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A HISTORY OF THE McGUFFEY READERS.
[Illustration: WILLIAM H. McGUFFEY]
A HISTORY
OF THE
McGUFFEY READERS
By
HENRY H. VAIL.
WITH THREE PORTRAITS.
THE BOOKISH BOOKS--IV.
New Edition.
CLEVELAND
THE BURROWS BROTHERS CO.
1911
Copyright, 1911, by Henry H. Vail.
[Transcriber's Note: At the top of each page in the original is a header
line briefly describing the content on each page. In this document,
these header lines have been placed inside square brackets and move to
the start of the paragraph which begins the content so described.]
A History of the McGuffey Readers
THE BOOKS.
Before me are four small books roughly bound in boards, the sides
covered with paper. On the reverse of the title pages, two bear a
copyright entry in the year 1836; the others were entered in 1837. They
are the earliest editions of McGuffey's Eclectic Readers that have been
found in a search lasting forty years.
They represent the first efforts in an educational and business
enterprise that has for three-quarters of a century called for the best
exertions of many skilled men, and in their several forms these books
have taken a conspicuous part in the education of millions of the
citizens of this country.
But what interest can the history of the McGuffey Eclectic Readers have
to those who did not use these books in their school career? Their story
differs from that of other readers since in successive forms, adjusted
more or less perfectly to the changing demands of the schools, they
attained a wider and more prolonged use than has been accorded to any
other series.
[The Function of Readers]
By custom and under sanction of law certain studies are pursued in the
common schools of every state. Spelling, reading, writing, arithmetic,
geography, history, grammar, civics and physiology are the subjects
usually taught. The school authorities select the textbooks which shall
be used in each subject. The readers are the only texts used in all
schools affording opportunity for distinct ethical teaching. The history
of our country should give ideas of patriotism; the civics should
contain the primary notions of government; the physiologies should
instruct the pupils in the laws of health; but the reader should cover
the whole field of morals and manners and in language that will impress
their teaching indelibly upon the mind of every pupil. While the chief
aim of the school readers must be to teach the child to apprehend
thought from the printed page and convey this thought to the attentive
listener with precision, these efforts should be exerted upon thoughts
that have permanent value. No other texts used in the school room bear
directly and positively upon the formation of character in the pupils.
The school readers are the proper and indispensable texts for teaching
true patriotism, integrity, honesty, industry, temperance, courage,
politeness, and all other moral and intellectual virtues. In these books
every lesson should have a distinct purpose in view, and the final aim
should be to establish in the pupils high moral principles which are at
the foundation of character.
[Formers of Character]
The literature of the English language is rich in material suited to
this intent; no other language is better endowed. This material is fresh
to every pupil, no matter how familiar it may be to teacher or parent.
Although some of it has been in print for three centuries, it is true
and beautiful today.
President Eliot has said, "When we teach a child to read, our primary
aim is not to enable it to decipher a way-bill or a receipt, but to
kindle its imagination, enlarge its vision and open for it the avenues
of knowledge." Knowledge gives power, which may be exerted for good or
for evil. Character gives direction to power. Power is the engine which
may force the steamer through the water, character is the helm which
renders the power serviceable for good.
Readers which have been recognized as formers of good habits of action,
thought, and speech for three-quarters of a century, which have taught
a sound morality to millions of children without giving offense to the
most violent sectarian, which have opened the doors of pure literature
to all their users, are surely worthy of study as to their origin, their
successive changes, and their subsequent career.
The story of these readers is told in the specimens of the several
editions, in the long treasured and time-worn contracts, in the books of
accounts kept by the successive publishers, and in the traditions which
have been passed down from white haired men who gossiped of the early
days in the schoolbook business. Valuable information has also been
furnished by descendants of the McGuffey family, and by the educational
institutions with which each of the authors of the readers was
connected.
[Different Editions]
For half a century the present writer has had personal knowledge of the
readers. At first, as a teacher, using them daily in the class room; but
soon, as an editor, directing the literary work of the publishers and
owners. It therefore falls to him to narrate a story "quorum pars minima
fui."
For more than seventy years the McGuffey Readers have held high rank as
text-books for use in the elementary schools, especially throughout the
West and South. But during this time these books have been revised five
times and adjusted to the changed conditions in the schools. In each one
of these revisions the marked characteristics of the original series
have been most scrupulously retained, and the continued success of the
series is doubtless owing to this fact. There has been a continuity of
spirit.
[Contents of the Books]
The First and Second Readers were first published in 1836. In 1837 the
Third and Fourth Readers were printed. For reasons elsewhere explained
these books were "improved and enlarged" in 1838. In 1841 a higher
reader was added to the series which was then named McGuffey's
Rhetorical Guide. In the years 1843 and 1844 the four books then
constituting the series were thoroughly remodeled and on the title pages
were placed the words "Newly Revised" and the Rhetorical Guide was
annexed as the Fifth Reader. Ten years later the entire series was made
over and issued in six books. These were then called the New Readers.
