Early Schools in Pickens County

"Randy, someday you might have to write a paper on the early schools in Pickens County, so maybe I better tell you a little about that.

When Alabama was admitted into the Union, it was by an act of Congress on March the second, eighteen and nineteen. At this time what is now Pickens County was a territory, and before the organization of the county it was connected with Tuscaloosa as a civil and political division. The early settlers that came here were mostly from South Carolina. Many of them came down the Tennessee River, into north Alabama, and then traveled by land down the central routes of travel, along the old Indian trails and the military roads that had been cut out by the United States troops in the Indian wars. These trails led through Madison, Limestone, Morgan, Blount, Tuscaloosa, and on into Pickens County. Now it was most convenient for them to follow this course as a channel of travel that had been indicated by the natural conformation of the country, and as early as eighteen five the settlers were permitted a horsepath through the Creek Nation. Many of the early Bigbee settlers came through Tennessee down the river to Colbert's Landing, where the Natchez Trace crossed the Tennessee River. And then they traveled this Trace on down to the Tombigbee, and traveled the Tombigbee on down to what is now Pickens County. From this east central Mississippi settlement came many of the early settlers of Pickens County.

Some of the best blood imported from the mother state flowed through the veins of those children who settled in this county. For tender sympathy, hospitality, Christian women and brave men, these people could not be surpassed. Now many of the men who braved the wrath of the Indians and the hardship of travel were veterans of the Revolutionary War, and I have been able to find where we had between twenty-five and thirty Revolutionary soldiers to come to this county. They had fought England for their independence, and now they were looking for a better place in which to settle down and bring up their children and grandchildren in a peacely, healthy, prosperous atmosphere. There were few men of highly cultivated minds, but most of the leading characters were men of ordinary education, just plain, yet intelligent, people, and people to such characteristics were naturally interested in the education of their children.

Many families taught the kids at home; some communities were blessed with an educated inhabitant who taught the children of the surrounding neighbors. But the more prosperous families sent their children back to Carolina to get an education. As the emigration increased and more settlements were made, there became a greater demand for schools, and in eighteen eighteen by an act of Congress, the lands in the Alabama Territory, to which the acY, the Indian title had been extinguished, were ordered to be surveyed, and it was provided that each sixteenth section was to be set aside for the use of schools. When Alabama was admitted to the Union as a state, and each county was formed, the Enabling Act was passed, for the disposal of this sixteenth sections. This act on the part of the Federal government formed the foundation of the system of public education in our state.

When the delegates to the convention called to formulate a state constitution met in Huntsville, it provided for that fundamental laws to the government of the new state, Athat schools and the means of education shall forever be encouraged in the State of Alabama, and the General Assembly shall take measures to preserve from unnecessary waste and damage such lands as are hereafter granted by the United States for the use of schools within each township in this State, and apply these funds which may be raised from these lands, in strict conformity to the object of such grants.

From eighteen twenty until eighteen fifty-four little can be recorded in any books about the history of education in our county. These were the days of home teaching, tutors, private schools for the wealthy, and, as I have stated before, the aristocrats who sent their children back to Carolina. In eighteen fifty-four, under the New Public School Act, every township except one, twenty-five in all, held an election and organized schools. The teachers were hired, and the one teacher-one room school came into being. The sixteenth section fund in eighteen fifty-five was forty thousand dollars per year. There were eleven private academies and twenty common schools in the county.

Between the ages of eight and sixteen there were two thousand, four hundred and thirty-one children in Pickens County. Now these crude, one-room schools were certainly a step in the right direction. With wood fires, a bucket and a dipper, and outdoor toilets, they served as the center of learning for each community, and no matter how cold or how hot, many children with their books and lunch basket walked miles to sit on hard logs and get what knowledge was available. One teacher often taught all grades and all subjects. The civilization of the county was a civilization of frontier people, and it was not strange that some of the pioneers were restless under discipline. Many are the stories we have heard of occasions when the male students made lift so miserable for the teacher that some of them threw up their hands in despair, and moved on to try their luck with some other occupation.

Carrollton being the county seat, I want to tell you about first public school here. The first of which there is any record was taught in an abandoned saloon next door to the Masonic Lodge building, which stood where the Post Office stands today. After one term here a building costing one thousand, five hundred dollars was erected where the Farm Bureau now has an office. This remained the school site until nineteen thirty.

