This black and white engraving is entitled “The Village School.” It shows a headmaster standing and sternly pointing to a boy who appears to have fallen asleep. The other students are seated or standing about the classroom.
As indicated below the image, it was engraved by the Illman & Sons printing house for Peterson’s magazine. This periodical was published in Philadelphia from 1842–1898 and focused on news and features of interest to women of that era. Illman & Sons was an engraving and printing firm established by English born Thomas Illman and his sons Henry and George circa 1840 through about 1860. The firm continued after Thomas Illman's death, circa 1858 as Illman Brothers and was managed by his sons William, Henry, George, Edward, Richard, and Charles.
This is a clipping from Harper’s Weekly dated March 10, 1866. The black and white image is entitled “Caught Napping.” It depicts a schoolmaster about to strike a student sleeping in class, while other students look on. Corporal punishment was common in both private and public U.S. schools during the 19th century and beyond. It was thought to be necessary to promote discipline and avoid rowdiness in boys, while girls were not subject to it.
Harper’s Weekly was published by Harper & Brothers in New York City from 1857 until 1916. It featured news, fiction, essays on many subjects, and humor, along with illustrations.
This full-page black and white illustration appeared in May 1876 in the Historical Register of the Centennial Exposition, which was held in Philadelphia. It portrays 14 well-dressed schoolchildren sitting around a table in a large ornate room. They are attended to by two female teachers. From a gallery in the background, the students’ parents are looking on.
Women were instrumental in the financial development and design of the Centennial Exposition. The Women’s Committee planned, funded, and managed their own pavilion. The Women’s Pavilion was a popular Exposition attraction, with demonstrations of women’s contributions to the arts, sciences, education, and industry.
The Historical Register was published by Frank Leslie. The illustration was made by a Mr. Hyde.
This is a Latin primer of “sacred history” containing 209 Bible stories presented in simplified Latin and English. The sixth edition, stereotype edition, has leather binding with gilt lettered spine label, 156 pages. This book was used at Nottingham Academy in Colora, Maryland by several students including Joseph Barnes, who later became an instructor at the school before pursuing a series of other careers.
Go Bob’s Little Reader is a mid-19th Century compilation of readings which emphasizes selections from American authors, both in prose and poetry. The editor’s goal was to correct the perceived imbalance in widely used readers of the time which emphasized British authors.
Lyman Cobb (1800-1864) was an influential author and editor of children’s readers and other textbooks. He attended the local public schools in Massachusetts and became a teacher upon graduation. After moving to New York City, he devoted himself to editing and publishing textbooks, chiefly in spelling, reading, and arithmetic. His widely used works included Go Bob’s Little Reader and Cobb’s Spelling Book. Besides children’s textbooks, he published The Evil Tendencies of Corporal Punishment in 1847. His arguments were adopted by leaders of the reform movement in American public schools.
This is a full-page illustrated article from a periodical entitled The Delineator, published in September 1914. The author, Caryle Ellis, contrasts the modern public schools in American cities with the austere classrooms of a generation earlier. He points out that in addition to central heating, movable table and chairs, the new teaching materials and setting are attractive. There are four color photos of modern classrooms, as well as a boy and girl neatly dressed for school. He concludes that: “We believe they are entitled to more than we had, and will be better mothers and fathers, better friends, and better citizens for it.”
Caryle Ellis was the editor of The Delineator, one of the most important women’s magazines of the period 1873-1937. It was a monthly periodical published in New York City. There is also a short side column entitled “Taking Beauty to School” by Dr. William H. Allen (1858 –1936), an American architect.
The Normal Primary Arithmetic was designed as an introduction to the author's text entitled a Thorough and Complete Course in Mental and Written Arithmetic. It contains practical oral and written exercises. Its 103 pages also include suggestions for teachers. The tan front cover contains an image of two buildings, probably schools, and a horse drawn carriage. The back cover lists other textbooks available in the Normal Educational Series.
American author and educator Edward Brooks (1831-1912) was the Principal of Pennsylvania State Normal School. Brooks also served as the Superintendent of Schools in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Among his many other publications were Normal Elementary Algebra and Philosophy of Arithmetic.
Sower, Potts and Co. of Philadelphia was a prominent publisher of educational texts in the last half of the 19th Century. In addition to works on mathematics, it published in the fields of English and American literature and physics.
