The First Normal School
As early as twenty years before the Liberty Arsenal was captured and the State of Missouri dived into the fray that was the Civil War, the desire to establish a normal school in the state was gaining support. A normal school is the term used to refer to a university established to train teachers specifically, not just to create teachers as an add-on to another course of study. The normal school model was the common design for much of the country at this time. Some normal schools were privately operated facilities, while others were public facilities. The normal school that would become known as Truman State University began life as a privately operated facility.
Many of the early houses of education were founded by religious groups. The Adair County experience ran parallel to these ideas. In 1859 a group of individuals were established to maintain the creation of a religious school in Kirksville. This body was founded out of the Cumberland Presbyterian Church. The board decided to create a school for higher learning in the vicinity of Hickory and Florence Streets. They would then begin their construction on the Cumberland Academy. This facility was a two story chapel and classroom building. Unfortunately for the Cumberland Academy, the Civil War would soon begin and bring a halt to many schools for the five years of battle. This would mean that the Cumberland Academy would not house any new classes of learners. The building wasn’t even completed, the second story remaining to be partitioned into the classrooms that the board of directors intended with the construction. When the war was over, the Cumberland Academy was a thing of the past hoping to find someone to occupy its facilities.
Joseph Baldwin was born in Pennsylvania. He would find his way to Missouri to be a school teacher in the early 1850s. Baldwin would also be instrumental as one of the founding fathers of the Missouri State Teachers’ Association in 1852. Baldwin believed in the importance of normal schools in training teachers for their careers and he helped establish normal schools in Indiana before his return to Missouri.
There are many plausible locations for Baldwin to have established a normal school in Missouri, but he would choose Kirksville. Why? Some think it was Baldwin’s encounter with Major John B. Merwin, the editor of the American Journal of Education. Others think it was Baldwin’s disappointment with the Indiana normal school practice. While still others think that it was because of friends and family Baldwin had in the Kirksville area. I want to think that it is this last proposed idea due to the fact that Baldwin’s relative, J.J. Grigsby, contacted him about the availability of the Cumberland Academy. Grigsby wanted Baldwin to create a normal school at Adair County and new his past experiences. Grigsby would basically serve as a middle-man between the Cumberland Presbyterian and Baldwin.
The first normal school in Adair County set up by Baldwin had three men and two women feverishly working to equip teachers for later. Those people were F.L Ferris, W.P. Nason, and J.M. Greenwood, with the wives of Ferris and Greenwood. The school would be completed and open on September 2, 1867. It would be known as the North Missouri Normal School and Commercial College. Although it was a private school, Missouri was well on its way to having an established normal school.
1870 brought state legislature decisions to provide for a normal school system. Baldwin offered his school to the state and they accepted it. He was named as the President of this new school, the First District Normal School.
Governor Thomas C. Fletcher pushed for a system of state normal schools in the years following the Civil War. The basic function of the final law passed was the establishment of schools whose purpose was the education of teachers for the public schools of the state.
In deciding where the state's first normal school would be located, Adair County had competition with other counties, most notably Livingston and Pettis. A Board of Regents met at Sedalia with a contingency of supporters from each of the counties present. They would offer their side of the argument in support of the school being located in their county. Those present at Sedalia to support Adair County were Judges Jacob Sands and A.H. Linder, James A. Greenwood, Samuel Pickler, David S. Hooper,and William H. Parcells. These men recruited the support of others and helped to rally the board to their side. Whether clandestine tactics were employed or not, the Kirksville delegation learned the plans for the Livingston County bid for setting the normal school at Chillicothe and used it to their advantage.
In the History of Adair, Schuyler, and Sullivan County, there are several references to Parcells going before the county court on charges of betting on cards during the early 1840s. Parcells partiality to a bet is also presented in the following paragraph:
“The serio-comic story of William Parcells and the Chillicothian-John T. Johnson-also had a place in the local literature of the time. It appears the latter, meeting Parcells, stated that he knew a judge down in his region who would put up $2,000 toward locating the normal school there. The former (Parcells), releasing a $6,000 check from his pocket-book, said “I am a common man from Adair, and will call your $2,000, and will go $4,000.”
When the Board of Regents had decided that their choice was Kirksville, Parcells had already sent word via telegraph to Kirksville saying we had won. When Judge Linder came up to Parcells, inviting him to join the judge in sending word back to Adair County, Parcells said the he had already done that. The judge asked him how he could have already known, to which Parcells replied "That's just the way I work."
At some point, this normal school outgrew the Cumberland Academy building and Baldwin would look for another site. Baldwin chose a cornfield just outside the Kirksville city limits. The state required that schools must be located inside the city limits, so Kirksville’s government had to move the city boundaries to allow the land to exist within the city limits. The building that would be erected may have been called the Normal Building, but would become known as Baldwin Hall.
