City and State excerpt March 16, 1899

City and State, 1899.45029, pp. 174 - 175, March 16, 1899

“THE EDUCATIONAL HOME” CONTINUED

In our last issue we touched upon one phase of the question of the Educational Home, an Indian contract school for boys which has been maintained for fourteen years in this city under the direction of a Board of Managers consisting of ladies and a Board of Council consisting of gentlemen. The first article of the corporate by-laws fixes the number of each board at thirty. If those ladies and gentlemen, numbering sixty members in all, and representing, as one may readily see by reference to their names, a moral and social influence of very high character, had exerted a careful and close supervision over the work of the school, it would no doubt have accomplished a very great amount of good, and have been free from the periodic scandals, of greater or less magnitude, that have attached to its operations. The school would thus have been spared the numerous adverse reports which have resulted from the various investigations which the Federal or State authorities have made and have published concerning it.

But the main difficulty with this institution, as we understand it, lies in the fact that one controlling mind and will has too exclusively determined its policy and ruled its motions. The First Directress has at all times been the supreme power in the Educational Home. In consequence of this fact the tendency has been for many of the more vigorous members of the Board of Management, those who felt a keen interest in the welfare of the institution, to retire. They found that the choice was open to them either of simple acquiescence in what was going on, or unpleasant conflict with the prevailing power, - or retirement. Many names of prominent ladies might be mentioned who have gone through this experience.

The First Directress has had full sway since the institution began its Indian work. All wills have bent to hers. For whatever good or ill the Home has accomplished she is virtually responsible. She must be credited with an extraordinary energy, and perseverance, and a unique persuasive or compelling power in carrying out plans into execution.

Let us now appeal to the record of facts presented from time to time by various organizations and committees which have had occasion to investigate the institution, in order to determine what it has accomplished. On October 5, 1884, a committee of the State Board of Charities visited the institution, and made, as will be seen by the following quotations, a very adverse report upon it:

“Here is another glaring example of discrepancy between the printed statements in the text-book of Indian philanthropists and actual large contributions in the ‘report.’ We found 176, from two and a half years to almost grown-up men, under the charge of two men and two women officers and three young women teachers. Fifty-six of these boys are Indians - Mohawks, Sioux, and Chippewas; the remainder are soldiers’ orphans and destitutes.

“The teaching is a feeble copy of public school instruction. As yet the pretension of teaching industrial occupations to the Indians is only a pretention. ... The pretense of everything struck us very unfavorably. While mottoes concerning order and cleanliness and gentle religious emotions and practices abounded, the house was dirty and disorderly, the children rough and untrained, and the caretakers severe in manner and rude in speech. The dormitories on the second floor were orderly, the beds spread with white, and the Bible lying conspicuously on a table at the head of the room. But on the third floor, where there were ninety beds, the beds were dirty, spreadless, and half made, and no Bible, no attendant. There was found a Bible lying conspicuously on a table at the head of every bed in all the dormitories; their third floor, where there were ninety beds, the beds were dirty, breadless, and half made, no Bible, no attendant.

“The ‘Indian Boys’ who have entered this fall were fine-looking fellows. Many of them spoke English. But why are they here? Poor teaching in the school-room, a sham industrial training, and most of them getting a training in pauperism by this semi-idle life, with three meals a day and clothes all round by the Government, and on their part no return made.”

Mrs. Cox, the First Directress, endeavored in various ways to neutralize the effect of this criticism. After receiving from the Indian Commissioner, Hon. Hiram Price, a copy of the report of the State Board, she wrote to him, February 28, 1885. In this letter Mrs. Cox stated that she had had no previous knowledge of the reports, and that during the past November the Committee on Public Charities had written her that the “house wanted painting and that the bedclothes should be renewed." She adds, "this was all promptly done, and there is no institution any place in a better condition to-day.” This last statement should be compared with those which appear in the report of Messrs. David M. Fox, C. Stuart Patterson, and William F. Harrity, made to Hon. John D. C. Atkins, Commissioner of Indian Affairs, under date of June 6, 1885, - just three months after the statement quoted above was written. Mrs. Cox then informs the Indian Commissioner that she had called on Dr. Herbert M. Howe, Chairman of the Committee on Public Charities, who, according to her statement, said to her:

“I want you to understand that the Committee on Public Charities had nothing to do with it. They are very much annoyed and worried about it. There is a committee of three women that have been appointed to visit the different institutions, and in many cases their reports have been as severe and discourteous as those they sent about the Educational Home. Please let it be understood that we do not approve and are not responsible for it in any way.” ‘I drew his attention,’ the writer continues, ‘to the spirit of the report, the low sarcastic tone, the utter untruthfulness of the whole report ... . ‘If such women are allowed to visit and make such false reports, in a few years there will not be found one volunteer worker in Philadelphia. I think the Committee on Public Charities feel this, for they said as much to me.’”

Commenting on this letter, Dr. Howe, in writing to the President of the State Board of Charities, says:

“I regret exceedingly that Mrs. Cox’s report of what I said to her regarding the report of the lady visitors following their inspection of the Educational Home is so inaccurate that I am compelled to review our interview somewhat carefully.”

Space forbids extended quotation from Dr. Howe’s letter, but it presents a statement of fact strongly opposed to that of Mrs. Cox. Among other things Dr. Howe says:

“She acknowledged that the Home was in bad condition last fall, and that accustomed as she was to the management of such places, it had caused her and the other managers much pain to know that it was so far from what it should be. ... She freely acknowledged the justice of the Commissioner’s adverse criticism. Her especial grievance ‘spiteful and sarcastic spirit’ which she thought she discovered in the report by the lady visitors.”

