A teacher projects himself through the lives of his pupils and an
institution of learning speaks through the voice of its scholars. St.
Johnsbury Academy has been a formative force in the educational life
of New England and beyond, and her leadership has been buttressed upon
sound learning.
Charles E. Putney was a great principal and an inspiring teacher. In the
classics his well-ordered mind found a congenial field for interpretation
and elucidation. Frail of physique, with all the scholar's nerves and
sensitiveness, he yet day after day ploughed through the hesitating
minds of his pupils with patience and thoroughness. Particularly as a
teacher of Greek did he excel. He led his pupils through the necessary
technique of parasangs to the mastery of the sublime secrets of this
imperial mother of tongues. He possessed the capacity of taking infinite
pains and played no favorites among his scholars. I imagine the
responsibility of administration irked his gentle spirit and the rawness
of self-centered youth must have tried his conscientious soul.
I never thought of him in those days as a veteran of the Civil War, in
fact, did not then know of his martial service, but I can see now how
that experience must have fed his hatred of disobedience and disloyalty
and increased his zeal for the proper development of the minds of his
boys and girls in order that they too might become dependable citizens
of the Republic.
His was a kindly nature, though to the pupil who first fronted him he
seemed stern, yet this was but the shell, in which daily duty encased
him. It was always a pleasure to watch his sense of humor expand
itself in friendly smile and expend itself in his low chuckle as some
particularly atrocious translation fell from lips unused to expressing
ancient thought.
It is hard to measure his personal influence by a sentence but it seems
to me as principal and teacher, by precept and practice, he showed how
desirable a thing it is to perform the daily task conscientiously and
patiently.