Quakertown Online_Mystic Oral School

Taken from: Annual Report of the Board of Education of the State of Connecticut Presented to the General Assembly, January Session, 1877. New Haven: Tuttle, Morehouse & Taylor, 1877. pp. 217-218.

WHIPPLE’S HOME SCHOOL FOR DEAF MUTES.

Mystic River, CONN., February 22, 1877.

B. G. NORTHROP, Secretary of the State Board of Education:

Sir--Since my last report, the general health of our pupils has been excellent. Only one epidemic has made its appearance; among us,--that of sore eyes. But though annoying, none of the cases have, as yet, resulted in anything more than local inflammation, which has yielded readily to treatment.

I have to record the death, from heart disease, of my brother, Walter M. Whipple, which occurred after an illness of only two days, October third, 1878. At the beginning of the term, only about a mouth previous to his death, he had entered the school as an assistant teacher, and had applied himself to the work with a zeal which nothing less than love for the children, and a real desire for their advancement, could have prompted.

Mr. N. Frank Whipple, one of the proprietors of the Home School, and Mrs. Jennie M. Whipple, my wife, are at present assisting me in the duties of the school-room. They are both experienced teachers, and carry into the school an enthusiasm which at once enkindles a corresponding earnestness among the pupils.

Miss Nanny J. Moredock, who was my assistant teacher from March, 1874, until the close of school, July 1st 1878, finding her health failing, went to Iowa, to teach a single pupil, in a private family. She reports improving health, and excellent success.

At the beginning of the present school year, we had eleven pupils; but one, a young man from Massachusetts, withdrew after receiving a few weeks’ instruction. This I very much regretted, on his account; for he was learning rapidly, and gave promise of becoming, in a comparatively short time, a remarkably plain talker.

I append a list of our present pupils:

William S. Downing, Wilmington, Delaware; Nellie C. Crary, Mystic River, Conn.; James A. Wright, Wilmington, N. C.; Raymond J. Cone, Riverton, Warren Co., Virginia; Walter N. Pennell, Linwood, Delaware Co., Penn.; Francis G. Thomas, Cheyney Delaware Co., Penn.; Almira Warren, Albany, N. Y.; Henry Schnakenberg, Hoboken, N. J.; D. Helen McClurg, Pittsburg, Penn.; Willie D. Munger, Bridgeport, Conn.

Of these, one is assisted by the Society of Friends in Philadelphia, Penn., two by the State of Connecticut, and one by the State of New Jersey. The others are supported by their friends. Willie D. Munger has been a pupil at the Clarke Institution, Mass., for seven years; but, failing to make satisfactory progress there in articulation, on the recommendation of Miss Rogers, the Principal, was transferred to this school. I have been instructing him with the aid of my Natural Alphabet, and already his articulation shows decided improvement.

The following extract from a letter written by Miss Annie M. Putnam, to whom I referred in my last report, may be interesting.

“I shall never give my speech up for anything in the world. It is a great enjoyment to me, I assure you. My friends consider it a perfect wonder, and don’t find it at all hard to understand me. I am so glad, and so are you, I suppose, who taught me to speak. The Natural Alphabet is considered to be wonderful by all. Many smart and intelligent people think that I have been restored to hearing. Is that not funny? I tell them No; that I cannot hear any better, but I can talk and read the lips. Still they think that I hear a little better, it surprises them go much.”

Francis G. Thomas, who entered this school in March, 1876, unable to understand a word from the lips, can now read sentences even when spoken with almost ordinary rapidity. I expect that after the close of the present school-year, he will attend common school at home, reciting orally like the other pupils. The pupil reported from Hoboken, N. J., was placed here last May. After a trial of five months, having made satisfactory progress, both in writing and speaking, he was selected by Governor J. D. Bedle as a State beneficiary, with an annual allowance of three hundred dollars.

During the eight years that I have spent as a teacher of articulation and lip-reading to deaf mates, I have had pupils from eleven states of the Union, ranging in age from five to thirty-five years, and of nearly every degree of mental ability, from idiocy to precocious intelligence. At the beginning my efforts were those of an experimentalist, trying to develope [sic] powers, both mental and physical, which I believed were latent in my pupils, but the existence of which had been generally denied.

The success which has attended my labors has exceeded my early anticipations, and 1 feel warranted in repeating with emphasis, the statement of my grandfather, the late Jonathan Whipple, that, “any intelligent child, though born deaf, if lacking nothing but hearing can be taught to talk.” I remain

Respectfully yours,

Zerah C. Whipple, Principal.