HER FIRST EXPERIENCE AS A TEACHER
The avenues which open into life are many now, and the feet of young
people who leave home or school are set at the intersection of many
highways. But it was not so in the early part of the nineteenth
century. For those who had aspirations for something else than the farm
or shop, the most common and convenient path to larger knowledge and a
professional career lay through the teaching of the district school.
When Mr. Fowler advised that responsibility be laid upon Clara to
develop her self-reliance and overcome her shyness, there were not many
kinds of work which could easily have been recommended. School-teaching
followed almost inevitably, and as something foreordained. She belonged
to a generation of teachers, and to a family which was quite at
home in the schoolroom. Her elder sister Dorothy developed symptoms
of invalidism, never married, and in time had to give up teaching,
and her younger sister Sally married and became Mrs. Vassall. Her
brother Stephen had graduated from the work of teaching, and he and
David were associated in farm, gristmill, sawmill, cloth-mill, and
other enterprises. There was no difficulty in securing for Clara
the opportunity to teach in the district where her married sister
lived. Bearing in mind the advice of Mr. Fowler, she did up her hair,
lengthened her skirts, and prepared for her first work as a teacher.
[Illustration: STONE SCHOOLHOUSE WHERE SHE FIRST TAUGHT]
At the close of the second term of school, the advice was acted
upon, and it was arranged that I teach the school in District No.
9. My sister resided within the district. How well I remember the
preparations--the efforts to look larger and older, the examination by
the learned committee of one clergyman, one lawyer, and one justice
of the peace; the certificate with “excellent” added at the close;
the bright May morning over the dewy, grassy road to the schoolhouse,
neither large nor new, and not a pupil in sight.
On entering, I found my little school of forty pupils all seated
according to their own selection, quietly waiting with folded hands.
Bright, rosy-cheeked boys and girls from four to thirteen, with the
exception of four lads, as tall and nearly as old as myself. These
four boys naturally looked a little curiously at me, as if forming
an opinion of how best to dispose of me, as rumor had it that on the
preceding summer, not being _en rapport_ with the young lady
teacher, they had excluded her from the building and taken possession
themselves. All arose as I entered, and remained standing until
requested to sit. Never having observed how schools were opened, I was
compelled, as one would say, to “blaze my own way.” I was too timid
to address them, but holding my Bible, I said they might take their
Testaments and turn to the Sermon on the Mount. All who could read,
read a verse each, I reading with them in turn. This opened the way
for remarks upon the meaning of what they had read. I found them more
ready to express themselves than I had expected, which was helpful
to me as well. I asked them what they supposed the Saviour meant by
saying that they must love their enemies and do good to them that
hated and misused them? This was a hard question, and they hesitated,
until at length a little bright-eyed girl with great earnestness
replied: “I think He meant that you must be good to everybody, and
mustn’t quarrel or make nobody feel bad, and I’m going to try.” An
ominous smile crept over the rather hard faces of my four lads,
but my response was so prompt, and my approval so hearty, that it
disappeared and they listened attentively, but ventured no remarks.
With this moderate beginning the day progressed, and night found us
social, friendly, and classed for a school. Country schools did not
admit of home dinners. I also remained. On the second or third day an
accident on their outside field of rough play called me to them. They
had been playing unfairly and dangerously and needed teaching, even
to play well. I must have thought they required object lessons, for
almost imperceptibly, either to them or to myself, I joined in the
game and was playing with them.
My four lads soon perceived that I was no stranger to their sports or
their tricks; that my early education had not been neglected, and that
they were not the first boys I had seen. When they found that I was
as agile and as strong as themselves, that my throw was as sure and
as straight as theirs, and that if they won a game it was because I
permitted it, their respect knew no bounds. No courtesy within their
knowledge was neglected. Their example was sufficient for the entire
school. I have seen no finer type of boys. They were faithful to me in
their boyhood, and in their manhood faithful to their country. Their
blood crimsoned its hardest fields, and the little bright-eyed girl
with the good resolve has made her whole life a blessing to others,
and still lives to follow the teaching given her. Little Emily has
“made nobody feel bad.”
