The withdrawal of the Lincoln Institution from the Government Indian School scheme

This is my understanding of the contract between the LI and the Federal Government. It is based on the annual reports and other documents. The information available is limited to those annual reports that have been discovered at this time.

The LI had a contract with the Federal Government to provide an education for the Indians under its charge.

The first challenge was for the Indians to learn English. The situation seems to have differed between the girls and boys. According to the annual reports all the girls learnt English. A similar statement has not been found for the boys. Presumably, some boys did not manage to obtain sufficient English to continue onto the next stage of their education and would have been sent back to their families.

It is unclear whether the girls had a similar split in their educational program.

Those students who performed particularly well were entered into the public Philadelphia educational system. From the way this was discussed the public system must have been at a higher level than was possible at the LI. The number of girls entering the public program is noted in the annual reports and some of them performed well. There is no mention of boys entering the program but it is clear that some of the boys obtained an education to a high level.

‘During the last two years twenty girls have been given positions in these (reservation) schools as teachers, kindergarten teachers, matrons, seamstresses and cooks at salaries ranging from $300 to $600 per annum, and the reports received by us from those in charge state that so far they are all giving satisfaction’ [2]. It is unclear what percentage these twenty girls are of the total girls in the school over that period. The final stage in the boy’s education was working full time. In 1898 there were 14 boys at this level. The number was lower in earlier years. The work experience seems to have been with outside organizations. The boys were paid for this work.

The availability of this work seems to have been very limited. The critical item in the Indian’s complaint and in the IRA report was the fact that there was no full time work experience available for a substantial number of the boys and they had to hang around the EH waiting for a job opportunity to open up, at times for many months.

Note: Daniel La France was working in a solicitor’s office in 1898. The solicitor volunteered for the armed services at the beginning of the Spanish ’ American War and Daniel had to return to the LI. He did not obtain another position outside Lincoln Institution.

References

1. Education Home annual report, 1895
2. Lincoln Institution Annual Report, 1898

Document History

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