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Urban Reform and the Schools: Kindergartens in Massachusetts, 1870–1915

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  24 February 2017

Marvin Lazerson
Marvin Lazerson*
Affiliation:
Harvard Graduate School of Education
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Extract

In the decades after the Civil War, no individual did more to popularize the kindergarten in America than Elizabeth Palmer Peabody. First acquainted with the new institution for childhood through Mrs. Carl Schurz in 1859, later followed by a European tour to see Friedrich Froebel's work, Peabody spent the next thirty-five years of her life proselytizing for the emancipation of the child. The kindergarten, she believed, was not simply a method of education but a movement of mystical significance. Her advocacy was an “apostolate,” kindergartening a religion, a “Gospel for children.” Like Froebel, Peabody spoke of absolutes and universality. She dealt with Truth, the Child, the Home, Family, and Motherhood, and offered to stem the hedonistic tendencies of childhood. All children, Peabody and her associates believed, were self-centered. In their earliest years they discover their bodies, senses, and power to act. Their mothers' tenderness heightens their impulses toward selfishness. They demand immediate satisfaction. Without an agency external to the family in which socialization among peers and to society's mores occurs, childhood would thus ultimately become self-destructive. It was here that the kindergarten became necessary, allowing the child “to take his place in the company of his equals, to learn his place in their companionship, and still later to learn wider social relations and their involved duties.” “A kindergarten, then,” Peabody wrote, “is children in society—a commonwealth or republic of children—whose laws are all part and parcel of the Higher Law alone.”

Type
Research Article
Information
History of Education Quarterly , Volume 11 , Issue 2 , Summer 1971 , pp. 115 - 142
Copyright
Copyright © 1971 History of Education Quarterly 

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References

Notes

1. Peabody, Elizabeth, Lectures in the Training Schools for Kindergartners (Boston: D. C. Heath & Co., 1893), pp. 4, 22, 66–67, 88; The American Institute of Instruction, Proceedings and Addresses (Boston, 1871), p. 7; New England Journal of Education I (January 2, 1875), 1; Mary Mann, “The Home,” Kindergarten Magazine I (September 1888), 133–36 and (October 1888), 165–68; Peabody, Elizabeth and Mann, Mary, Moral Culture of Infancy and Kindergarten Guide (Boston: T.O.H.P. Burnham, 1863)), pp. 12–14. On Peabody, Elizabeth, see Baylor, Ruth M., Elizabeth Palmer Peabody: Kindergarten Pioneer (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1965). An early and still useful history of the kindergarten is Vandewalker, Nina C., The Kindergarten in American Education (New York: Macmillan Co., 1908). For more extensive documentation of the materials in this article, see Marvin Lazerson, “The Burden of Urban Education: Public Schools in Massachusetts, 1870–1915” (Ph.D. diss., Harvard University, 1969), ch. 2.Google Scholar

2. Peabody, and Mann, , Moral Culture pp. 10–15; Peabody, , Lectures, pp. 4–5; Angeline Brooks, “The Theory of Froebel's Kindergarten System” in The Kindergarten and the Schools, Anne Page et al. (Springfield: Milton Bradley Co., 1886), p. 47; Bond, Elizabeth P. Mrs., “The Kindergarten in the Mother's Work,” National Education Association, Journal of Proceedings and Addresses (1885), p. 359.Google Scholar

3. Peabody, , Lectures pp. 15–18, 64; Peabody, and Mann, , Moral Culture, pp. 23–24; Peabody, , What is a Kindergarten? (Cambridge, Mass.: privately published, 1874).Google Scholar

4. Peabody, , Lectures pp. 2, 4–5, 14–15, 44–46, 67, 78, 179; Peabody, , “Kindergarten Schools,” Massachusetts Teacher XXIII, 3d ser. (July 1870), 238; Peabody, and Mann, , Moral Culture, p. 182.Google Scholar

5. Wheelock, Lucy, “The Purpose of the Kindergarten,” Journal of Education (July 2, 1891), p. 36; Angeline Brooks, “Philosophy of the Kindergarten/' in The Kindergarten, ed. Douglas Wiggin, Kate (New York: Harper and Brothers, 1893), pp. 119–21, 131; Rollins, Alice W. in ibid., p. 2; Peabody, and Mann, , Moral Culture, pp. 34–51; Smith, Nora A., The Children of the Future (Boston: Houghton. Mifflin & Co., 1898), pp. 67–100.Google Scholar