From 1853 until 1878 the books remained substantially unchanged; but in
the latter year they were renewed largely in substance and improved in
form. These readers as copyrighted in 1879 were extensively used for
more than a quarter of a century. Changing conditions in the school room
called for another revision in 1901. This latest form now in extensive
use is called The New McGuffey Readers.
Each of these revisions has constituted practically a new series
although the changes have never included the entire contents. In the
higher readers will be found today many selections which appeared in the
original books. The reason for retaining such selections is clear. No
one has been able to write in the English language selections that are
better for school use than some written by Shakespeare, Milton, Bacon,
and other early writers. The literature of the English language has not
all been written in the present decade nor in the last century.
As at first published, the lower books of the McGuffey Readers had no
trace of the modern methods now used in teaching the mastery of
words--even the alphabet was not given in orderly form; but the
alphabetic method of teaching the art of reading was then the only one
used. The pupil at first spelled each word by naming the letters and
then pronounced each syllable and then the word.
[First Editions]
The following stanza is copied from page 61 of the edition of 1844 to
illustrate the method of presenting words:
I like to see a lit-tle dog,
And pat him on the head;
So pret-ti-ly he wags his tail
When-ev-er he is fed.
The First Reader was mostly in words of one syllable. In this book we
find the story of the lame dog that, when cured, brought another lame
dog to be doctored: of the kind boy who freed his caged bird; of the
cruel boy who drowned the cat and pulled wings and legs from flies; of
Peter Pindar the story teller, and the "snow dog" of Mount St. Bernard;
of Mr. Post who adopted and reared Mary; of the boy who told a lie and
repented after he was found out; of the chimney sweep who was tempted to
steal a gold watch but put it back and was thereafter educated by its
owner; of the whisky boy; and of the mischievous boy who played ghost
and made another boy insane. Nearly every lesson has a moral clearly
stated in formal didactic words at its close.
In the Second Reader we find the story of the idle boy who talked with
the bees, dogs, and horses, and having found them all busy, reformed
himself; of the kind girl who shared her cake with a dog and an old man;
of the mischievous boys who tied the grass across the path and thus
upset not only the milk-maid but the messenger running for a doctor
to come to their father; of the wise lark who knew that the farmer's
grain would not be cut until he resolved to cut it himself; of the wild
and ravenous bear that treed a boy and hung suspended by his boot; and
of another bear that traveled as a passenger by night in a stage coach;
of the quarrelsome cocks, pictured in a clearly English farm yard, that
were both eaten up by the fox that had been brought in by the defeated
cock; of the honest boy and the thief who was judiciously kicked by the
horse that carried oranges in baskets; of George Washington and his
historic hatchet and the mutilated cherry-tree; and of the garden that
was planted with seeds in lines spelling Washington's name which removed
all doubt as to an intelligent Creator. There were also some lessons on
such animals as beavers, whales, peacocks and lions.
[Favorite Selections]
The Third Reader will be remembered first because of the picture, on
the cover, of Napoleon on his rearing charger. This book contained five
selections from the Bible; Croly's "Conflagration of the Ampitheatre
at Rome;" "How a Fly Walks on the Ceiling;" "The Child's Inquiry;"
"How big was Alexander, Pa;" Irving's "Description of Pompey's Pillar;"
Woodworth's "Old Oaken Bucket;" Miss Gould's "The Winter King;" and
Scott's "Bonaparte Crossing the Alps," commencing "'Is the route
practicable?' said Bonaparte. 'It is barely possible to pass,' replied
the engineer. 'Let us set forward, then,' said Napoleon." The rearing
steed facing a precipitous slope in the picture gave emphasis to the
words. There were also in this reader several pieces about Indians and
bears, which indicate that Dr. McGuffey never forgot the stories told
at the fireside by his father of his adventures as an Indian scout and
hunter.
In the Fourth Reader there were seventeen selections from the Bible;
William Wirt's "Description of the Blind Preacher;" Phillip's "Character
of Napoleon Bonaparte;" Bacon's "Essay on Studies;" Nott's "Speech on
the Death of Alexander Hamilton;" Addison's "Westminster Abbey;"
Irving's "Alhambra;" Rogers's "Genevra;" Willis's "Parrhasius;"
Montgomery's "Make Way for Liberty;" two extracts from Milton and two
from Shakespeare, and no less than fourteen selections from the writings
of the men and women who lectured before the College of Teachers in
Cincinnati. The story of the widow of the Pine Cottage sharing her last
smoked herring with a strange traveler who revealed himself as her
long-lost son, returning rich from the Indies, was anonymous, but it
will be remembered by those who read it.
These selections were the most noteworthy ones in the first editions of
these readers.