This movable wooded school chair-desk consists of a chair with a adjustable, liftable desktop. The desk features a drawer under the chair seat and metal rails and was produced by the Union School Furnishing Company. The chair part has a cut out handle are for moving. Desk top tilts at angles for better positioning for penmanship and light on desk surface. There are minor differences such as the geometric design on the drawer pull which was also used as a border on the company's advertising literature. This desk is an example of one of the many knock offs of the Moulthrop design chair desk. In 1922, H.D. Fowler sued the company in Chicago for commission sales as a result of their patent.
Union School Furnishing Company was based in Chicago between about 1909 to about 1927. The company sold school supplies, books, and school furniture.
The Rand-McNally Primary School Geography is richly illustrated with drawings and diagrams, as well as maps in color. Content covers the world with an emphasis on the United States. It contains information on plant and animal life, history, anthropology and industry. The book has question-and-answer style lessons and oral exercises. The brown cover is illustrated on the front and back with a red and blue globe of the world.
Rand-McNally & Company was established in Chicago in 1868 by print shop owner William Rand and printer partner Andrew McNally. The company incorporated in 1873. The company ventured into educational publishing, and began offering a line of globes, maps, and geography textbooks in 1880. It became so lucrative that they opened a textbook department in 1894 featuring their primary school geography. By 1923, the company was publishing Goode School Atlas, later Goode’s World Atlas as a standard geography text for high schools and colleges.
The Children’s Primer is a reader for the primary grades and a forerunner to the “Dick and Jane” and similar easy reader series. Each chapter is illustrated with drawings of children playing at home or in a natural setting. The front cover contains an intricate, puzzle-like pattern, with a large scallop shell and a seaside scene.
Author Ellen M. Cyr (1860-1920) taught in the Holmes Primary School in the township of Cambridge, Massachusetts. She was a prolific author of a series of children’s readers for the elementary grades.
Edwin Ginn founded the publishing company Ginn Brothers in the City of Boston in 1867. The firm was reorganized under the name Ginn & Company in 1885 and became particularly known for its school texts. In 1895, the company built a new publishing factory, the Athenaeum Press, in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Ginn & Company continued to be a successful publisher of educational texts for 70 years.
Framed hand colored map of the United States published in John Hayward’s Gazetteer of the United States of America in 1853. States from the eastern portion of the United States, an overly large Minnesota, and western territories are delineated prior to the Gadsden Purchase (1854) but after the Mexican-American War (1848) as seen in the border for New Mexico and Arizona. Large western areas are labeled Nebraska, Oregon, Utah, California, New Mexico, Texas, and an area listed with Indian tribal nations and a more general Indian Territory. The map mentions several Indian tribes, and migration routes such as John C. Fremont's route, the Oregon Trail, the Santa Fe Trail, and the Old Spanish Mission Road. Mormon Settlements in Utah and John Bropy Rancho are also noted.
John Hayward (1781-1862) was a publisher of several “Gazetteers” of the New England region and the United States, travel guides and 2 books on religion: Religious Creeds of the United States and of the British Providences (1837) and Book of Religions (1842). He was born and worked in Boston as well as in Hartford, Connecticut and was active circa 1828-1860.
This late 19th Century black and white print is a clipping from Harper’s Weekly. It depicts a classroom filled with rows of “news-boys” and “boot blacks.” These terms were often used to refer to impoverished, orphaned and/or homeless children. The scene is of a Sunday evening service. Three men are standing, one of whom is reading from what is likely a prayer book. A woman is playing the piano. The setting is in “the New York City Industrial School,” one of several founded in the 1800s to teach self-support skills to poor children, usually from immigrant families. It may have been the Children’s Aid Society Tompkins Square Lodging House for Boys and Industrial School which specifically sheltered and educated destitute working children, particularly newsboys and bootblacks, which opened April 21, 1887. The Children’s Aid Society was founded in 1853 by Charles Loring Brace.
Harper’s Weekly was an American political magazine based in New York City and was published by Harper & Brothers from 1857-1916. It featured foreign and domestic news, fiction, essays on many subjects, and humor, as well as illustrations.
Theodore Roosevelt: Scholar, Citizen and Statesman is Volume XXIII, No. 34 of The School World Literature Series, a monthly publication of popular supplemental readings. It contains a short, laudatory biography of the 26th President. It highlights his boyhood, public service as Assemblyman and Governor of New York, exploits in the military, and first Presidential Inauguration. As it was published in September 1903, it does not discuss the bulk of his presidency (1901-1909), nor his subsequent unsuccessful run as a third party candidate in the Presidential elections of 1912.