6. Brooks, “Philosophy of the Kindergarten,” pp. 103–8; Journal of Education XXIV (November 18, 1886), 324.Google Scholar

7. Stanley Hall, G., Aspects of Child Life and Education (New York: D. Appleton & Co., 1921), pp. vi, 11; Strickland, Charles and Burgess, Charles, eds., Health, Growth, and Heredity: G. Stanley Hall on Education (New York: Teachers College Press, 1965), pp. vii–viii, 1–3; Curti, Merle, The Social Ideas of American Educators (Paterson: Littlefield, Adams & Co., 1963), pp. 396–428 remains the best study of Hall.Google Scholar

8. Hall, , Aspects of Child Life pp. 10–26.Google Scholar

9. Ibid., p. 300–21; Strickland, and Burgess, , Hall pp. 16–18, 53–58. For examples of the antiurban bias of kindergarten supporters, see Peabody, Lectures, pp. 1–23; Payne, Ellise B., “The Problem of the City Kindergarten,” NEA, Proceedings (1896), pp. 510–14; Seaver, Edwin P. in Massachusetts Board of Education, Report of the Committee Appointed to Investigate the Existing System of Manual and Industrial Education (Boston: Massachusetts Board of Education, 1893), p. 29. Hall was later to break with the kindergartners over their overformalization of play. See Bain, Winifred, Leadership in Childhood Education: A History of Wheelock College (Boston: Wheelock College, 1964), pp. 15–16.Google Scholar

10. Philbrick, John, “The New Departure in Boston,” New England Journal of Education XI (February 19, 1880), 116; A.G.W., The Kindergarten, What Is It? (Boston: privately printed, 1872–74?), copy in Harvard College Library.Google Scholar

11. Bremner, Robert, From the Depths: The Discovery of Poverty in America (New York: New York University Press, 1956), chs. 1, 3, 5, 8, 9; Hugins, Nathan I., “Private Charities in Boston, 1870–1900” (Ph.D. diss., Harvard University, 1962), chs. 3, 5: Associated Charities of Boston, Annual Report (1880), pp. 23–24; ibid. (1886), pp. 33–34.Google Scholar

12. Mann, Mary in Cambridge Chronicle, May 11, 1878, p. 2; Gilder, Richard W., “The Kindergarten: An Uplifting Social Influence in the Home and District,” NEA, Proceedings (1903), p. 390.Google Scholar

13. Lawrence, , Annual Report of the School Committee (1881), p. 40; Lynn, School Report (1892), p. 51; Bedford, New, Annual Report of the School Committee (1902), p. 26; Haverhill, , Annual Report of the School Committee (1897), p. 29. See also Lowell, Annual Report of the School Committee (1880), pp. 22–23; ibid. (1881), pp. 10–12; Cambridge, Annual Report of the School Committee (1895), p. 48. (Hereafter reports of school committees and superintendents of schools will be cited as School Reports.) Google Scholar

14. Fisher, Laura, “The Kindergarten,” U.S. Bureau of Education, Annual Report of the Commissioner (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1904), p. 692; Kindergarten News III (January 1893), 5; Massachusetts Board of Education, Annual Report of the Board and Secretary, 1897–98 (Boston: Massachusetts Board of Education, 1898), p. 197 (hereafter cited as Annual Report), Woods, Robert A., The City Wilderness (Boston: Houghton, Mifflin & Co., 1898), p. 237; Lee, Joseph, “Kindergarten Principles in Social Work,” NEA, Proceedings (1903), pp. 378–82.Google Scholar

15. Diary of Smith, Nora, January 6, 1893, Denison House Papers, folder 3, Schlesinger Library, Radcliffe College; Pittsfield Sun in Kindergarten Review IV (October 1898), 118–21; Smith, Children of the Future, pp. 52–55; Vandewalker, , Kindergarten, pp. 108–11. See also Davis, Allen F., Spearheads for Reform: The Social Settlements and the Progressive Movement, 1890–1914 (New York: Oxford University Press, 1965), pp. 43–45, and Mann, Arthur, Yankee Reformers in the Urban Age (Boston: Harper Torchbook, 1966), pp. 115–23.Google Scholar

