The History of University Education in Maryland: The Johns Hopkins University (1876-1891). With supplementary notes on university extension and the university of the futureSteiner, Bernard C. (Bernard Christian)
History
The History of University Education in Maryland: The Johns Hopkins University (1876-1891). With supplementary notes on university extension and the university of the future
Steiner, Bernard C. (Bernard Christian)
Johns Hopkins University -- History; Universities and colleges -- Maryland -- History
Collegiate education in Maryland did not begin until after the
Revolution. In the colonial period there was no demand for it sufficient
to warrant the establishment of a seat of higher learning. For this
state of things there were several causes. The majority of the early
settlers were planters and frontiersmen, having little need for an
extended education and desiring it still less. Of the wealthier classes,
some were like the fox-hunting English gentry, caring for little else
than sport; and others, who did desire the advantages of a culture
higher than that obtainable from a village schoolmaster or a private
tutor, found it elsewhere. They went over to William and Mary's College
in Virginia, across the ocean to England, or, in case of some Catholics
like Charles Carroll, to the institutions on the continent of Europe.
But, though no college was established in colonial times, there was no
lack of plans and attempts for one. In 1671, while as yet Harvard was
the only American college, there was read and passed in the Upper House
of the Assembly "An Act for the founding and Erecting of a School or
College within this Province for the Education of Youth in Learning and
Virtue." The Lower House amended and passed the bill; but the plan seems
never to have progressed further. According to the bill the Lord
Proprietor was "to Set out his Declaration of what Privileges and
Immunities shall be Enjoyed by the Schollars;" and "the Tutors or School
Masters" were to be of "the reformed Church of England" or, if two in
number, to be "the one for the Catholick and other for the Protestants'
Children."[1]
A second collegiate plan was brought before the legislature in 1732;
but, having passed the Upper House, was seemingly not acted on by the
Lower. This proposed college was intended to be placed at Annapolis and
was to offer instruction in "theology, law, medicine, and the higher
branches of a collegiate education." The governor of the colony was to
be its chancellor and provision was made for a faculty of five, under
whom students were to be instructed in everything from their alphabet
upwards.[2]
A third unsuccessful attempt to secure the founding of a college was
made in 1761,[3] and a fourth in 1763, when contrary to the earlier
course of events, the rock, on which the project was shipwrecked, was
found in the Upper House. The college was to be placed at Annapolis, to
occupy Governor Bladen's mansion, and to have a faculty of seven
masters, who were to be provided with five servants. The expense was to
be defrayed from the colonial treasury, in case a tax to be levied on
bachelors should prove insufficient for the purpose.[4]
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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