Morning journal and courier., 1889-06-01
NORTH HAVEN ANNALS.

A brief analysis of the "Sohool Plan" as last considered will not be out of place this time. Firstly, it reveals the grand list of the parish property at one thousand pounds or five thousand dollars. Next it indicates but one school house, and that on the west eide of the river near Pine bridge or Sackett's Point bridge. It likewise determines that although the meeting house was being built on the market place. and the parade and the burying ground established there also, yet that point had not become the center of the population of the parish by any means, but rather that the settlers were widely scattered
 with the major portion of them dwelling on the southern fringe of our territory at Muddy river near Cedar Hill.
 Indeed, except for timber, the writer ven- lures the opinion that there was nothing es- pecially attractive to the husbandman on the village, and had it not been for the "neigh- bors of Mount Carmel" the first meeting house would never have been placed where it was but would have gone nearer Muddy River"
 The phrase 1.-two oenters," in that report should be construed as two places, or more strictly, as two sections within whose borders at some convenient point school should be established. The west section was already furnished with school building, it seems, while in the remainder of the parish no such provision existed. Neither does the specific were distinct localities from the "Five dis tricts' which the committee recommended to be erected in the parish. The first and fifth include these centers within their bounda- ries, the understanding being simply that 8 'sman schooF should be kept in each of these districts three months in the year, while in their season, the 'dame schools" might be kept there also as well as in the other set places.
 Now bearing in mind that these specified tions of their school plan emanated from the old second meeting house on the green (which was the center of their active world) we have little difficulty in understanding the geography of ssFive Districts" as they plann- ed them in the "extream parts of the socie- ty," The first as has been said was at Mud dy river (now Montowese). Then came the temporary "man school, at or near Benjamin
 Beach's." This gentleman, according to best information, lived near the Muddy river bridge about on the ground now occupied by the present house: The ,n, second district
 mile tract, the subject of so much contro-
 versy st one time, lay on our eastern bound- ary and will form the subject of 6 future article. It included part of "North Hill" and all ssSmithtown," now better known by the more classic name of Clintonville. The third district included the present nearly de- populated fifth district, extending north
 ward to Wharton's brook at the WaIlingford line. The fourth crossed the East river and at the northwest corner of the parish took in the "Blew Hills," extending southward pre- sumably half the length of our territory there, or to an imaginary line which separ- ated it from the fifth next below; in this Iatf f0r HHn @An gtvHany oIO ATo1n ed. Thus the school topography of 1763 is supposed to have been plotted.
 The reader has probably noticed ere this that in the details given no allusion what ever is made to locality, district or school at or near their meeting house. This certainly has planted his meeting house in the colo nies of New England as a rule he planted school house under it's caves, and yet 1t was forty years after the first church was erected here that we have any written intimation that school building stood in the shadow of or near their place of worship, for it was at the same parish meeting in which they adopt ed the plan under consideration that they voted as the laet item of business before ad- journment that December afternoon :sThat there might be school house set on the market place built by particular men," No further allusion is made to it. The supposi- tion remains that thoss fsparticular men," whoever they were, acting by permission rather than authority, went forward and erected that memorable old school building which stood we'll within the present century, containing rich collections of carved auto graphs of a goodly company of which
 Part of the host have crossed the flood,
 And part are crossing now"
 That this school house had district of it's own, and that such territory was embraced within pretty much the same limits as the Yre H(yaOfraO or fOurkh dicfriot cupies, may reasonably be assumed. The language of the vote in referring to the "ex- tream parts" fairly implies an already exist ing division with the meeting house for it's center. These district lines were very elastic. The parish was continually tinkering at them for dozen years and more until eight in all had been framed bearing essentially the same that they do to-day.
 Returning again to the "Plan" as presented we zee by the restrictions placed upon entry into the 'fman schools" that the authorities contemplated in this grade higher than our present districts, after one hundred and twenty five years of existence, are ss advanc- sd as thisl If the vocabulary of the English tongue is complete enough on all other themes, it is an overwhelming failure as vehicle to express the fossilized condition of many a country school, the present Connecti- cut legislature to the contrary notwithstand- ing. But we are not here to moralize.
 Of the committee who prepared the plan we are considering, there is one with an un- familiar name, tAaron Day. Who was he1 The writer, thus far, has been unable to find trace of such family within our borders No such name appears upon any church record, or in any cemetery, and yet in 1762 he was made one of committee of the soci- ety "to fill up vacancies in the seats." In 1763, as stated, he reported the school plan, and in 1764 was made one of the annually appointed general committee on school af- fairs. Further than this no mention Is made of him. Turning now to the New Haven we find one Aaron Day appointed | by the General Court in 1747 as custodian of l certain arms and ammunition provided for the intended Canada expedition but un- used-1n 1750 ordered to care for the l the powder and stores in his keeping and | sell the same-in 1753 appears as plaintiff in a suit against one Stowe, master of the ! brigantine Dragon" of New Haven for miss | of business-in 1754 one of committee to build a wharf at 'Ferry Point," New Haven, (the money for which had been raised by a lottery)-in 1755 to go to Albany to purchase com stores for the Connecticut troops pedition--in 1759 inspector of arms, Sre., at New Haven-also in this same year when the White Haven church was separated from the old first church, be Is named as remalnlng With the original stock, and with this allusion and date, so far as known, his career ceases in New Haven. Now as Aaron Day as an off, cial. disappears from the New Haven record in 1759, and such person appears on the North I Haven record in 1762-3-4, is 1t presumptuous to say the two were identical, and that in the l closing years of his life he either became l resident of this parish, or that still remaining in New Haven, but being man of exception | ally sound judgment and wide experience .he fathers of this parish sought his advice l and counsel in the administration of their | .ffairs. Leaving now this query to be an- | ,wered by our readers, we dismiss the schools | for the present and return to the year 1718. |
 At the time of Mir. Wetmore's ordination l ve may assume the frame of the meeting l house as well underway, perhaps already up. ! But this building (as do more or less all new | tructures in the country) did not attract all | he attention of the settlers. Long before it | was finished the ring of the broadaxe was | heard at the south end of the msrketplace, | md the newly settled pastor was building |