The First and Second Readers of the McGuffey Series were substantially
made new at each revision. A comparison of the original Third Reader
with an edition copyrighted in 1847, shows that the latter book was
increased about one-third in size. Of the sixty-six selections in the
early edition only forty-seven were retained, while thirty new ones were
inserted. Among the latter were "Harry and his Dog Frisk" that brought
to him, punished by being sent to bed, a Windsor pear; "Perseverance," a
tale of kite-flying followed by the poem, "Try, try again;" the "Little
Philosopher," named Peter Hurdle, who caught Mr. Lenox's runaway horse
and on examination seemed to lack nothing but an Eclectic spelling book,
a reader and a Testament--which were promised him; "The Colonists," in
which men of various callings offered their services, and while even the
dancing master was accepted as of some possible use, the gentleman was
scornfully rejected; "Things by Their Right Names," in which a battle
was described as wholesale murder; "Little Victories," in which Hugh's
mother consoled him for the loss of a leg by telling him of the lives of
men who became celebrated under even greater adversities; "The Wonderful
Instrument," which turned out to be the eye; "Metaphysics," a ludicrous
description of a colonial salt-box in affected terms of exactness
designed to ridicule some forms of reasoning. Those who used this
edition of the third reader will surely remember some of these
selections.
[The Bible]
In the Fourth Reader printed in 1844 there were thirty new
selections--less than one-third of the book; but some of these were
such as will be remembered by those who read them in school. There was
"Respect for the Sabbath Rewarded," in which a barber of Bath had become
so poor because he would not shave his customers on Sunday, that he
borrowed a half-penny to buy a candle Saturday night to give light for
a late customer, and was thus discovered to be the long-lost William
Reed of Taunton, heir to many thousand pounds; "The Just Judge," who
disguised himself as a miller and, obtaining a place on the jury,
received only five guineas as a bribe when the others got ten, and who
revealed himself as Lord Chief Justice Hale and tried the case over in
his miller's clothing; Hawthorne's "The Town Pump;" Mrs. Southey's
"April Day."
"All day the low-hung clouds have dropped
Their garnered fullness down.
All day a soft gray mist hath wrapped
Hill, valley, grove and town."
Bryant's "Death of the Flowers;" Campbell's "Lochiel's Warning;" and the
trial scene from Shakespeare's Merchant of Venice. All these became
favorite reading exercises in later years.
As late as 1840 the Bible was read daily in all the schools of the
West. Although sectarian or denominational teaching was not permitted,
religious instruction was desired by the great majority of school
patrons.
Even up to the opening of the Civil War, whatever the faith or the
practice of the adult inhabitants of the country, the Bible story and
the Bible diction were familiar to all. The speeches of the popular
orators of that day were filled with distinct allusions to the Bible
and these were quickly and clearly apprehended by the people. It may be
questioned whether popular speeches of the present day would have equal
force if based on the assumption that everybody knows the Biblical
stories. Indeed it is a common remark made by professors of English in
the higher institutions of learning that pupils know little of the
Bible as a distinctly formative and conservative element in English
literature. In the texts authorized for the study of English classics,
Biblical allusions are very common. These have little meaning to pupils
who have not read the Bible, unless the passage is pointed out and
hunted up.
[Dr. Swing's Opinion]
From the pages of these readers the pupils learned to master the printed
word and obtain the thought of the authors. Without conscious effort
they received moral instruction and incentives toward right living.
Without intent they treasured in their memories such extracts from the
authors of the best English Literature as gave them a desire to read
more.
[Books as Teachers]
In one of his sermons Dr. David Swing of Chicago said: "Much as you may
have studied the languages or the sciences, that which most affected you
was the moral lessons in the series of McGuffey. And yet the reading
class was filed out only once a day to read for a few moments, and
then we were all sent to our seats to spend two hours in learning
how to bound New Hampshire or Connecticut, or how long it would take a
greyhound to overtake a fox or a hare if the spring of each was so and
so, and the poor fugitive had such and such a start. That was perhaps
well, but we have forgotten how to bound Connecticut, and how to solve
the equation of the field and thicket; but up out of the far-off years
come all the blessed lessons in virtue and righteousness which those
reading books taught; and when we now remember, how even these moral
memories have faded I cannot but wish the teachers had made us bound the
States less, and solve fewer puzzles in 'position' and the 'cube root'
and made us commit to memory the whole series of the McGuffey Eclectic
Readers. The memory that comes from these far-away pages is full of the
best wisdom of time or the timeless land. In these books we were indeed
led by a schoolmaster, from beautiful maxims for children up to the
best thoughts of a long line of sages, and poets, and naturalists. There
we all first learned the awful weakness of the duel that took away a
Hamilton; there we saw the grandeur of the Blind Preacher of William
Wirt; there we saw the emptiness of the ambition of Alexander, and there
we heard even the infidel say, 'Socrates died like a philosopher, but
Jesus Christ like a God.'"
This public recognition of the influence of these readers upon the mind
and character of this great preacher is again noted in Rev. Joseph Fort
Newton's biography of David Swing in which the books which influenced
that life are named as "The Bible, Calvin's Institutes, Fox's Book of
Martyrs and the McGuffey Readers;" and the author quotes David Swing as
saying that "The Institutes were rather large reading for a boy, but to
the end of his life he held that McGuffey's Sixth Reader was a great
book. For Swing, as for many a boy in the older West, its varied and
wise selections from the best English authors were the very gates of
literature ajar."
