FOUNDING MOTHERS AND OTHERS:

Wornen Educational Leaders During the Progressive Era

EOITED BY

AlAN R. SADOYNIK

AND

SUSAN F. SEMEl

palgrave

* FOUNDINC MOTHERS AND OTHERS

© Alan R. Sadovnik, Susan F. Seme!, 2002 All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reprodueed in any manner what-~oever withuut wriuen permission cxcept in the case of brief quotations ernbodied in criti-

eal arrieles or reviews.

Firsr published 2002 by PALGRAVE""" 175 Fitrh Avenue, New York, N. Y.l 00 1 0 and Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire RG21 6XS. Companies and represenratives rhroughour the world

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ISBN 978-0-312-29502-8 ISBN 978-1-137-05475-3 (eBook)

DOI 10.1007/978-1-137-05475-3

Library of Congress Caraloging-in-Publication Dara Founding mothers and others : women edueationalleaders during the progressive era / edited by Alan R. Sadovnik, Susan F. Seme!.

p. em. Ineludes bibliographieal referenees.

I. Women edueators-United States-Biography. 2. Progressive edueation-United States-History-20th eemury. I. Sadovnik, Alan R. 11. Seme!, Susan F., 1941-

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CONTENTS

Acknowledgments v Contributors Vll

Photographs

Introduction Alan R. Sadovnik and Susan F Semel

l. Charlotte Hawkins Brown and the Palmer Institute 7 Katherine C. Reynolds

2. Marietta Johnson and the Organic 5chool 19 Joseph W Newman

3. Margaret Naumburg and the WaIden 5chool 37 Blythe Hinitz

4. Caroline Pratt and the City and Country 5chool 61 Mary E. Hauser

5. Helen Parkhurst and the Dalton 5chool 77 Susan F Semel

6. Elsie Ripley Clapp and the Arthurdale 5chools 93 Sam Stack

7. Carmelita Chase Hinton and the Putney 5chool 111 Susan McIntosh Lloyd

8. Flora J. Cooke and the Francis W. Parker 5chool 125 Gail L. Kroepel

9. Margaret Haley: Progressive Education and the Teacher 147 Kate Rousmaniere

10. Ella Flagg Young and the Chicago 5chools 163 Jackie M. Blount

1l. Laura Bragg and the Charleston Museum 177 Louise Anderson Allen

12. Charl Williarns and the National Education Association WIlyne j. Urban

13. And Gladly Would She Leam: Margaret Willis and the Ohio State University School

Craig Kridel

14. Frorn Susan Isaacs to Lillian Weber and Deborah Meier: A Progressive Legacy in England and the United States

Jody Hall

Conclusion Alan R. Sadovnik and Susan F. Semel

Index

201

217

237

253

263

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

This book began as a symposium on "Founding Mothers" at the American Educational Research Meetings in 1991. After this symposium, we turned our attention to many of the progressive schools founded by some of these women, which resulted in the pub li-cation of"Schools ofTomorrow, " Schools ofToday: What Happened to Progressive Education (Peter Lang, 1999). We continued, however, to work on female founders and other women educationalleaders, culminating in this book.

During this period, we presented other parts of this work as a symposium at the American Educational Studies Association Meetings in 1996 and at the Joseph Co rn-wall Center for Metropolitan Studies at Rutgers University-Newark in 2001.

This book would not have been possible without the help of a number of individu-als. At Palgrave Macmillan, Michael Flamini provided extraordinary editorial support and friendship. Amanda Johnson, Donna Cherry, and Sabahat Chaudhary all provided essential assistance in the production process.

lan Steinberg provided exemplary technical assistance in the preparation of the final manuscript and index. The contributors provided timely commentary on the intro duc-tion and conclusion and in securing photographs, when available.

At Rutgers-Newark Bette Jenkins and LaChone McKenzie provided important and helpful secretarial support.

Most of all, we acknowledge the legacies of the remarkable women examined in this book.

CONTRIBUTORS

LOUISE ANDERSON ALLEN is Assistant Professor of Curriculum and Supervision at the University ofNorth Carolina at Charlotte where she is also the graduate coordinator for the doctoral program in educational leadership. She was awarded the first postdoctoral fellowship offered by the Avery Research Center for African American History and Cul-ture at the College of Charleston. Much of the research on Laura Bragg's involvement with the African American community, which is documented in Chapter 12 was sup-ported by the postdoctoral fellowship. Her first book, A Bluestocking in Charleston: The Lift and Career 0/ Laura Bragg, was published in 200l. Her current research interests focus on southern women educational leaders of the Progressive Era and their curricu-lum reforms.

