A Tight Squeeze for the 1780–81 School Year

When we left the Boston selectmen yesterday, a town meeting committee had just told them that they’d heard the widow Rebecca Holbrook might have a room in her house suitable for teaching handwriting and arithmetic to 70–80 boys.

Since Widow Holbrook’s late husband and his brother had both been masters of the South Writing School, she would surely be willing to host scholars from that school while it was repaired after a fire, right?

The selectmen delegated two of their number, Gustavus Fellows and Tuthill Hubbard, to confer with Rebecca Holbrook. On 12 April they reported back “that Mr. [Samuel? Mrs.?] Holbrook was out of Town & they were of opinion that said Room would not accommodate the Schoolars of the South part of the Town, without very great expence.”

“Very great“ was the same level of expense that had prompted the selectmen to reject refitting the laboratory building as a school. With the war and wartime inflation both raging, the selectmen very much wanted to avoid spending a lot.

So the selectmen and town came to a decision about what to do with the South Writing School: nothing.

At least that’s how I interpret the record, which doesn’t include any moment of decision but shows the results. The boys appear to have been crowded into the town’s two other Writing Schools, on Queen Street and in the North End. The charred building was apparently left alone.

Normally in early July the selectmen led a big committee of officials and eminent male citizens on a visit to each of the schools. This was an end-of-school-year ritual, an occasion for the Writing School boys to show off their skills and for the Latin School boys to recite. The parents of the Latin School boys who were graduating after the full course of study (only about a third of those who had entered seven years before) joined the town notables for a dinner in Faneuil Hall.

I see no record of that ceremony in 1780—another likely sign of wartime austerity. The selectmen’s records say they visited the schools on 6 July, but there’s no list of invitees. That page left space for the count of boys in the South Latin School, North Latin School, Writing School on Queen Street, and North Writing School—but those spaces are blank. And the South Writing School wasn’t mentioned at all.

On 11 July 1781 the custom was back on, and the count was:

• South Latin School: 91 scholars
• North Latin School: 39
• Queen Street Writing School: 270
• North Writing School: 271

Back in 1773, the three Writing Schools held 674 students. Evidently Boston’s population was still low enough that all the Writing School boys could squeeze into two buildings.

But that population was growing. Inflation leveled off with the arrival of hard money from France. Bostonians wanted to go back to normal—even if that might cost a bit.

In May 1781 the town meeting authorized paying “Three hundred Pounds old Currency towards purchasing Repairs for South Writing School.” The next month, the selectmen reached an agreement with an experienced writing master to reopen that school, sixteen months after the fire.

John Vinal was moving back from Newburyport.

COMING UP: Vinal in the new republic.

“To accommodate the Youth of the South part of the Town with a School House”

As March 1780 began, the selectmen of Boston were looking for two new schoolmasters and one temporary schoolhouse.

Before the war, men tended to serve as schoolmasters for many years. There was more churn among the ushers, or assistant teachers—they probably had so little chance of advancement that they took jobs in other towns.

By 1780 the wartime economy was causing problems for everyone, but especially men who provided services in return for set salaries. The town provided extra grants (of paper money), but it also paid late, so the teachers were struggling.

William Bentley had taught at the North Latin School for three years, starting as usher in 1777 and becoming master in 1779. But on 23 Feb 1780 parents told the selectmen that he would leave “next Satturday.” A couple of years later Bentley became a minister in Salem, a job more to his liking. (He kept it for more than thirty-five years.)

Fortunately, the North Latin School usher, Aaron Smith, could keep the lessons going there. He and two other men immediately applied for the job of master. Furthermore, that public school was the smallest in Boston—only 39 boys attended as of July 1781.

On 8 March, Smith promised the selectmen that as master he would stay for at least twelve months, so the selectmen gave him the job. One problem solved! (Smith did serve through the end of the 1780–81 school year before leaving.)

The South Writing School presented a bigger difficulty. The night before the selectmen heard about Bentley’s departure, that schoolhouse had caught fire. Then Master Samuel Holbrook resigned, as described yesterday. I can’t be sure, but it looks like he took his usher with him.

There were probably over 150 boys attending the South Writing School—a drop from before the war, when the town routinely counted over 200, but still too many to let loose unsupervised on the town.

At the time, a schoolhouse was a large room with long desks and benches for all those boys. The master and usher needed their own desks, and the room needed a stove and a firewood supply, but that was about it. No chalkboards, bookshelves, or other special pedagogical equipment. The town just need to find a big room unoccupied during the day.

On the morning after the fire, the selectmen delegated two of their number, Nathan Frazier and Harbottle Dorr, “to apply to the Overseers of the Poor, for the use of the Workhouse Hall for Mr. Holbrooks Scholars.” At best that might have been a short-term remedy.

On 1 March, the selectmen added John Preston to that committee and sent them to ask whether the “Labretory” could become the new Writing School. After all, it was right next to the fire-damaged building.

A week later those selectmen reported:

That Colo. [William] Burbeck has the care of it at present for the use of the State—that he came in possession of it under Colo. [Thomas] Crafts—

that the Land on which it is built belongs to the Town, Major [Adino] Paddock building on it first—

That it will answer for a School, tho not without a very great expense to the Town in fitting it up in a proper manner.

So the town could demand the property back, kick out the artillerists in the middle of a war, and refit the building with a lot of money—which it didn’t have. Not a practical solution. 

On 13 March, Boston embarked on its annual town meeting to elect new officials. One item on that meeting’s agenda was “what is necessary to be done to accommodate the Youth of the South part of the Town with a School House.” Eventually, on 21 March, the meeting chose a committee to tackle that problem, headed by militia colonel Josiah Waters. John Preston wasn’t reelected as a selectman, but he was put on that committee, so he couldn’t escape the problem.

The schoolhouse committee submitted their first report on 24 March. It was “Recommitted,” or rejected, and the town meeting record doesn’t even say what they suggested. On 4 April they told the meeting:

That upon enquirey they had found that the Widow Holbrook had a Room which would accomodate about Seventy or Eighty Scholars, and that they were of Opinion that if this Room could be obtained it would be best to hire it for a School

This was Rebecca Holbrook, widow of the late Abiah Holbrook and sister-in-law of Samuel Holbrook. So she knew what a writing master needed in order to teach.

The town meeting quickly approved that idea and directed the selectmen “to agree with Mrs. Holbrook for said Room as they shall Judge for the Interest of the Town.”

TOMORROW: The cheapest solution.