One of the most eminent political leaders of the present day attributes
his power in the use of English largely to the study of McGuffey's Sixth
Reader in the common schools of Ohio.
[How a Japanese Learned English]
At a dinner lately given in New York to Marquis Ito of Japan, the
marquis responded to the toast of his health returning thanks in
English. He then continued his remarks in Japanese for some eight
minutes. At its close Mr. Tsudjuki, who was then the minister of
Education in Japan, traveling with Marquis Ito as his friend and
companion, and who had taken shorthand notes of the Japanese speech,
rose and translated the speech readily and fluently into good English.
One of the guests asked how he had learned to speak English so
correctly. He replied that he had done so in the public schools of Japan
and added, "I learned my English from McGuffey's Readers, with which you
are no doubt familiar."
[The Authorship]
It is not unusual to see in the literary columns of a daily newspaper
inquiries as to where certain poems may be found of which a single
stanza is faintly recalled. Many of these prove to be fragments of
pieces that are found in the McGuffey Readers. Quite lately Theodore
Roosevelt made the public statement that he did not propose to become a
"Meddlesome Matty." This allusion was perfectly clear to the millions of
people who used the McGuffey Readers at any time after 1853.
When the Fourth Reader was issued in 1837 it contained a preface of
three closely printed pages setting forth and defending the plan of
McGuffey's books. In this he said: "In conclusion, the author begs leave
to state, that the whole series of Eclectic Readers is his own. In the
preparation of the rules, etc., for the present volume he has had the
assistance of a very distinguished Teacher, whose judgment and zeal in
promoting the cause of education have often been commended by the
American people. In the arrangement of the series generally, he is
indebted to many of his friends for valuable suggestions, and he takes
this opportunity of tendering them his thanks for the lively interest
they have manifested for the success of his undertaking."
The sole author of the four readers first issued as the Eclectic Readers
was William Holmes McGuffey. He was responsible for the marked qualities
in these books which met with such astonishing popular approval in all
these years. What these qualities are is well known to those who have
used the books and the users are numbered by millions.
[The Rhetorical Guide]
The Rhetorical Guide was prepared by Mr. A.H. McGuffey, and his name
alone was on the early editions. In 1844 the book was revised by the
author and Dr. Pinneo, and was given the alternate title "or Fifth
Reader of the Eclectic Series." The work of revision occupied two years.
The title page carried the name of its author until, for reasons of his
own, he asked to have it removed.
As usual when revisions of schoolbooks are made, the older edition was
continued in publication so long as a distinct demand for it existed.
But the issuance of a revised edition always suggests the question of
change, which competing publishers promptly seek to bring about. The
publishers of the "Newly Revised McGuffey Readers," therefore, sought
to replace the older edition wherever it was in use and to displace
competing books wherever possible. The edition of 1843 acquired large
sales over a very wide territory in the central West and South. It is
the edition generally known by the grandfathers of the school boys of
the present day.
It may be interesting to name some of the selections in this Rhetorical
Guide issued in 1844 since in modified form the work has been the
highest reader of the series.
[Selections of Value]
As a guide toward rhetorical reading the book contained a carefully
prepared collection of rules and directions with examples for practice
in Articulation. Inflection, Accent and Emphasis, Reading Verse, for the
Management of the Voice and Gesture. These pages were intended for drill
work, and in those days the teachers were not content with the dull
monotonous utterance of the words or with mere mastery of thought, to
be tested by multitudinous questioning. If the pupil obtained from the
printed page the very thought the author intended to convey, the pupil
was expected to read orally so as to express that thought to all
hearers. If the correct thought was thus heard, no questions were
needed. The test of reading orally is the communication of thought by
the reader to the intelligent and attentive hearer, and the words of the
author carry this message more accurately than can any other words the
pupil may select.
[Noted Selections]
The selections in the Rhetorical Guide were made, first of all, to teach
the art of reading. There was therefore great variety. Second, to
inculcate a love for literature. Therefore the selections were taken
from the great writers,--poets, orators, essayists, historians, and
preachers. The extracts are wonderfully complete in themselves,--one
does not need to read the whole of Byron's Don Juan to appreciate the
six stanzas that describe the thunder-storm on the Alps. Of the poetical
extracts all the users of this book will remember Southey's "Cataract
of Lodore" with its exacting drill on the ending,--"ing," Longfellow's
"Village Blacksmith" and the "Reaper and the Flowers;" Bryant's
"Thanatopsis" and "Song of the Stars;" Wolfe's "Burial of Sir John
Moore;" Gray's "Elegy;" Mrs. Hemans's "Landing of the Pilgrim Fathers;"
Cowper's "My Mother's Picture;" Jones's "What Constitutes a State;"
Scott's "Lochinvar;" Halleck's "Marco Bozzaris;" Drake's "American
Flag;" and Mrs. Thrale's "Three Warnings." As an introduction to the
thought, imagery and diction of Shakespeare, there were "Hamlet's
Soliloquy," "Speech of Henry Fifth to his Troops," "Othello's Apology,"
"The Fall of Cardinal Wolsey" and his death, the "Quarrel of Brutus and
Cassius" (often committed to memory and spoken) and Antony's Oration
over dead Caesar. The extracts from orations were chosen largely for
their relation to great events in history. There were Patrick Henry's
"Speech before the Virginia Convention," Walpole's "Reproof of Mr.