JACKIE M. BLOUNT is Associate Professor ofHistorical, Philosophical, and Comparative Studies in Education at Iowa State University (ISU). She has received the Thomas Urban Award for Education Research and the ISU Award for Early Achievement in Teaching. Her work has been published in such journals as the Harvard Educational Re-viewand The Review 0/ Educational Research. She has written Destined to Rule the Schools: Women and the Superintendency, 1873-1995, and is completing a book exploring the history of gender transgression, broadly defined, in public school employment. Cur-rently she serves as Associate Dean of the ISU College of Education.

JODY HALL is Assistant Professor in the Department of Curriculum and Instruction at the University of Massachusetts at Boston. Her academic research interests are in the areas of history, psychology, and schooling. She is the author of ''lohn Dewey and Prag-matism in the Primary School: a Thing of the Past?" in Curriculum Studies (1996) and "Psychology and Schooling: the Impact of Susan Isaacs and Jean Piaget on 1960s Sci-ence Education Reform" in History 0/ Education (2000). Her practical research interest is elementary science education. She is the author of Organizing Wonder: Making Inquiry Science Work in the Elementary School (1998).

BLYTHE HINITZ is Professor of Elementary and Early Childhood Education and Coor-dinator of the P-3 Certification Pro gram at the College of New Jersey. She currently holds a grant from Educational Equity Concepts and is participating in a group Ful-bright Alumni Initiative Award. She is a founding member of the History Seminar of the National Association for the Education ofYoung Children. Blythe Hinitz is the au-thor of Teaching Social Studies to the Young Child: A Research and Resource Guide (1992) and coauthor of History 0/ Early Childhood Education (2000).

MARY HAUSER is Associate Professor of Education and Director of the Graduate Pro-gram in Education at Carroll College, Waukesha, Wisconsin. Her research interests are

VlII / CONTRIBUTORS

centered in the sociocultural context of education. She coedited Intersections: Femi-nisms/Early Childhoods (1998) and has published in several early childhood books and journals. She has presented research on Caroline Pratt in Readers Theatre format at AERA, ACEI, and at the Reconceptualizing Research in Early Childhood Education conferences and is currently working on a biography of Caroline Pratt.

CRAIG KruOEL is Professor of Educational Foundations and Research at the University of South Carolina. His research interests focus on progressive education, educational bi-ography, and documentary editing, and he is currently completing a history of the Eight Year Study and a biography of Harold Taylor. Kridel's publications include Books o[ the Century, Writing Educational Biography, Teachers and Mentors, and The American Cur-riculum, and he serves on the editorial board of the History o[ Education Quarterly and as columnist in the Journal o[ Curriculum Theorizing.

GAIL L. KROEPEL is Senior Professor ofComputer Information Systems at DeVry Insti-tute ofTechnology in Chicago and has been a computer consultant for Midwest busi-nesses and corporations. Her scholarly writings have focused on the life and contributions of the progressive educator Flora J. Cooke and the philanthrop ist Anita McCormick Blaine; scholarly articles by Dr. Kroepel have been accepted for publication in the American Educational History Journal and the Proceedings o[ the Midwest Philoso-phy o[ Education Society, and she has presented papers at the History of Education Soci-ety, the Midwest History of Education Society, and the Midwest Philosophy of Education Society.

SUSAN MclNTOSH LLOYD taught history, music, and urban studies for 29 years at Phillips Academy in Andover, Massachusetts, and the same disciplines more briefly at both the elementary and college level. She served for seven years as a founding member of the National Board for Professional Teaching Standards. Since taking early retire-ment, she has been secretary of the Tinmouth, Vermont, School Board, chamber music coach and secretary-director for Rutland County's youth orchestra, and chairleditor for an international chamber music society. Most ofher scholarship has focused on the his-tory of American education. She has written rwo books, A Singular School: Abbot Acad-emy, 1828-1973, University Press of New England, 1979, and The Putney School: A Progressive Experiment, Yale University Press, 1987, as weil as numerous articles; and, with her Urban Studies students, she has written Growing Up in Lawrence, Massachu-setts, I (1985) and 11 (1998).

JOSEPH W NEWMAN is Professor and Chair ofEducational Leadership and Foundations at the University of South Alabama. The author of America's Teachers: An Introduction to Education, 4th ed. (2002), he focuses his research on teachers, teacher organizations, and educ::>tion in the Somh. Newman is active in the History of Education Society and Di-vision F, History and Historiography, of the American Educational Research Associa-tion. Now serving as an officer of the American Educational Studies Association, he will become president in 2003.

KATHERINE C. REYNOLDS is Associate Professor of Higher Education Studies, and di-rector of the Museum of Education, at the University of South Carolina. Her historical studies have resulted in several books, including Park City: A History (Weller Press), Vi-

CONTRIBUTORS / IX

sions and Vanities: John Andrew Rice of Black Mountain College (Louisiana State Univer-sity Press), and Carolina Voices: 200 Years of Student Experiences (University of South Carolina Press). Her reviews and articles have appeared in numerous journals, including Education and Culture, The Journal of Educational Thought, The North Carolina Literary Review, History of Education Quarterly, and others.

