Harrisburg telegraph. [volume] (Harrisburg, Pa.) 1879-1948, 1914-07-15

AS already stated, the seating ca
pacity of all the school buildings of
1874, including many rented rooms.
a continual demand for more build
ings. Forty years ago the city had
80 teachers in its public schools, in
elusive of the four special teachers
in music and drawing. To-day the
Aumber is 295. or more than triple
the teaching force of 1874
In 1874 the city had eighteen school
buildings that were its own property,
but nine of them were of the most
trif1ing character for school purposes
containing but one or two rooms.
There were others that were equipped
for a teaching force of but three,
while the largest number of teachers
that could be accommodated in any
school building of the city was eight.
To-day the Harrisburg School Board
has in use twenty-seven school build
ings, exclusive of the houses used only
for open-afr schools. But several of
these are of size so enormous and
containing so many rooms that from
16 to 25 teachers are required to in
struct the pupils who pour through
their portals daily. Indeed, 1t would
be an easy task from these twenty
seven school buildings to select five
that would house the entire school
population of Harrisburg of 1874, and
house them better than they then
were accommodated.
Financial and Property Growth
The public school directory of 1874
gives a carefully itemized statement
of the property of the district, which
sums up in value to $331,65O for real
estate and $19,147 for furniture, maxi
ing total of s35O.797. To-day the
real estate of the district is valued at
81, $50, 900, more than quadrupling the
valuation of forty years ago; and 1t is
probable that this is a very conserva-
tive estimate. The valuation placed on
the present furniture holdings of the
district is S125,0O0, or more than six
times the valuation of 1874.
In this valuation of school proper
ties of 1874 it is interesting to note
that the Boas and Verbeke buildings,
now mere pigmies compared with
more recent erections, head the list at
$4,000 each. Then comes the Dewitt
building at $4,000, the West State
street school at $40, 900, the old Harris
Park frame and the PENNSYLVANIA
avenue each at $4,000, while the Mt.
Pleasant, the Lochiel and the Ridge
avenue (Sixth street, buildings are
Thus the valuation trails on down
ward till we find that the school board
of that period had buildings in which
schools were conducted which. with
the ground belonging to them, were
valued at but $4,000 and $4,000, while
the little shack in Fourth street, next
to the Mt. Vernon firehouse, which
was a school room for many years.
was rated at $500.
The Two High Schools of 1874
But perhaps the most suggestive
and interesting points of contrast be-
tween 1874 and 1914, is presented by
the statistics of the high schools then
and now.
In 1874 all the high school boys of
the city were housed in a single room
occupying less than half the floor
space of the second floor of the old
Lancasterian building. This room was
on the eastern side and could be made
to accommodate about eighty pupils,
or, more properly, about eighty husky
boys, could be crowded into 1t, very
much like sardines in a box, with
little regard to either comfort or sani-
tary conditions.
Over this room presided Principal
L. Q. Foose with two assistants, Miss
Martha NJ. Tomkinson and Miss Edith
P. Leedy, in two little recitation rooms,