Pitt," and Pitt's reply. Who cannot remember "The atrocious crime of
being a young man," and go on with the context? There were extracts
from Hayne's "Speech on South Carolina," and Webster's reply defending
Massachusetts; a part of Burke's long speech on the Trial of Warren
Hastings prefaced by Macaulay's description of the scene; Webster's
"Speech on the Trial of a Murderer," ending with "It must be confessed,
it will be confessed; there is no refuge from confession but suicide,
and suicide is confession;" Webster's speech on the Importance of the
Union with its concluding sentiment, "Liberty and Union, now and
forever; one and inseparable." There was also Fox's "Political Pause"
with its wonderful requirements of inflection to express irony;
Sprague's "American Indians," "Not many generations ago, where you now
sit, encircled with all that exalts and embellishes civilized life,
the rank thistle nodded in the wind, and the wild fox dug his hole
unscared." Did you not commit it to memory and speak it? Then there was
Webster's Speech in which he supplied John Adams from his own fervid
imagination that favorite of all patriotic boys, "Sink or swim, live
or die, survive or perish; I give my hand and my heart to this vote."
At its close, "it is my living sentiment, and, by the blessing of God,
it shall be my dying sentiment; independence now, and independence
forever."
[Literary Selections]
From the essayists there was Lamb's "Eulogy on Candle Light;" that
delightful "Eulogy on Debt" from an unknown author; Addison's "Allegory
on Discontent," and "Westminster Abbey;" and Jane Taylor's "Discontented
Pendulum." Only seven selections were taken from the Bible; but one of
these was Paul's Defense before Agrippa. There were, however, quite a
number of articles of strongly religious tendency, like Dr. Spring's
"Observance of the Sabbath."
The book contained two hundred and thirty-five selections and of this
number nearly one-half appeared in all subsequent revisions.
This Rhetorical Guide or Fifth Reader is the book that by its careful
selection of specimens of the best English literature in prose and verse
contributed most to the training of its readers toward the appreciation
of true beauty in literature. It contained many pieces of solid and
continuous worth,--many that relate closely to the great historical eras
of the United States.
[McGuffey's Ancestry]
In the latest revision of the highest reader, made in 1879, one hundred
and thirty-eight selections composed the book. Of this number sixty-one
were in the original book as prepared by Mr. A.H. McGuffey.
It was an admirable collection of much material that is still prized and
which, when carefully read by pupils hungry for thoughtful language,
made a deep and lasting impression. In many cases the inmost thought of
the author may not have been at once fully apprehended by the young
readers; but with advancing years and wider experience in life the
stored words became instinct with thought and feeling.
THE AUTHORS.
Dr. William Holmes McGuffey was born September 28, 1800, on the southern
border of Washington county, Pa. The family descended from William
and Anna (McKittrick) McGuffey who came from Scotland, and landed at
Philadelphia. They made a home in the southern part of York county,
at which, during the Revolution, General Washington often stopped to
refresh himself. In 1789 this family removed to Washington county, Pa.
[The Indian Scouts]
Alexander McGuffey, the father of Dr. McGuffey, was six years old when
the family came to America in August, 1774. In 1790, when he was
twenty-two years of age, he and his friend, Duncan McArthur, afterward a
governor of Ohio, were selected from five young men who volunteered to
act as scouts against the Indians in Ohio who were then threatening the
frontier settlements in the western part of Virginia and Pennsylvania.
These two young men were selected after tests by Samuel Brady to find
which could run the fastest, shoot most accurately, and were least
afraid of Indians. Alexander McGuffey served in the army three years,
venturing his life with small bodies of scouts in the Indian country.
He took part in several fights with the Indians. When General St. Clair
in 1792 marched north from Cincinnati to meet the Indians, this body of
scouts was one day concealed in a swamp near the spring of Castalia,
Ohio. There they saw great numbers of Indians passing to meet General
St. Clair, and three of the scouts hastened through the Indian country
to inform the general. They traveled only at night and hid during the
day. One night they marched forty miles. They told General St. Clair
what they had seen and again went out to watch the collecting Indians.
Three days later St. Clair was defeated. These scouts were then twelve
miles away but the retreating soldiers soon overtook them and then the
"woods were alive with Indians." The scouts turned eastward and in due
time reached Logstown, near Wheeling.
[Indian Warfare]
The next year McArthur, McGuffey and George Sutherland were again sent
out by General Wayne to spy the Indians. When only seven or eight miles
from Wheeling and west of the Ohio river, they came upon a trail which
led to a deer lick. Just at dusk McGuffey, who was leading the party,
saw in the path the gaily decorated head-dress of an Indian. It had been
placed there by the Indians who were in ambush close by and were ready
to shoot any white man who should stop to pick it up. McGuffey saw
through the stratagem instantly; without halting, he gave it a kick and
shouted "Indians!" Several Indians fired at once and one of the balls
smashed McGuffey's powder horn, and passed through his clothing, but did
not wound him. The three scouts retreated in safety, and the Indians did
not follow them.
