398 HISTORY OF SOUTHEAST MISSOURI Work op the Subscription Schools It is iuteuded here to give an aceoimt of the attempts to provide schools independent of the state and later to discuss the growth of the public schools system itself. As has been said, a few schools had been conducted in scattering settlements before the transfer to the United States. These schools were taught by teachers who were paid by subscrip- tion, or else by some priest or mm of the church. Private schools in Southeast Missouri of au elementary character were usually either sub- scription schools or else the elementary de- partment of an academy. There were two kinds of academies, those chartered by the state and those which existed without a char- ter. What we have termed subscription schools were probably the most common form of the early elementary schools. They were taught usually by men who claimed certain attain- ments in learning and for a longer or shorter period devoted themselves to instruction. These teachers were professional teachers m that they supported themselves in part by teaching but most of them turned their atten- tion during the greater part of the year to other pursuits. These schools were usually conducted in the winter time when it was im- possible to do much of anything else while in other seasons of the year both teacher and pupils were otherwise engaged. There were two principal methods of organizing and con- ducting such schools. Either a teacher pro- vided room in some dwelling house and se- cured, by personal canvass, a sufficient num- ber of subscribers to make it worth while to conduct the school (the patrons having no or- ganization of their own), or else, and more commonly, those families in the commiuiity which desired to send children to school banded themselves together, appointed one of their number as trustee and provided a place for conducting the school. This trustee was empowered by the voluntary association which he represented, to employ a teacher
- ind to exercise a degree of supervision over
his actions. This was the most common plan and it is perhaps not too much to say that in many parts of Southeast Missouri the schools thus organized and conducted were the most important factors in educational work during all the period preceding the war. Even after the war this plan was stiU used in many places. The writer well remembers that his first .school days were spent in such a school. The house had been built by volim- tary association of neighbors who appointed one of their number as a trustee. He hired the teacher and when necessary discharged him. The house itself was well built and for the time, excellently seated and furnished. This was at a period long after the war. The state exercised no control over these schools and of course contributed nothing to their support. No license to teach was re- quired of those who conducted them, and ac- cordingly the only requirements to be met by the would-be teacher were such as were es- tablished in the community itself. These re- quirements varied in the different communi- ties, and from time to time. Quite naturally, however, they were not usually high. In many cases, especially in the early days, those who taught were almost wholly incompetent. They possessed but the merest smattering of knowledge and in some cases the moral stand- ards set for them were very low. In another chapter we have quoted from Peck as to the character of some who conducted schools. Such conditions were inevitable, however. It was entirely beyond the limited means of the
