HENRY BARNARD—THE AMERICAN EDUCATOR.
BY THE LATE HON. JOHN D. PHILBRICK. [5]
The career of Henry Barnard as a promoter of the cause of education has no precedent and is without a parallel. We think of Page as a great practical teacher; of Gallaudet as the founder of a new institution; of Pestalozzi as the originator of a new method of instruction; of Spurzheim as the expounder of the philosophy of education, and of Horace Mann as its most eloquent advocate; but Mr. Barnard stands before the world as the national educator. We know, indeed, that he has held office, and achieved great success in the administration and improvement of systems of public instruction in particular States. But these labors, however important, constitute only a segment, so to speak, in the larger sphere of his efforts. Declining numerous calls to high and lucrative posts of local importance and influence, he has accepted the whole country as the theatre of his operations, without regard to State lines, and by the extent, variety, and comprehensiveness of his efforts has earned the title of the American Educator. It is in this view that his course has been patterned after no example, and admits of no comparison. But if in his plan, equally beneficent and original, he had no example to copy, he has furnished one worthy alike of admiration and imitation.
Mr. Barnard was a native of Hartford, Conn., where his family had lived from the first settlement of the colony. He was born on the 24th of January, 1811, in the fine mansion where he now resides. The son of a wealthy farmer, and living within half a mile of the centre of a considerable town and the State capital, he was placed in the most favorable circumstances for early physical and mental development.
His elementary instruction was received at the district school, which, with all its imperfections, “as it was,” he remembers with gratitude, not indeed on account of the amount of learning acquired in it, but because it was a common school, “a school of equal rights, where merit, and not social position, was the acknowledged basis of distinction, and therefore the fittest seminary to give the schooling essential to the American citizen.”
While pursuing the studies preparatory for college at Monson Mass., and at the Hopkins Grammar School in Hartford, his proficiency was brilliant; and such was his eagerness for knowledge that, in addition to the prescribed course, he extended his reading among the works of the best English authors.
Having entered Yale College in 1826, he graduated with honor in 1830.