The wars with the Indians in that region closed in 1794, and Alexander
McGuffey then married Anna Holmes, of Washington county, and became a
settler. His eldest son was William Holmes McGuffey. When this son was
but two years old the family moved to Trumbull county, Ohio. Here, in
the care of a pious mother and father, he spent the years of childhood
and of early manhood, performing the labors falling upon the eldest son
in a large family of children dwelling in a log cabin on the frontier.
From the heavy forest, fields were cleared, fenced and cultivated, roads
were made and bridges were built, and in all these labors the sturdy son
of the famous Indian scout took part.
[A Frontier School]
During the first eighteen years of W.H. McGuffey's life he had no
opportunities for education other than those afforded by the brief
winter schools supported by the voluntary subscriptions of the parents
in the neighborhood.
In 1802 Rev. Thos. Hughes, a Presbyterian clergyman, built at
Darlington, Pa., the "Old Stone Academy" for the education of young men,
having obtained the necessary funds by traveling on horseback throughout
Pennsylvania and eastward even to Newburyport, Mass.
This seminary of learning was conducted on lines of the utmost economy
to meet the needs of the boys living on the frontier. The tuition was
only three dollars a year and the charge for board was seventy-five
cents a week. The food was simple. For breakfast, bread, butter, and
coffee; for dinner, bread, meat, and sauce; for supper, bread and milk.
The only variation allowed in this bill of fare was the occasional
omission of sauce or coffee.
[The Old Stone Academy]
At the close of a summer day in 1818, Thomas Hughes was riding horseback
through Trumbull county. The dust on the highway deadened the sound of
his horse's feet. While passing a log cabin, half hidden from the road
by intervening trees and shrubs, he heard the plaintive voice of a woman
who was in the garden, out of sight. The clergyman stopped his horse and
listened. He heard the woman earnestly praying that some way might be
opened for her children to obtain such education as should fit them for
the duties of life. Riding on, the clergyman inquired at the next house
regarding the inmates of the log cabin. He was informed that a Mr.
McGuffey lived there. Turning back he sought the prayerful mother and
learned from her the circumstances of the family. The doors of the "Old
Stone Academy" were opened to William H. McGuffey and he there obtained
his first start in a preparation for college. But his labor could not be
wholly spared on the farm so lately won from the surrounding forest. He
worked in the fields in summer, continuing his studies and walked many
miles once a week to recite his lessons to a kindly clergyman.
W.H. McGuffey's father was too poor to aid his son in obtaining a
collegiate education, and the latter soon turned to teaching as a means
of obtaining money to support himself in college. When prepared for
college he went back to his native county and entered Washington
College. He was in his twenty-sixth year when he graduated with
distinguished honors from that institution.
It was at Washington College that W.H. McGuffey first met with a great
teacher and former of character,--Dr. Andrew Wylie, then the president.
It was considered by Dr. McGuffey one of the most fortunate events of
his life that he came at that time under the influence of Dr. Wylie's
forceful mind and elevated character.
[A College Professor]
Dr. McGuffey was obliged to suspend his collegiate course for a year to
earn more money for his support. He taught a private school at Paris,
Ky., in 1823 and 1824. There he met Dr. Robert H. Bishop, the president
of Miami University at Oxford, Ohio. Dr. Bishop was so impressed with
the character and mental power of the young teacher that on March 29,
1826, even before McGuffey received his bachelor's degree from
Washington College, he received his appointment as professor of Ancient
Languages at Miami University.
He graduated in 1826 and began his labor at Oxford, Ohio, at the opening
of the fall session. He at once took high rank in a faculty consisting
of strong men, and, young as he was, won the respect and homage of the
students. In 1832 he was transferred to the chair of Mental Philosophy.
To make this subject interesting and valuable to beginners requires, on
the part of the teacher, wide reading, clearness of thought, and
simplicity and directness of speech. These qualities Dr. McGuffey had.
He had become well read in philosophy, especially of the Scottish
school, Brown being his favorite author. But he had fully assimilated
the matter and had thought independently. He also had a fund of fresh
and suggestive illustrations coming within the daily experience of men,
which brought his lectures close to the minds of the students. Whatever
positions of honor or of trust his pupils held in their later careers,
they never ceased to feel the impulse which came from Dr. McGuffey as a
teacher.
On March 29, 1829, he was licensed as a preacher in the Presbyterian
church, and from that date he became a frequent public speaker. He never
had charge of a parish as minister, but usually preached on Sunday in
the college chapel to the students and to such of the public as could
obtain space to sit or to stand. The preacher's unassuming manner, the
clearness of his thought, and the simplicity of his language produced
impressions that were enduring. He never wrote his sermons. He simply
thought them out rigorously, and his mind worked so logically and in
such definite lines that he could repeat on request a sermon, preached
years before, in a form recognized by his hearers as substantially the
same.