My school was continued beyond the customary length of time, and its
only hard feature was our parting. In memory I see that pitiful group
of children sobbing their way down the hill after the last good-bye
was said, and I was little better. We had all been children together,
and when, in accordance with the then custom at town meetings, the
grades of the schools were named and No. 9 stood first for discipline,
I thought it the greatest injustice, and remonstrated, affirming that
there had been no discipline, that not one scholar had ever been
disciplined. Child that I was, I did not know that the surest test
of discipline is its absence.
Clara Barton was now embarked upon what seemed likely to be a life
vocation. Her success in teaching was marked, and her reputation
increased year by year. For twenty years the schoolroom was her home.
She taught in district schools near Oxford, and established a school of
her own, which she conducted for ten years. Then she stopped teaching
for a time, in order to complete her own education, as completion then
was accepted and understood. She did a memorable piece of school work
in Bordentown, New Jersey, and, but for the failure of her voice, might
have continued a teacher to the end of her life.
Her experiences during the years when she was teaching and pursuing
further studies were recorded by her in 1908, in a manuscript which
has never been published. She had already written and printed a little
book entitled “The Story of my Childhood,” which was well received and
brought her many expressions of pleasure from its readers. She thought
of continuing her autobiography in sections, and publishing these
separately. She hoped then to revise and unify them, supplement them
with adequate references to her record, and make a complete biography.
But she got no farther than the second installment, which must appear
as a chapter in this present work.
Before turning to this narrative which marks the beginning of her life
away from the parental roof, we may listen to the story of her first
journey away from home. It occurred at the end of her first term of
school, when her brother David set out on a journey to the State of
Maine to bring home his bride, and asked her to accompany him.
One day, early in September, my brother David, now one of the active,
popular business men of the town, nearly took my breath away by
inviting me to accompany him on a journey to the State of Maine, to
be present at his wedding and with him bring back the wife who was to
grace his home and share his future life.
There was now more lengthening of skirts, and a rush of dressmaking
such as I had never known before; and when, two weeks later, I found
myself with my brother and a rather gay party of ladies and gentlemen,
friends of his, at one of the most elegant hotels in Boston (where I
had never been), waiting the arrival of a delayed steamer, I was so
overcome by the dread of committing some impropriety or indiscretion
which might embarrass my brother that I begged him to permit me to
go back home. I was not distressed about what might be thought of
_me_. I did not seem to care much about that; but how it might
reflect upon my brother, and the mortification that my awkwardness
could not fail to inflict on him.
I had never set foot on a vessel or seagoing craft of any kind,
and when, in the glitter of that finely equipped steamer, I really
crossed over a corner of the great Atlantic Ocean, the very waves
of which touched other continents as well, I felt that my world was
miraculously widening.
It was another merry party, and magnificent spans of horses that met
and galloped away with us over the country to our destination.
But the crowning astonishment came when I was informed that it was the
desire and decision of all parties, that I act as bridesmaid; that I
assist in introducing the younger of the guests, and stand beside the
tall, handsome young bride who was to be my sister, while she pledged
her troth to the brother dearer to me than my own life.
This responsibility seemed to throw the whole world wide open to me.
How well I remember the tearful resolution with which I pledged myself
to try to overcome my troublesome propensities and to strive only for
the courage of the right, and for the fearlessness of true womanhood
so much needed and earnestly desired, and so painfully lacking.
November found us home again. Under the circumstances, there must
naturally be a share of social gayeties during the winter, and some
preparations for my new school duties; and I waited with more or less
apprehension for what would be my first life among strangers, and the
coming of my anticipated “First of May.” With slight variation I could
have joined truthfully in the dear old child refrain:
“Then wake and call me early,
Call me early, mother dear,”
For that will be the veriest day
“Of all the glad New Year.”