It is clear that this investigation, made in the autumn of 1884 by the State Board, brought about an improvement in the Home. This is admitted in a subsequent report made by the State Board in 1885, wherein the management is complimented for the advance made. But even in this the deficiency in industrial training is commented upon. It is clear, however, that this improvement was by no means complete, from the following quotations made from the report of the Commissioners appointed by President Cleveland in 1885, given in under date of June 6th, of that year. One of the members of this Commission, on visiting the school, was refused the right to inspect by the officer in charge, and it was not until he demanded it in the name of the Government that he was allowed to make an inspection. The institution seems always to have objected, just as we find is the case in 1899, to unannounced visits of investigators. We quote from the report as follows:

“The officers and servants of the institution are, with the exception of the teachers, sufficient in number and adequately paid. Yet the undersigned could not fail to observe an apparent want of system and order in the administration of the institution.

“Necessary repairs to the buildings have been projected, ordered, and begun, but have not been pushed to completion with adequate speed. The duties and relative subordination of the resident officials do not seem to be clearly defined.

“The punishments inflicted are whipping, marching in line,” etc., ... “but there does not appear to be any positive system or record of punishment. There is a want of that thorough order and discipline which is essential to the right administration of a public institution. ... the system of teaching seems to be quite up to the standard of instruction of the common schools of the city, but there does not appear to be a sufficient number of teachers. ... Less than one-half, therefore, of the Indian pupils [italics our] whose names are borne on the rolls of the institution receive industrial training, and the undersigned are obliged to report that in their opinion the benefits of industrial training are not extended to a sufficient number of the Indian pupils, that the system of training is too limited in its scope, and those who receive the training as now given at the institution are not so thoroughly instructed that they will be enabled in after life to earn their bread as farmers, tailors, shoemakers, or bakers.”

The significance of this last paragraph will be appreciated when one remembers that it was for the very purpose of securing such fitness for self-support that the Government expended $167 per annum on each Indian pupil, and also incurred the cost of their transportation from their distant homes. The report continues:

“Upon the occasion of a visit to the institution by one of the undersigned, May 30th, he was informed by the superintendent that there was a chain-ladder fire-escape, but upon being requested to produce it he was unable to find it. Since then the undersigned have been informed that rope fire-escapes have been supplied to each dormitory in the establishment. ... ”

The report concludes by stating:

“The undersigned have fully reported that which they observed. They have only to say further that, while they fully recognize the charitable motives which have led the ladies connected with the Educational Home to undertake the care of such of the Indian wards as the government has sent to the institution, they nevertheless are obliged to report that in their opinion the location and the appliances used are not adapted to give the Indian pupils the thorough and varied training for which they are sent thither from their distant homes. ... ”

In 1891, December 22d, the Home was again visited by the State Board of Charities, Messrs. Dickinson and Biddle being the visitors.

This report is very adverse. We quote from it as follows:

“We regret to have again to criticize this institution unfavorably. At the time of our visit it was exceedingly unclean. The classes visited were seemingly without being under proper control. Large Indian men sat with small white boys, the faces of the later covered with blacking. The cellar was damp and very dirty. The closets in the yard were simply indescribably disgusting. ... Indian men should be, as they are now at Carlisle, educated by men who have thorough training in discipline and order.”

Reports of similar adverse tenor were made upon the Home by visitors of the State Board of Charities in 1888 and 1889.

Another report, made December 9, 1895, while not so severe as the foregoing, has in it several unfavorable comments and states that –

“The dormitories are devoid of any air of comfort; the beds made by the boys show a want of proper supervision; the whole aspect of the house seems to point to a need of proper oversight.”

This report was made a little more than one year before cases of extraordinary and shocking cruelty occurred in the Home. These we hope to treat in our next issue, pursuant of our purpose to show the varied and continuous mismanagement that has marked this institution’s career up to the present time, notwithstanding the imposing social influences that have surrounded it, and the political powers that have been summoned to its support the moment its true character stood in danger of such an exposure as threatened its downfall. From what we have already published, it is clear that long ago the Government subsidy, which has maintained the life of the school, should have been withdrawn, and that its pupils should have been cared for at Carlisle, Hampton, or some of the Western industrial schools. We doubt if any institution in the country has had more tireless energy or more extraordinary power of persuasion enlisted in its defense than the Educational Home, while we feel convinced, from a very exhaustive examination of the facts, that all these exertions have been woefully misapplied.

It is true that in several instances when a visit was anticipated by the management of the Home such preparation was made that the visitor was pleased by what he saw, and would frankly confess himself to that effect. But unexpected visits, like that of Mr. Sniffen last December, revealed in part the true condition of affairs, and consequently aroused the anger of the management, so that in an interview between the First Directress of the institution and the corresponding secretary of the Indian Rights Association, the former official accused the latter of “meddling with her affairs,” and threatened energetically to attack the Association “with the law.” But a school which receives $167 a year from the Government for each pupil ought not to be regarded as the purely personal affair of any one person, nor ought the law to be invoked to intimidate those whose function it is to observe and report on Indian affairs because they do not give warning of their intention to visit an institution which for so many years has been the subject of adverse report as the Educational Home. The Indian Rights Association might, perhaps, be criticized for tardiness in making a thorough investigation of this institution, but surely not justly for failure to apprise the management of its final determination to visit the school and do its full duty in the matter.

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• Transcribed by HS 2025-08-06