Education in Lincoln's Springfield

Today, public education is widespread in the United States. Nearly every community enjoys the benefits of a free public school, and 90 percent of eligible Americans have a high school diploma. But this was not always the case. In 1870, only 2 percent of Americans received the equivalent of a high school diploma, and American education was largely private, disorganized, and unequal. However, the 1800s were also when free public schools started to spread across the United States, beginning the nation’s long journey toward its modern education system. By examining the history of education in Illinois and Springfield during Abraham Lincoln’s time, we can better understand the origins of America’s public schools, as well as the importance of free public education.

American Education in the 1800s

From America’s founding, education was outlined as a crucial part of creating and maintaining republican ideals. However, access to education varied wildly across the United States. In New England states like Massachusetts, both public and private schools were abundant. Early Puritan settlers in the region encouraged a culture of high-quality, free education, which turned New England into the public-school powerhouse of Colonial America. Southern states like Virginia, South Carolina, and Georgia were much different. Their economies were largely agricultural and starkly unequal. An elite class of plantation owners enjoyed private tutoring and exclusive private institutions, but excluded the region’s large population of poor farmers and enslaved people. Early American school systems also discriminated based on race and gender. Very few schools allowed students of color to attend, and many white communities actively discouraged Black people from learning to read or write. In early American history, one’s quality of education available was largely determined by location, race, class, and gender.

The same was true in Illinois. In its early years, Illinois’s population was tilted towards “Little Egypt,” the state’s southernmost region. Poor migrant farmers from Virginia, Kentucky, and the Carolinas were drawn to the area's fertile fields and extensive river network. A small contingent of wealthy farmers joined these poor ones, recreating the unequal, privatized educational environment seen in the American south. In 1825, Illinois Governor Edward Coles helped push through a law that established the right to free public schools across the entire state. Only two years later, however, a state legislature dominated by politicians from southern Illinois passed a law that stripped funding from these schools by requiring explicit written permission from each individual Illinoisan before their tax dollars could be used to support them. Illinois schools would remain disorganized, privatized, and underfunded for many years after.

 

An 1834 advertisement for John B. Watson's private school at Sixth and Adams Street in Springfield, Illinois. Like Watson, all Springfield schools charged student tuition prior to 1856, and many actively advertised to prospective students.

Sangamo Valley Collection

Illinoisans’ attitudes toward education shifted as the state grew larger and more diverse. New Englanders, drawn by Chicago’s burgeoning trade networks and industrial expansion, began moving to northern Illinois in large numbers. As they did, they brought a strong tradition of public education with them. Despite the limitations of the 1827 school funding law, northern Illinoisans began setting up local networks of publicly funded schools. Education in Illinois became a microcosm of the entire nation: vastly unequal, and largely determined by the preferences of local forces. Activism from teachers and parents across the state, as well as the continued influx of New Englanders and European immigrants into Illinois, slowly turned public opinion in favor of free public schooling. Reflecting national trends, Illinoisans began to see free education as a necessary part of developing upstanding, “moral” citizens, and therefore worthy of funding through taxation. In 1855, legislators passed a law that made free public schools a reality across the state, kickstarting the gradual decline of private schools in Illinois.

Schooling in Springfield

The 1855 law would prove transformational for Illinois’s educational system, but public schools would not become widespread until after the Civil War. In the meantime, education in cities like Springfield remained disorganized. Twenty modest private schools serviced Springfield’s population of a few thousand, and two private academies were the only secondary education offered in the area. These schools primarily served middle- and upper-class white students, with a strong preference for boys. Some schools permitted school-aged girls, though they were kept strictly segregated from boys in the classroom and on the playground. Black people in Springfield were advocating for free, integrated public schools as early as 1852, but the city ignored their requests in favor of continued discrimination. Springfield’s first public school opened in 1856, but no schools in the city permitted students of color until 1859, when the first public school that serviced people of color – a segregated one – was created.

 

The Arnold House was one of Springfield’s first schools. Reverend Francis Springer operated the school, and would go on to be the first superintendent of Springfield’s public school system. The Arnold House stands today as a part of the Lincoln Home National Historic Site.

NPS Photo

Education for the Lincolns

In this chaotic educational environment, the Lincolns’ fractured experience demonstrates the inequality of the time. Abraham, born into poverty, only accumulated one year of formal education throughout his entire life. Largely self-taught, he studied primarily through borrowing books from neighbors and friends. Mary’s wealthy upbringing, meanwhile, afforded her twelve years of private school education, where she was classically trained in French, dance, drama, and music.

After their marriage, the Lincolns settled into a middle-class life. This allowed them to provide limited, strategic investment in their children’s education. Robert, the Lincolns’ oldest son, showed the most aptitude for traditional schooling and thus enjoyed the most formal education among his siblings. He attended three different private schools in the Springfield area, including a four-year term at the recently founded Illinois State-Springfield college preparatory school. After failing the Harvard entrance exam, Robert Lincoln spent an additional year of study at Phillips Exeter Academy before he was accepted to Harvard College in 1860. The Lincolns happily paid their son’s private tuition costs, and Abraham sat on the school board at Illinois State-Springfield upon Robert’s arrival there. In contrast, the Lincolns’ youngest sons William and Thomas did not take well to classroom learning, and received only a piecemeal education during their time in Springfield. Without a robust public school system, even a successful and well-respected family like the Lincolns could only afford to invest in their children that demonstrated strong academic performance.

 

American education in the 1800s was primarily reserved for well-to-do white people, particularly men and boys. Privatized and disorganized, it largely excluded women and girls, people of color, and the poor from formal schooling. But the 1800s were also the period that laid the foundation of widespread public education as we know it today, as progressive politicians, teachers, and activists fought to establish the first free public-school networks. Studying the history of education in Lincoln’s Springfield helps us comprehend the origins of America’s modern public school system and appreciate the value of free, accessible, public education for all.

 

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