The Ocala banner. (Ocala, Marion County, Fla.) 1883-194?, 1913-01-03

II
quickens our zeal and stirs our en-
i thusiasm on these lines.
Away, long years back, before
ever saw the light of day, this state
was alive to the matter of education
On the oath of February, 1851, the
| legislature of the state of Florida
dealt with the subject of education
| actively, and created institutions OF
learning, and in addition to other pro
| visions, created two institutions OF
| learning named seminaries, one 10
Gated east and the other west aof the
| Suwannee river, and known as the
East Florida Seminary and the West
Florida Seminary Ocala and the
surrounding country had already man.
| ifested such an interest in education
al matters and her people made such
!, contributions to the cause, that the
| legislature, at it's succeeding session,
on the 9th day of January, 1852, es-
tablished the East Florida Seminary
at Ocala Prior to the war between
the states, Ocala had established,
| through. this seminary, a reputation
as a great educational center, and
/ from that institution have issued forth
some of our noted men and women,
whose names and deeds adorn the
history of this state.
In addition to these two seminarie5
the legislature also created other in
situations of learning, of less dignity
than seminaries, called academies.
One of these academies was located
at what we now proudly call our
University City, our sister city of
Gainesville.
Then came the cruel fates of war
Our fathers and our older brothers
heard the call of duty, left their
homes, their children and their
schools, and, as patriotic citizens,
shouldered their rifles and marched
to the armies. Years of deprivation
ensued, and when the bloody strug
gle ended the few scattering remnant
of the flower of our land, poor in
health, footsore, weary and desti-
tute, with empty sleeve and hating
gait, limped to their former homes,
there to help comfort the weeping
widows and the crying orphans of
their comrades whose bleaching
bones were scattered on the battle
field.
What a scene of desolation and
waste greeted their eyes, for in the
wake of the victorious armies came,
also, a horde of vandals who seized
upon our institutions of government
and took charge of the political af-
fairs of the state.
Where the soldier left his beautiful
colonial home, with broad veranda
and green lawn, now he gazed upon
| heap of smouldering ashes. His
lands had been washed in the blood
of his fellow man and his neighbor,
his cattle scattered and gone, his
| fields desolate and barren, his barn
empty, the school houses gone into
| decay, and the Fairgrounds where
| the children had romped in gleeful
| pleasure had grown up with brush
and briar. Poverty, hunger and dis
tress gazed at him from every nook
| and corner, and desolation and ruin
was abroad in the land
| But, my friends, the noble spirit oil
| patriotism had not been quenched
for these noble men, heroes that they
were, recognizing that the struggle
was forever over and done, 'beat
their swords into plowshares anG
their spears into pruning hooks" and
started again.
In this condition something had tc
be done. Our little resources tina;
We're left to US had to be utilized by
Capitalization and combining the
fragments. In our sister city d
Gainesville was an academy of learn
ms will ntC0 OulluIuSS anu IuTnI
ture, which the noble people of that
section had preserved, by their in
domitable will, through all these try
Ing times of war, and all of which
they offered as donation to the sem
mary east of the Suwannee- river, or
the condition that it was located
there. This offer the legislature &C
cepted. by chapter 14S7, acts of 1865
and the East Florida Seminary was
transferred to Gainesville.
Our people had done much for the
cause of education while the semi
nary was here, by way of donations
and otherwise, and while the people
OF the state recognized the fact. the
state was then too poor to compen.
safe us for the loss that we had sus.
tanned by the removal of the semi.
nary from Ocala.
/ The act of removal was one of ex.