[Cincinnati College]
After ten years spent in teaching and preaching at Miami University, Dr.
McGuffey resigned, August 26, 1836, and accepted the presidency of
Cincinnati College.
This institution was chartered in the winter of 1818-1819 by the
legislature of Ohio, largely at the solicitation of Dr. Daniel Drake. It
was partially endowed by the gifts of the public-spirited citizens of
Cincinnati. But its collegiate functions had been allowed to drop,
although a school on the Lancastrian system was maintained.
The election of Dr. McGuffey as president of this college was a result
of renewed activity on the part of the leading men in the city to found
a genuine college of high character in that city. They believed that if
well conducted such an institution would bring to its doors students
enough to support the college by their fees.
A medical department was organized in June, 1835, with eight competent
professors, a law department with three professors, and a faculty of
arts with seven teachers. In this faculty, William H. McGuffey was
president and professor of Moral and Intellectual Philosophy, O.M.
Mitchell was professor of Mathematics and Astronomy, and Edward D.
Mansfield was professor of Constitutional Law and History. Dr. McGuffey
accepted the presidency with a full knowledge that the work was
experimental. A trial of three years demonstrated that a college could
not be sustained without an invested endowment. Cincinnati College "was
endowed with genius, and nothing else."
[Ohio University]
In 1839, Dr. McGuffey accepted the presidency of the Ohio University at
Athens, Ohio, which office he held for four years. During these years
his faculties were at their fullest development. He had become an
experienced, scholarly teacher and a popular speaker on religious and
educational subjects. The students at Athens held him in the highest
esteem, and the influence of his teaching became deeper as years rolled
by and experience emphasized his lessons.
In 1839 he was honored with the degree of Doctor of Laws conferred upon
him by the Indiana University, of which his former teacher and friend,
Dr. Wylie, was then president.
The income of the Ohio University came chiefly from the rents of two
entire townships of land which had been given it for an endowment. This
land was lawfully revalued at the end of ten years. The revaluation was
contested in the courts by the tenants. The Supreme Court decided in
favor of the university; but the farmers induced the legislature in 1843
to pass a law which fixed the income of the university from these lands
at a sum so low as to cause the doors of the institution to be closed
for five years.
Dr. McGuffey returned to Cincinnati and was for two years a professor in
Woodward College, now Woodward High School.
[University of Virginia]
In 1845 he was appointed professor of Natural and Moral Philosophy in
the University of Virginia. This position he filled with credit to
himself and with great acceptance to the students in that institution
for more than a quarter of a century and until his death on May 4, 1873.
Dr. McGuffey's classes in the University of Virginia were well attended.
His lectures were delivered extempore, in language exactly expressing
his thoughts. His illustrations were most apt. He taught "with the
simplicity of a child, with the precision of a mathematician, and with
the authority of truth."
[Method of Teaching]
A portion of the lecture hour was given to questioning the members of
the class. In this he used the Socratic method, leading the pupil by a
series of questions to the discovery of the incorrectness of his
reasoning or the falsity of his grounds. By this process the students
were led to question their own reasoning, to think clearly and to
express their thoughts accurately.
Dr. McGuffey once told a pupil that he had preached three thousand
sermons and had never written one. Until late in life he had never
written his lectures. Shortly before his death he began the preparation
of a book on Mental Philosophy. This was never completed.
Dr. McGuffey was twice married. By his first wife. Miss Harriet Spinning
of Dayton, he had several children. One daughter, Mary, married Dr.
William W. Stewart of Dayton; another, Henrietta, married Professor A.
D. Hepburn who was for a time president of Miami University. Professor
Hepburn's son, in turn inheriting his grandfather's faculty of teaching,
is a professor in the University of Indiana.
[Interest in Public Schools]
In 1837 Professor Calvin E. Stowe went to Europe to investigate the
organization and method of elementary schools. On his return he
published, in 1838, his report on the Prussian system. Subsequently Dr.
McGuffey labored in Ohio with Samuel Lewis and other public-spirited men
for the passage of the general school law under which the common schools
of Ohio were first organized. He carried to Virginia the same zeal for
the education of all the children of the state to prepare them for the
duties of life. One of his first acts on assuming the duties of his
professorship in the university was to make a tour of the state
advocating the introduction of a public school system in Virginia.
To this first appeal for common schools, open alike to rich and poor,
there was then but a feeble response; but, twenty-five years later, Dr.
McGuffey had the satisfaction of seeing the public schools organized
with one of his own friends and a former pupil at its head,--Hon. W.H.
Ruffner.
Dr. McGuffey was a man of medium stature and compact figure. His
forehead was broad and full; his eyes clear and expressive. His features
were of the strongly marked rugged Scotch type. He was a ready speaker,
a popular lecturer on educational topics, and an able preacher. He was
admirable in conversation. His observation of men was accurate, and his
study of character close.