16. Pauline, Shaw to “My Dear Children,” November 30, 1916, Women's Rights Collection, Schlesinger Library, Radcliffe College; The Journal of Education XIV (September 29, 1881), 205; Boston Evening Transcript, February 10, 1917 (copy in Schlesinger Library). For biographical information on Mrs. Shaw, see Pauline Agassiz Shaw: Tributes Paid Her Memory (Boston: privately printed, 1917).Google Scholar

17. Pauline Agassiz Shaw: Tributes, pp. 32–36; Journal of Education XXVII (April 26, 1888), 264; Kindergarten Magazine II (December 1889), 248.Google Scholar

18. Parker, Francis W., “The Kindergartens of Boston,” Kindergarten Magazine I (March 1889), 334–35; “Kindergartens: The Need of Their Establishment.” “Establishment and Support” [1874–75 ?] (printed copy of letter in Harvard College Library).Google Scholar

19. Guernsey, Alice M., “Schools and Homes,” Journal of Education XVIII (July 12, 1883), 53; Parker, , “The Kindergartens of Boston,” p. 335. On the use of public school classrooms for Mrs. Shaw's kindergartens, see Boston School Committee, Minutes of the School Committee (1882) (Boston: City of Boston, 1883), pp. 218–19.Google Scholar

20. Wheelock, Lucy, “A Lily's Mission,” Voice from the Old Bowrey and Five Points Mission Monthly, October 1, 1889, Wheelock, Lucy Papers, Wheelock College; Laliah Pingree in Boston, Documents of the School Committee (1885) (Boston: City of Boston, 1886), no. 4, pp. 51–52 (hereafter cited as School Documents). Similar to the Wheelock story is Willis, Annie I., “A Midsummer Story: The Charity Kindergarten,” Journal of Education XXXVI (July 14, 1892), 55–57.Google Scholar

21. For a general summary of kindergarten developments in Massachusetts and New England, see Wheelock, Lucy, ed., “The Kindergarten in New England” presented to the Association for Childhood Education, June 26–30, 1935, Wheelock Papers, Wheelock College. Of the ten largest Massachusetts cities, Boston, Worcester, Fall River, Lowell, Cambridge, Springfield, and Somerville had public kindergartens, while New Bedford, Lynn, and Lawrence did not. Of the next ten cities, Holyoke, Haverhill, Salem, Newton, and Fitchburg had classes. Brockton, Maiden, Taunton, Everett, and Quincy did not.Google Scholar

22. Boston, , School Documents (1885), no. 4, pp. 50–54; ibid. (1886), no. 3, pp. 46–49; ibid. (1887), no. 3, pp. 28–32; ibid. (1887), no. 21; ibid. (1888), no. 18, pp. 10–13.Google Scholar

23. Cambridge, School Report (1889), pp. 28–30; ibid. (1900), p. 41; ibid. (1901), p. 50; Fall River, School Report (1912), p. 25; Hoffer, Amalie, “Brookline Schools–-Well-Equipped, Well-Developed, Well-Poised,” Kindergarten Magazine IX (December 1896), 282, 285, 288; Dutton, Samuel T., Social Phases of Education in the School and the Home (New York: Macmillan Co., 1899), pp. 213–15, 245–46.Google Scholar

24. Massachusetts Board of Education, Annual Report (1884–1885), pp. 90–91; ibid. (1894–1895), pp. 189, 191–92; Massachusetts, Documents of the House of Representatives (1909) (Boston: Massachusetts General Court, 1910), no. 577, no. 1462, no. 1538.Google Scholar

25. Massachusetts Board of Education, Annual Report (1890–1891), pp. 56–57; ibid. (1899–1900), p. 129; ibid. (1913–1914), p. 198. While Boston and Worcester contained over half (9,451 of 18,118) the public school kindergarten children in Massachusetts in 1912, their proportion of total day public school students was only about 25 percent. The United States Bureau of Education estimated that 1,500 children, seven to eight percent of the total enrollment, were registered in nonpublic school kindergartens–-tuition charging, charity, and parochial–-in 1912. While the figure is probably too low, compared to the 17–18 percent of all Massachusetts school children enrolled in nonpublic day school classes, it does suggest that when children went to kindergarten, they were more likely to do so under public auspices than at a later period in their school life. United States Bureau of Education, “Kindergarten in the United States,” Bulletin (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1914), no. 6, pp. 28–29, 66–67; Massachusetts Board of Education, Annual Report (1911–1912), pp. 57, 61, xlix.Google Scholar

