"The Softening Shadows of Our Schooldays"

In 1914, Charles Austin Wood penned a recollection of his school days in Middleborough in the late 1840s and early 1850s. Born on July 18, 1841, the son of Eliab Wood, Jr., and Mary C. (Freeman) Wood of Wood Street, Charles A. Wood attended school at the Green in the building which preceded the current Green School house. Bearing testament to the truism concerning childhood schooldays that "these are the best years of your life", Wood's recollections present a picture of education in 19th century Middleborough which provided him with fond memories in his old age.

In a review of my school days I am not unmindful of the wide difference in the methods employed then in contrast with those of the present day. We entered as A. B. C. scholars, run through the various courses of studies and jumped into J. W. P. Jenks’ [Peirce] academy without further preparation or, if not into the academy, then about our several avocations. There was no particular object in view except to get suck knowledge as was handed out to us by the pedagogues who were engaged for the task. And, after all I have often thought we were about as well equipped to meet the requirements of life as the boys who go through the graded schools and graduate from the high schools today.

There were no aristocrats in our school. Each one was viewed pretty nearly on a level, though there was a difference, not, however, on account of worldly possessions. There wasn’t much wealth in the district. It wasn’t considered any disgrace to wear breeches with liberal patches on the knees, or jackets darned at the elbows. It was a proud day when we put on our high-topped boots, took our dinner pail and started for school.

I recall making an early start on the first morning of a winter term with the object of getting a “back seat,” as there was always a scramble for those coveted places. I was among the first, and as soon as the key was turned made a mad rush for a seat I hoped to get and retain for the winter. I felt a little doubtful of my right of possession, as I knew AI was several years the junior of scholars who were pretty sure to be there. But the older ones who came in may have thought that I was an interloper, but reflecting that possession was nine points of the law, took seats below me, and I had begun to flatter myself that I was secure in my holdings, when the school room door opened and in came Earle Bennett, looking as though he had been forced to make a long race, hoping to reach school in time to get one of the back seats. He was a husky youth, full grown and capable of doing yeoman work. He was naturally dark, but he had never looked quite so dark to me as he did that morning when he marched up the aisle, headed directly for my seat. He asked me no questions, nor made any apologies, but seizing me by the collar he pulled me out of the seat and sent me flying down the aisle, tumbling my slate and books after me. The master, who was a stranger to all of us, looked on with astonishment, but as he didn’t offer to interfere, I gathered up my belongings, looked about and seeing a vacant seat well down to the front slipped into it, not any too proud of my zeal in getting ahead of the big boys.

These “happenings” [and the] relating of my personal experiences are not made because I was conspicuously vicious, a bigger blockhead or more inured to accident than my fellows, but because they happened to me and are thus fast in my memory.

It was among my last days at school that I received a blow across the face from a bat that left a scar perfectly visible today. We were playing the old-fashioned game of “run around,” and I stepped up behind the batter to catch the ball when he swung around with a long bat and hit me square in the face, (no masks then,) and for a few minutes I didn’t know what had happened to me. When I came to I discovered that my nose had been completely knocked out of shape and all the teeth in my upper jaw loosened. The doctor did a very good job on my nose and the teeth, after a time, got solid again, but I never had much fondness for the game after that, except as a looker-on.

We had some scholars in school who were prodigies in their line. It has always seemed to me that the knack of spelling correctly was a gift peculiar to families. For instance, my brother Ed was a master of mathematics and history, capable of committing to memory pages of literature; in fact, he had at his tongue’s end the declaration of independence and the constitution of the United States, but as a speller of words he was about the poorest that ever stood on two legs – excepting, perhaps, his two brothers. Our cousins, William and Horace, who attended the same school, tackled all kinds of words with fluency and ease, and Josiah Tinkham at the evening spelling matches not only spelled down all competitors, but would battle the teacher to pick out a word that he couldn’t find the correct letters for, and finally go to his seat, master of the situation. In other branches, however, he was not particularly brilliant.

The evening singing school was a feature that was greatly enjoyed in those days. Among the teachers was Augustus Soule and George Soule, and the place of meeting was in the vestry in the rear of the church, where were assembled not only the scholars of the Green school, but of the Thompsonville and Muttock schools. In fact, it was the privilege of any one to attend these schools, and not infrequently the large room would be filled and the exercises on the blackboard gone through with more or less harmony – and discord – perhaps harmonious discord is the better interpretation of the various sounds that were heard on these evenings, for in spite of every effort to the contrary discordant notes could be heard either in the lead or far in the rear.

Another adjunct of school days was the kissing parties, or “sprees,” as they were more frequently called, held in the homes of the scholars, when all kinds of “parlor games” were played, followed by refreshments of corn-balls and apples. At the close of the festivities each rustic swain sought out his affinity and in bashful silence wended his way to her doorstep and then hied himself home in double quick time. At least that was my experience.

Since I commenced to write of my school days I have learned that two of the lovable young ladies who taught during the summer terms are still living. This Christmas greeting from one of them is greatly appreciated:

Among the Christmas greetings kind,
Your numerous well-wishers send,
None truer or more cordial you will find
Than this one from the heart of your old friend.

As I left home soon after the completion of the events I have related only to return occasionally for a brief stay most of the faces I knew then remain unchanged in my memory, and are all the more precious on that account. I cannot imagine that we have grown a day older. Often as I sit dreaming of those days it is difficult for me to form a mental picture of the great changes that have taken place in the intervening half century.

I cannot be unmindful of the fact that many, perhaps a large majority, have passed to their final reward, and that others, like myself, have reached the three score and ten mark. But however full our lives have been with activities that have been thrust upon us, the softening shadows of our school days have often come to gladden our hearts and awaken pleasant memories of our youthful days.

Source:
Middleboro Gazette, "The Biography of a Middleboro Boy: No. 7", January 16, 1914, page 1.