But in nineteen eight the Sprain Building was declared too small to house the increasing enrollment, and a two story, a two story stone structure was erected there. It housed six classrooms on the lower floor, and two classrooms, an office, and an auditorium on the upper floor. Jack M. Pratt, a resident of Carrollton, taught there from nineteen four until nineteen eight. Not only were writing, arithmetic, and reading required, but Latin, history, economics, English, and government were a part of the courses offered. Music and art were taught at all the early schools in the county, and the students had the advantage of a cultural as well as an academic education.

The academies in Pickens County were most active during the War Between the States; there were three in Carrollton, two in Pickensville, one at Franconia, one at Bridgeville, one at Spring Grove, Grove, one at Spring Hill, one at Liberty, and two at Olney or, what we might say, Benevola. One of the academies out there prepared students for the medical profession. Tuition was awfully cheap back in those years. Grammar school was two dollars and fifty cents a month, junior high was three dollars and fifty cents a month, and high school four fifty. Music was three dollars extra.

Now, the first academy here was taught in the house where Mrs. R. S. Jones once lived. The all-male academy was founded by Jeremiah Marston, a native of New Hampshire and a graduate of Dartmouth College. When he came to Pickens County from Tennessee he brought a recommendation from President James K. Polk in his pocket. He also practiced law while he was teaching here in Carrollton.

Another fashionable school of the nineteenth century was in the home of Mr. and Mrs. Henry B. Latham. This was a private school, and was taught with Carrollton Select School for Young Ladies. This school with two more teachers, was taught in a two-room cottage next door to the Latham home, and it offered a complete educational course in English, French, German, Latin, music, and art, and the enrollment was usually around a hundred. The Lathams kept at least twenty girls in their home while they attended school, using a part of their house as a dormitory. On Sundays the students marched in formation to the church, where they occupied the amen corner. They were required to wear uniforms and keep them in tiptop order at all times. A study hall was kept open in the Latham home for the students to go at any time and study without disturbance. And here, every Friday night, a social was given, and to this was invited all the young people in town, and out of these socials grew many romances and marriages that later came. The close of the school was marked by a public examination. These were held in the Presbyterian Church, and were conducted by the county superintendent of education.

Another private school was the Pickensville Female Institute erected in eighteen forty-six by stockholders, among those being Darby Henley, W. C. Ferguson, Dr. James Beckett, Dr. Peyton King, James Poindexter, Robert Johnston, A. M. Wilkins, James Stinson, A. P. Bush, A. T. Henley, S. Pulliam, and James Chalmers. Among the eighteen forty-nine graduates from that school we find Miss Martha Wilson who later became Mrs. W. H. Bonner, and Miss Margaret Turnipseed who became, uh, a Mrs. Carrington. The eighteen fifty-four graduates were Mary Benion, who later was Mrs. King, and Miss N. J. Spraiggins, later a Mrs. Townsend, and Miss Sarah B. Clark. At this time Pickensville on the Tombigbee was a thriving little town, and the school attracted ladies from all over, uh, west Alabama and east Mississippi.

There were two schools in Reform before the railroads came through. The first school stood where the present William Lowe residence stands today. There were trees all over the hills beyond the school, and Miss Della Gladney was the teacher. A story is told that the late Joe Huff had a reputation as being a bad boy, and Miss Della would tap the restless children on the head with a pencil. One day when she hit Joe he fell to the floor, blinked his eyes, kicked his heels, and scared Miss Della out of her wits. The other school in Reform was a private school that was sponsored by the late F. A. Howell. This building stood across the street from the concrete block building on Graham Street. At the time Reform was incorporated in eighteen ninety-eight Mr. Cooper from Tuscaloosa was conducting a fine school for the student body of thirty-five scholars.

Before the Mexican War, and the coming of the railroads, Gordo was called The Settlement of the Crossroads. This referred to the Vienna and Fayette Road crossing the Columbus-Tuscaloosa Road just north of where the town of Gordo now stands. In eighteen ninety-eight, Professor William Stilton Bell operated a flourishing school with forty-five students. He later graduated from the medical school in Mobile and practiced medicine in Pickens County in and around Gordo for a number of years. At this time a large schoolhouse was in the planning stage, and when it was completed, it had two stories. The lower floor being an auditorium and used for religious purposes, until churches could be built. Among the early settlers here we find such names as Daniel, Windom, Gilbert, Props, Free, Ezelle, Kirk, Davis, Brown, Glass, Starke, Crawford, Mosley, Stringfellow, Harden, Stapps, Bell, Shirley, Hurlburt, Pearson, Frasier, Crawford, Strickland, and Carver.