KATE ROUSMANIERE is Associate Professor in the Department ofEducational Leadership at Miami University, Oxford, Ohio. Her research interests center on the history and pol-itics of teachers and methodological questions in the social history of education. Her publications include City Teachers: Teaching and School Reform in Historical Perspective (1997), Silences and Images: The Social History of the Classroom (coedited with lan Grosvenor and Martin Lawn, 1999), and numerous publications on the history of teachers and historical research methods. She is currently writing a biography of Mar-garet Haley, the turn-of-the-century leader of America's first teachers' union.

ALAN R. SADOVNIK is Professor of Education and Sociology at Rutgers University, Newark, New Jersey, and Chair ofits Department ofEducation. He is the author of Eq-uity and Excellence in Higher Education (1995); coauthor of Exploring Education: An In-troduction to the Foundations of Education (1994, 2001); editor of Knowledge and Pedagogy: The Sociology of Basil Bernstein (1995); and coeditor of Exploring Society (1987), International Handbook of Educational Reform (1992), Implementing Educational Reform: Sociological Perspectives on Educational Reform (1995), "Schools of Tomorrow," Schools ofToday: What Happened to Progressive Education (1999), and Sociology and Ed-ucation: An Encyclopedia (2001). He received the Willard Waller Award in 1993 from the American Sociological Association's Sociology of Education Section for the out-standing article published in the field, and American Educational Studies Association Critics Choice Awards in 1995 for Knowledge and Pedagogy and in 2000 for "Schools of Tomorrow," He is coeditor, with Susan F. Semel, of the History ofSchools and Schooling se ries at Peter Lang Publishing.

SUSAN F. SEMEL is Associate Professor of Education at the City College of New York. She is the author of The Dalton School: The Transformation of a Progressive School (1992); coauthor of Exploring Education: An Introduction to the Foundations of Education (1994, 2001); and coeditor of International Handbook of Educational Reform (1992); and "Schools ofTomorrow, " Schools ofToday: What Happened to Progressive Education (1999). She received American Educational Studies Association Critics Choice Awards in 1994 for The Dalton School and in 2000 for "Schools ofTomorrow, "She serves on the editorial board of History of Education Quarterly.

SAM STACK is Associate Professor of Social and Cultural Foundations of Education, De-partment of Advanced Educational Studies, West Virginia University, Morgantown. His academic inrerests include history of progressive education, educational theory, and edu-cational biography. His publications have appeared in various monographs and journals, including Journal ofThought, Vitae Scholasticae, Lock Haven International Review, Journal of Philosophy and Social Science, History of Education Quarterly, and Educational Studies.

WAYNE J. URBAN is Regents' Professor and Acting Chair of the Department of Educa-tional Policy Studies and Professor of History at Georgia State University, Atlanta. He is

x / CONTRIßUTORS

the author of Gender, Race, and the National Education Association: Professionalism and Its Limitations (2000), More Than the Facts: The Research Division 0/ the National Edu-cation Association: 1922-1997 (1998), Black Scholar: Horace Mann Bond, 1904-1972 (1992), and Why Teachers Organized (1982). He is Secretary of the International Stand-ing Conference for the History of Education and a past president of the History of Ed-ucation Society and the American Educational Studies Association.

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above: Margarer Naumburg, n.d. Courresy ofThomas Frank, M.D., personal collection. left: Marietta Johnson, n.d. Used by permission of the Marietta Johnson Museum, 440 Fairhope Ave, Fairhope, Ala. 36532.

left: Helen Parkhurst, n.d. Used by permission of the Dalton School, New York City.

above: Catoline Prau, n.d. Used by permission of City and County School Archives. right: Carmelita Hinton, n.d. Used by permission of the Putney School Alumni Office, Putney, Vt.

above: Flora Cooke. Used by perm iss ion of the Francis W Parker Archives, Chicago, Ill. right: Margaret A. Haley, n.p., ca. 1910-1915. Used by with permission from the Chicago His-torical Society, Prints & Photographs Department, 1601 N. Clark Street, Chicago, BI. 60614-6099.

Ella Flagg Young, (n.p.); (n.d), by Louis Betts (American). Used wirh permlsslOn from rhe Chicago Hisrorical Sociery, Prinrs & Photographs Departmenr, 1601 N. Clark Srreer, Chicago, Ill.60614-6099.

Margaret Willis traveling in Egypt, c 1946, used by permission of the Museum of Education, University of 50uth Carolina.