Oak Hill School on Dedham Street (King’s Handbook of Newton, p. 325)
In colonial Newton, the public school mission was clear: protect children against Satan by teaching them to read the Bible. After the Civil War, the school day still began with devotional activities, but there were more demands on the curriculum. The government wanted civics and heroic American history to unite the nation; educational leaders wanted child-centered methods for the head, heart, and hand; and industrialists wanted a skilled workforce. On top of all that, Newton’s schoolhouses were filled to bursting with the children of Irish immigrants.
Population growth
In 1860, Newton had 1,627 students and 36 teachers in its 11 schoolhouses. By 1900, Newton had 5,025 students, 21 school buildings, and 187 teachers. The high school population had grown from 72 to 690 pupils, and its building had been enlarged twice. School Committee reports were filled with requests for more funds and descriptions of overcrowded, unhealthy schoolrooms:
“Nearly one hundred of our children are doing their school-work in rooms which necessitate frequent resort to gaslight, and in an atmosphere which has been justly pronounced as “poisonous.” [1]
“The [Claflin] school building is now too small for the number of pupils in attendance. The attic rooms are not proper places for the children, and the rooms on the first and second floors are already over-crowded.” [2]
Per-pupil expenditures rise
In 1860, the town spent $14,000 on its public schools, $10.35 per pupil, the tenth-highest per-pupil expenditure in Massachusetts. The School Committee explained the higher-than-average school expenses by the need to compete with Boston for teachers and the village nature of the town, which scattered students and made it challenging to balance the schoolhouses. By 1900, Newton’s school budget had increased to $176,840, or $35 per child, and was the ninth-highest per-pupil expenditure in…