The brown front cover contains reviews and endorsements of the 32-page booklet. Both the back cover and inside cover pages contain ads for other volumes of School World Readings, which were published monthly from September to June. Other subjects in the series included biographies of famous persons such as Joan of Arc and Ben Franklin, as well as modern innovations such as electricity.
D. H. Knowlton & Co. was a venerable publishing house based in Farmington, Maine from the late 19th to the early 20th Century. It specialized in educational books in the fields of history, social studies, and world events.
School Needlework is the Teacher's Edition which supplements the companion instruction manual by providing practical suggestions as to how to teach the lessons. The author asserts in the Preface that the importance of sewing instruction in the public schools is broadly recognized. There are many black and white illustrations of stiches, sewing patters, and fabrics. Page one contains a message emblematic of the 19th Century’s view of the role of girls and women: "Dear Girls: You have now become old enough to prepare for women's duties; one of these is the art of sewing, ...By following the given directions carefully, you will become able to dress your dolls, assist your mothers in mending, make garments, fancy articles, etc."
Author Olive C. Hapgood was a teacher of sewing in the Boston Public School System.
Edwin Ginn founded the publishing company Ginn Brothers in the City of Boston in 1867. The firm was reorganized under the name Ginn & Company in 1885 and became particularly known for its school texts. In 1895, the company built a new publishing factory, the Athenaeum Press, in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Ginn & Company continued to be a successful publisher of educational texts for 70 years.
This teaching device was designed for students to move blocks with letters on tracks to assemble words or even sentences in the middle two center tracks, and on the rear side to move numbers and operators around for elementary math equations. This is 12'x12" hard-pressed, double sided cardboard board has 31 wooden tiles with letters on one side and numbers on the other side. The letter side as a border of 28 yellow squares with images of common objects and the word spelled under the image.
Little Scholar Spelling and Counting Board was manufactured by Bar-Zim Manufacturing Company. Bar-Zim Toy manufacturing Company was incorporated in New York City with capital stock of $8,000 by Harry Zimmerman, William Bartholomae, and Abraham B. Wolpin in May of 1916. The company moved its headquarters to New Jersey in October 1938 and held numerous patents and trademarks for games and toys throughout much of the 20th Century. The company was dissolved July 13, 1971.
This comprehensive textbook was part of the Gray’s Botanical series of 10 items. It is an introduction to the plants, shrubs, herbs, and trees of the United States. This revised edition was adapted for use as a handbook for field study. The 1887 Preface notes this is a revision of an earlier work (Civil War period) and was designed for “competent teachers” who are incorporating the topic into their lectures. Apparently, the book inspired its young owner because the inside front cover page contains two handwritten stanzas from an Alfred, Lord Tennyson poem extolling the beauty of trees and flowers.
The American Book Company was an educational book publisher formed in 1890 and based in New York City that specialized in elementary school, secondary school and collegiate-level textbooks. The company was absorbed into D. C. Heath in 1981. Any remaining K-12 assets of the American Book Company were acquired by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt in 1995.
Appletons' Standard Elementary Geography is primarily devoted to the United States and its regional groupings of states. Each chapter briefly presents a topography of land and water, along with distinctive features of climate. Also included in each lesson is a summary of the history and commercial pursuits of the inhabitants. In addition, every continent is discussed, with attention to the largest countries and cities. There are numerous colored maps and black and white illustrations of key historical events and settlements. The brown front cover features stylized capital letters for the A of Appletons and the G of Geography, akin to an illuminated manuscript. This comprehensive and sophisticated textbook is 108 pages in length.
D. Appleton & Company was an American publisher founded in New York City by Daniel Appleton (1785-1849). He published his first book in 1831 and the firm’s publications gradually extended over many genres, including literature and travel. The family-run publishing house went on to issue the New American Cyclopedia and the Unabridged English Dictionary, which made the Appleton name world famous. The company grew to become one of the world's most important publishing houses. In 1933, Appleton merged with Century to create a new company, D. Appleton-Century Co. Then in 1948, D. Appleton-Century Co. merged with F.S. Crofts, Inc. The company was sold to Prentice-Hall in the 1960s.