Many of the early houses of education were founded by religious groups. The Adair County experience ran parallel to these ideas. In 1859 a group of individuals were established to maintain the creation of a religious school in Kirksville. This body was founded out of the Cumberland Presbyterian Church. The board decided to create a school for higher learning in the vicinity of Hickory and Florence Streets. They would then begin their construction on the Cumberland Academy. This facility was a two story chapel and classroom building. Unfortunately for the Cumberland Academy, the Civil War would soon begin and bring a halt to many schools for the five years of battle. This would mean that the Cumberland Academy would not house any new classes of learners. The building wasn’t even completed, the second story remaining to be partitioned into the classrooms that the board of directors intended with the construction. When the war was over, the Cumberland Academy was a thing of the past hoping to find someone to occupy its facilities.
Joseph Baldwin was born in Pennsylvania. He would find his way to Missouri to be a school teacher in the early 1850s. Baldwin would also be instrumental as one of the founding fathers of the Missouri State Teachers’ Association in 1852. Baldwin believed in the importance of normal schools in training teachers for their careers and he helped establish normal schools in Indiana before his return to Missouri.
There are many plausible locations for Baldwin to have established a normal school in Missouri, but he would choose Kirksville. Why? Some think it was Baldwin’s encounter with Major John B. Merwin, the editor of the American Journal of Education. Others think it was Baldwin’s disappointment with the Indiana normal school practice. While still others think that it was because of friends and family Baldwin had in the Kirksville area. I want to think that it is this last proposed idea due to the fact that Baldwin’s relative, J.J. Grigsby, contacted him about the availability of the Cumberland Academy. Grigsby wanted Baldwin to create a normal school at Adair County and new his past experiences. Grigsby would basically serve as a middle-man between the Cumberland Presbyterian and Baldwin.
The first normal school in Adair County set up by Baldwin had three men and two women feverishly working to equip teachers for later. Those people were F.L Ferris, W.P. Nason, and J.M. Greenwood, with the wives of Ferris and Greenwood. The school would be completed and open on September 2, 1867. It would be known as the North Missouri Normal School and Commercial College. Although it was a private school, Missouri was well on its way to having an established normal school.
1870 brought state legislature decisions to provide for a normal school system. Baldwin offered his school to the state and they accepted it. He was named as the President of this new school, the First District Normal School.
Governor Thomas C. Fletcher pushed for a system of state normal schools in the years following the Civil War. The basic function of the final law passed was the establishment of schools whose purpose was the education of teachers for the public schools of the state.
In deciding where the state's first normal school would be located, Adair County had competition with other counties, most notably Livingston and Pettis. A Board of Regents met at Sedalia with a contingency of supporters from each of the counties present. They would offer their side of the argument in support of the school being located in their county. Those present at Sedalia to support Adair County were Judges Jacob Sands and A.H. Linder, James A. Greenwood, Samuel Pickler, David S. Hooper,and William H. Parcells. These men recruited the support of others and helped to rally the board to their side. Whether clandestine tactics were employed or not, the Kirksville delegation learned the plans for the Livingston County bid for setting the normal school at Chillicothe and used it to their advantage.
In the History of Adair, Schuyler, and Sullivan County, there are several references to Parcells going before the county court on charges of betting on cards during the early 1840s. Parcells partiality to a bet is also presented in the following paragraph:
“The serio-comic story of William Parcells and the Chillicothian-John T. Johnson-also had a place in the local literature of the time. It appears the latter, meeting Parcells, stated that he knew a judge down in his region who would put up $2,000 toward locating the normal school there. The former (Parcells), releasing a $6,000 check from his pocket-book, said “I am a common man from Adair, and will call your $2,000, and will go $4,000.”
When the Board of Regents had decided that their choice was Kirksville, Parcells had already sent word via telegraph to Kirksville saying we had won. When Judge Linder came up to Parcells, inviting him to join the judge in sending word back to Adair County, Parcells said the he had already done that. The judge asked him how he could have already known, to which Parcells replied "That's just the way I work."
At some point, this normal school outgrew the Cumberland Academy building and Baldwin would look for another site. Baldwin chose a cornfield just outside the Kirksville city limits. The state required that schools must be located inside the city limits, so Kirksville’s government had to move the city boundaries to allow the land to exist within the city limits. The building that would be erected may have been called the Normal Building, but would become known as Baldwin Hall.
Truman State University Art Professor William Unger was known for his efforts at capturing imagery of the local area. This Unger sketch is of the original Baldwin Hall located on the Normal School Campus. The building was destroyed by a late night fire and the lake in front was drained in battling the blaze.