26. U.S. Bureau of Education, “Statistics of Public and Private Kindergartens,” Report of the Commissioner, 1903, LI; U.S. Bureau of Education, “Kindergartens in the United States,” pp. 28–29, passim.Google Scholar

27. Massachusetts Board of Education, Annual Report (1899–1900), pp. 126–27; ibid. (1904–1905), pp. 177–78; ibid. (1913–1914), p. 198; Cambridge, School Report (1890), p. 17; ibid. (1898), p. 19; ibid. (1908), p. 28; ibid. (1915), p. 49; Boston Finance Commission, Report on the Boston School System (Boston: City of Boston, 1911), p. 167. Only Springfield's kindergartens contained more kindergarten pupils per teacher than elementary pupils, while Lynn, the seventh city, had no official kindergarten classes. Whereas Boston averaged 43 elementary school pupils per teacher, it had only 26 for the kindergarten. Comparable figures in Lowell were 37 to 19, Cambridge 38 to 25, Worcester 34 to 22, and Fall River 33 to 22. Lawrence dropped its experimental kindergarten in 1898 due to financial pressures. (Lawrence, School Report [1898], pp. 15–16.) Kindergarten advocates recognized their difficulties and attempted to persuade the public that the educational benefits were either worth the costs or compromised their methods to cut costs. See Eastern Kindergarten Association, Does the Kindergarten Pay? (Boston, 1909) and Vandewalker, , The Kindergarten, pp. 184–85.Google Scholar

28. Massachusetts Board of Education, Annual Report (1914–1915), pp. 48–49.Google Scholar

29. International Kindergarten Union, The Kindergarten (Boston: Houghton, Mifflin & Co., 1913), pp. 242, 295–301. This is an excellent summary of conflicting tendencies in the kindergarten movement just before World War I.Google Scholar

30. Massachusetts Board of Education, Annual Report (1914–1915), pp. 49–50.Google Scholar

31. In 1913, 57 percent and 53 percent of the children in the public first and second grades were from non-English speaking homes. Between 1890 and 1910, the proportion of foreign born in New Bedford went from 34.6 percent to 44.1 percent of the total population, except for Lawrence, the highest in the state. (New Bedford, School Report [1913], p. 42.)Google Scholar

32. Wheelock, , “The Kindergarten in New England,” pp. 14–15; New Bedford, “Minutes of the School Committee,” July 1, 1895, February 3, 1896, May 4, 1896, May 3, 1897, August 16, 1897 (ms. in the Office of the School Committee, New Bedford); New Bedford, School Report (1896), pp. 91–94; ibid. (1897), pp. 97–99.Google Scholar

33. Ibid., p. 100–1; ibid. (1902), pp. 26, 138–39.Google Scholar

34. Ibid. (1904), p. 142; New Bedford, “Minutes,” June 15, 1905, June 30, 1905, February 5, 1906, March 5, 1906, March 19, 1906; New Bedford Morning Mercury, March 20, 1906, p. 8.Google Scholar

35. New Bedford, “Minutes,” April 2, 1906, June 4, 1906, November 5, 1906, February 3, 1908; New Bedford, School Report (1906), pp. 113–15; ibid. (1908), pp. 74–75; ibid. (1909), pp. 71–72.Google Scholar

36. Massachusetts Board of Education, Annual Report (1914–1915), pp. 49–50; Parker, Francis quoted in Kindergarten Magazine (April 1889), p. 381; Boston, School Documents (1914), no. 11, pp. 39–41.Google Scholar

37. Kindergarten Magazine XI (November 1898), 146–50. The front cover of this periodical in 1899–1900 carried as one of its goals, support for the social quarantine movement in kindergarten and elementary education.Google Scholar

38. Cambridge, School Report (1911), pp. 20–21, 29; Worcester, , School Report (1911), p. 71; Boston Finance Commission, Report (1916), pp. 70–71. A number of cities still continued to think in terms of broader social issues, although it is hard to gauge their actual involvement. See Springfield, School Report (1912), p. 60; Fall River, School Report (1916), p. 39; Worcester, , School Report (1913), pp. 84–85.Google Scholar

39. In Lowell, for example, between 1910 and 1916 the superintendent of schools never mentioned kindergartens except to report that one had been added or dropped from the system. A little more than a decade earlier, Lowell's pride in its kindergartens was unbounded. (Lowell, School Report, [1899], p. 56.)Google Scholar