Now the first school building in the town of Aliceville was located at what is now known as Second Street Southeast, almost directly across the street from the Dr. Parker residence. The tew, the two huge oak trees standing there today shaded this old building. The lot is now owned by the Summerville estate. This school was erected in nineteen five and was completed in time for the nineteen five-nineteen six secession. It opened its doors on September nineteenth, nineteen five, and bore the name Aliceville Academy. The enrollment grew so large that the school had to move to a larger building, that now is being used as a city library, and partly by the health department, and plans are being made to restore the old building as a historic site. The first principal of the old school was James P. Doston, and the assistant principal was Miss Mary Parker, Miss Hamilton taught music.

The first building consisted of only three rooms and fifty-three students enrolled for that first term. The school trustees were S. F. Crooks, A. S. Murphy, and J. D. Hines. Only the first eight grades were taught, and tuition in the Aliceville school was for the first through second grades a dollar and fifty cents per month, the third through the four, a dollar seventy-five, the fifth through the sixth, two dollars, and the seventh through the eighth, two dollars and twenty-five cents. Now lots of the churc.., children out in the country wanted to stay in town and go to school, and they could get room and board for ten dollars a month, and only seven dollars and fifty cents, if they would go home every weekend. This first school was erected by the Aliceville Improvement and Investment Company, and financed by the citizens of Aliceville.

Eighteen fifty-four found Pickens County with its first superintendent of education. This was the Reverend James Summerville. He was appointed in September eighteen fifty-four, and served until eighteen eighty-four, with exception of the War Between the States years, when we had no schools, and for a short time when Dr. E. F. B-O-U-C-H-E-L-L-E, I guess that's Bouchelle (Bo'shell), a Radical, served. The Reverend Summerville was an ancestor of Mrs. Elizabeth Stewart and Mrs. J. B. Park, Sr. He was born in South Carolina; he was a graduate of the University of North Carolina, and studies theology under the Reverend R. S. Gladney, distinguished minister of the Presbyterian Church in South Carolina. His first and his last pastorate was at Franconia, at the Oak Grove Presbyterian Church. This old church was founded in eighteen thirty-seven and had a membership of twenty-two, of which two were slaves.

Reverend Summerville served as a chaplain during the War Between the States, and upon his return was elected to serve the Pickens County school system. But the Republican Radical party forced Reverend Summerville to resign in eighteen sixty-eight, and he was replaced by this Dr. Bouchelle. The doctor resided five miles south of Pickensville, and his appointment caused much concern in this county. At first he was thought not to be competent and trustworthy, and this proved to be true, for by the year eighteen seventy he had depleted the office of all its funds. One of his plans for holding and in many cases keeping the teacher's money was to keep the county funds in such large bills that it was almost impossible to get change for the teachers when needed. This was especially with, true, with him living out from town and there being no bank in the county. This practice of being unable to pay the teachers came to a sudden halt in eighteen seventy-one when a group of masked men visited him one dark night, and he was given a short period of time to settle all his debts and resign. And again the Reverend Summerville was appointed and served until he resigned in eighteen eighty-four.

The next superintendent of education in Pickens County was Reverend Praigg, P-R-A-I-G-G. He had served the Carrollton Presbyterian Church and the Carrollton schools for several years. He served until eighteen eighty-six, when he resigned to become pastor of a Presbyterian church in Tuscaloosa.

The next superintendent was a Baptist pastor and at the time of his appointment serving as principal of the Pickensville Female Institute. This was Reverend J. H. Curry, the grandfather of John Curry, our attorney in Carrollton. He served only a few years, and resigned to take a similar position with Tuscaloosa County, and also served as pastor of the Northport Baptist Church while there.

From this period until nineteen four, M. G. Lofton, B.A. Chapwell, and L. V. Rocker filled the office. In nineteen four Mr. W. H. Story became superintendent of education. He was reared here in Pickens County and spent his entire life in the field of education. He occupied this office until nineteen thirteen, and in that year Mr. John W. Dowdle, of Ethelesville, was the choice of the people. He, too, was a dedicated leader in the field of education, and served until nineteen sixteen, when once again Mr. W.H. Story was to head the public school system. He was to have a long career in this position, and for many years the strongest pillar Pickens County had in its school system.

As one looks back at the many hardships our ancestors had to overcome to get an education, we are astonished at the strides they made in the field of education, and are proud to be the descendents of those brave frontiersmen who did so much with so little.

It would be interesting now, Randy, for you to study about the school, public school in Carrollton today, and the Academy, when they were built, who started them, and all about those school, and then you can branch out and learn about other schools in the county.

Since we've talked about so many things in the past, Randy, I want to read you a little poem that I wrote:"