impressive, imposing structure. Classrooms, dorms, the dining hall, chapel, kitchen, library, administrative offices and housing for female faculty were all within. The day began at 5:00 a.m. and was regulated by bells. There were many rules, and mandatory devotional time. The girls had to help with chores, but domestic education was absolutely not the focus, and girls were expected to be trained in the domestic arts at home. They had close mentor relationships with teachers, which were fostered by regularly meeting in groups of eight to ten, and calisthenics were considered an important part of the day.
In order to be admitted, Retta had to pass exams in English grammar, modern geography, U.S. history and “mental and written” mathematics. Admission was on a probationary basis for six weeks. As a senior, Retta would study Virgil, Loomis’ Trigonometry, Geology, the history of literature, Haven’s mental philosophy, Wayland’s moral science, Butler’s analogy, the Bible (prophets and epistles) and composition. She probably also had instruction in vocal music and drawing.
The school, which appealed to the middle class, intended to outfit its girls for teaching jobs in the west, and missionary work. Tuition, room and board for Retta’s senior year was $160. This would be comparable to roughly $5,200 today, although exact equivalence is difficult to determine. Girls were expected to furnish their own towel, napkin and napkin ring, sheets, pillowcases and blanket, a dessert spoon and a teaspoon. Thick-soled shoes and overshoes were a must, and a dress suitable for gymnastic exercises. They were also to arrive with a dictionary, ancient and modern atlas, Bible dictionary and Bible study guides, and a Latin lexicon.
Of her 22 classmates, Retta was one of twelve who hadn’t married at the class reunion twenty-five years later. (One member of her class was a doctor.) She ended up teaching in Kansas for a total of 12 years. Retta had a family to fall back on, and some years she lived with them and others she “boarded ‘round.” Twice Retta received top scores on teacher examinations, and she frequently presented at the teacher institutes, a form of professional development, that Kansas required its teachers to attend.
In1871, when Laura Sadd attended Ohio Female College, the class valedictorian wrote a farewell poem for the class.
Oh classmates, turn back from this sorrowing present,
And say with our motto, “Past labors are pleasant,”
Then looking beyond in the future afar
We’ll hopefully journey aloft to you star
Our days have been passed as a beautiful tune
But now, in this sunshiny morning in June
Old Time cuts the strings with his terrible hand
And hushes the music and scatters our band.
Yet afar from each other, o’er land, o’er sea,
The sweet ringing echoes of fond memory
Shall wing the glad air to our spirits again
while fondest affection shall sing the refrain.
Sources:
Banning, Jennifer and Callie McCune. “Allen County, Catalog and Register of Fort Wayne Female College, Indiana Historical Society Press, 2013, 1851-1852,” https://indianahistory.org/wp-content/uploads/18a94ac2e8ecab173b8cb9dda7f31636.pdf
Beidie, Nancy. “Academy Students in the Mid-Nineteenth Century: Social, Geography, Demography and the Culture of Academy Attendance,” History of Education Quarterly, Vol. 41, No. 2 (Summer 2001), pp. 251-262.
Fort Wayne Female College Catalog and Register, (1855) Academic Catalogs (TUFW and Predecessors)1. https//pillars.taylor.edu/tufw-catalogs/1.
Melder, Keith. “Mask of Oppression: The Female Seminary Movement in the United States,” New York History, Vol. 55, No. 3 (July 1974), pp. 260-279.
Oates, Mary J. “Catholic Female Academies on the Frontier,” U.S. Catholic Historian, Vol. 12, No. 4 (Fall 1994), pp. 121-136.
The Ohio Female College at College Hill, Hamilton, Ohio With the Plan, Reason and Encouragement for Its Permanent Endowment As a First-Class Female Seminary,” New York: Edward O. Jenkins, 1862.
Ohio Female College, Ohio History Central https://ohiohistorycentral.org/w/Ohio_Female_College
Sweet, Leonard. “The Female Seminary Movement and Women’s Mission in Antebellum America,” Church History, Vol. 54, No. 1, (March 1985), pp. 41-55.
Turpin, Andrea L. “The Ideological Origins of the Women’s College: Religion, Class and Curriculum in the Educational Visions of Catherine Beecher and Mary Lyon,” History of Education Quarterly, Vol. 50, No. 2 (May 2010), pp. 133-158.
“Ohio Female College,” The Courier-Journal (Louisville, Kentucky), 31 Aug 1852, p. 2.
“Commencement Season - The Ohio Female College,” The Cincinnati Enquirer, 9 June 1871, p. 4.
Light, Gladys. “Young Lady Student at DePauw University Writes History of Old Fort Wayne M.E. College,” Fort Wayne Daily News, 30 March 1916, p. 6.
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