[Trip Through the South]
After the Civil War and while the reconstruction was in progress it
was extremely difficult in the North to obtain a correct view of the
situation in the South. State governments had been established in which
"carpet-baggers" had more or less control. Nearly all the whites in the
South had taken part in the war. They were largely disfranchised and
their former servants often became the legal rulers. The Klu Klux Klan
had begun their unlawful work, of which the papers gave contradictory
reports.
As business men, the publishers of McGuffey's Readers desired to learn
the truth about the situation of the South and its probable future.
They asked Dr. McGuffey to take a trip through the Carolinas, Georgia,
Alabama, and Mississippi and make report to them at Cincinnati. This he
did, visiting all the larger towns where he was usually the honored
guest of some graduate of the university. He saw the legislatures in
session, met the governors, and studied the whole situation. He then
came to Cincinnati and told his story. He had made no notes, but he
never hesitated for a name. He repeated conversations with unquestioned
accuracy and described with humor the gross ignorance and brutality of
some of the southern legislators, the looting of the capitol at the end
of the session, the indirect robbery that was under way, the reversal of
all the conditions of life, and the growing unrest of the men who had
heretofore been the rulers.
It was such a picture as at that time no Northern paper would have dared
to print--it was the truth. For days he held his listeners captive with
the story--the writer never heard a more interesting one.
[College of Teachers]
While Dr. McGuffey was still at Oxford, Ohio, he took part in the
formation of probably the first extended Teachers' Association formed in
the West. There had been a previous association of Cincinnati teachers
organized for mutual aid and improvement. This was about to be given
up; but at their first anniversary on June 20, 1831, Mr. Albert Pickett,
principal of a private school in Cincinnati, proposed a plan for
organizing in one body the instructors in public and private schools and
the friends of education. Circulars were sent out and the first meeting
of the College of Teachers was held October 3, 1832. A great number of
teachers from many states of the West and South attended these meetings
and took part in the proceedings. Throughout its continuance Dr.
McGuffey took an active part in the work. In the years 1832-1836
fifty-seven addresses were delivered to the College by thirty-nine
speakers. Of this number Dr. McGuffey prepared and delivered three.
[Topics Discussed]
The proceedings of the College of Teachers were published in annual
pamphlets which together formed two large octavo volumes. The topics
which were then under discussion are best shown by the titles of a few
of the addresses, with the name of the speaker and the year of delivery:
On Introducing the Bible into Schools, Rev. B.P. Aydelott, 1836;
Importance of making the business of Teaching a Profession, Lyman
Beecher, D.D., 1833; The Kind of Education Adapted to the West,
Professor Bradford, 1833; Qualifications of Teachers, Mr. Mann Butler,
1832; Physical Education, Dr. Daniel Drake, 1833; On Popular Education,
John P. Harrison, M.D., 1836; On the Study and Nature of Ancient
Languages, A. Kinmont, 1832; On Common Schools, Samuel Lewis, Esq.,
1835; On the Qualifications of Teachers, E.D. Mansfield, Esq., 1836;
Reciprocal Duties of Parents and Teachers, Rev. W.H. McGuffey, A.M.,
1835; General Duties of Teachers, Albert Pickett, 1835; Philosophy of
the Human Mind, Bishop Purcell, 1836; Utility of Cabinets of Natural
Science, Joseph Ray, 1836; Agriculture as a Branch of Education, Rev. E.
Slack, 1836; Education of Emigrants, Professor Calvin Stowe, 1835; Best
Method of Teaching Composition, D.L. Talbott, 1835; Manual Labor in the
Schools, Milo G. Williams.
Some of these topics are still engrossing the attention of teachers at
their annual meetings for the discussion of live educational questions.
While Dr. McGuffey was at Oxford, teaching mental philosophy to the
pupils in Miami University, he prepared the manuscript for the two lower
readers of the graded series which bore his name. To test his work while
in progress, he collected in his own house a number of small children
whom he taught to read by the use of his lessons.
It is evident that these readers were prepared at the solicitation of
the publishers and on such a general plan as to number and size as was
desired by the publishers. Dr. McGuffey was selected by them as the most
competent teacher known to them for the preparation of successful books.
He did not prepare the manuscripts and search for a publisher.
[The Copyright Contract]
On April 28, 1836, he made a contract with Truman & Smith, publishers of
Cincinnati, for the preparation and publication of a graded series of
readers to consist of four books. The First and Second readers were then
in manuscript, the Third and Fourth readers were to be completed within
eighteen months. They were both issued in 1837. Dr. Benjamin Chidlaw,
then a student in college, aided the author by copying the indicated
selections and preparing them for the printer. He received for this work
five dollars and thought himself well paid.
These four books constituted the original series of the Eclectic Readers
by W.H. McGuffey which in all the subsequent revisions have borne his
name and retained the impress of his mind.
The First Reader made a thin 18mo book of seventy-two pages, having
green paper covered sides; the Second Reader contained one hundred and
sixty-four pages of the same size. The Third Reader had a larger page
and was printed as a duodecimo of one hundred and sixty-five pages. The
fourth Reader ranked in size with the Third and contained three hundred
and twenty-four printed pages. Each was printed from the type, which was
distributed when the required number for the edition came from the
press.