Bridgewater College: the First Hundred Years, 1880-1980

I Beginnings at Spring Creek: The Spring Creek Normal School, 1880-1882 In the census-year 1880, the United States of America, extending from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific, had between 50 and 51 million inhabitants, and the country's president was Rutherford B. Hayes. The nation then consisted of only 38 states (26 of them to the east of the Mississippi River) and 10 federal territories. Fifteen years had elapsed since the close of the nation's Civil War between the North and South. The public school system in Virginia, with William Henry Ruffner as its first superintendent (1870-82), was then in its infancy. In the same year (1880), Bridgewater College, a co-educational, church-affiliated liberal arts institution at Bridgewater, Rockingham County, Virginia, had its beginnings in the Spring Creek Normal School, founded at Spring Creek (four miles west of Bridgewater), in the same county as Bridgewater, in 1880, by Daniel Christian Flory (1854-1914), a lay member of the German Baptist Brethren Church (called Church of the Brethren since 1908). Factors Motivating the Founder The need for teacher-training institutions in Virginia, in consequence of the legislative enactment of 1870 for the establishment of a public school system in the state, was an important factor motivating Mr. Flory to open a normal school. More important still was his desire to establish a school where young people, especially of his religious sect, could get a broad, liberal education while surrounded by "wholesome moral and religious influences." The Brethren's Normal College (today, Juniata College), at Huntingdon, Pennsylvania, where Mr. Flory taught the Greek and German languages and literatures during the session, 1878-79, was another influencing factor. "The Huntingdon experiment," he is said to have remarked, "looks like a good idea for Virginia."1 The fact that the German Baptist Brethren did not yet have an institution of higher learning of their own in the Old Dominion induced their youth to attend state (or other) schools and resulted, sometimes, in their joining other churches. Mr. Flory made plans for the founding of the Spring Creek Normal School, in discussions with friends, while serving as principal of the Beaver Creek Graded School (located 1.4 miles northeast of Spring Creek) during the session, 1879-80. 2 1PHB, Southeast, p. 23. 2BMF1ory, p. 13. 2 Beginnings at Spring Creek: The Spring Creek Normal School, 1880-1882 He knew no better place to establish a German Baptist Brethren school than in the Beaver Creek-Spring Creek area of Rockingham County, in which county, at that time, it was reported, lived more German Baptist Brethren than in any other county in the United States.3 The area was well known to Mr. Flory, since it was the locality of his mother's family. During the 1880's, Spring Creek was an enterprising village of a few more than 100 inhabitants, located 10 miles southwest of Harrisonburg, the county seat, in the midst of a prosperous farming section. It had a church, two schools, two physicians, a dentist, and an undertaker; also two stores, a flour mill, a grist mill, a wagon factory, two tinner shops, a harness shop, a tannery, a nail factory, and a shoemaker's shop. Today, however, Spring Creek is "only a landmark" of bygone days. "The town's former glory has faded away."4 SPRING CREEK On the map (above) of the village of Spring Creek in the early 1880's, from Lake's Atlas of Rockingham County, Va. (1885), the arrow indicates the building used by the Spring Creek Normal School. Spring Creek is located four miles west of Bridgewater and 10 miles southwest of Harrisonburg, the county seat of Rockingham County. Opposition Encountered and Support Received But many members of Mr. Flory's religious sect, "men of unimpeachable sincerity and of recognized Christian integrity," opposed his projected undertaking. They had grave doubts as to the benefits of higher education for their sons and daughters. Many associated higher education with worldliness, vanity, and irreligion: colleges were "calculated to lead us astray 3DHZigler, p. 238. 4walter Miller to JWW, Sept. 28, 1954, JWW Papers, AMML. Bridgewater College: The First Hundred Years, 1880-1980 3 from the faith and obedience to the Gospel" and from "the humble ways of the Lord."5 Higher education, furthermore, would "spoil" their sons for farm work. The opponents, declared James R. Shipman, who spoke from first-hand knowledge, were "much greater in point of numbers than the supporters." Mr. Flory agreed. "I am sure a large majority of them," he said, "were decidedly opposed to the institution," the Spring Creek Normal School, which they viewed as "the production of a wild theorist or a crank," and which the "Brethren generally" believed would be short-lived. 6 Mr. Flory, however, was not easily discouraged. He was heartened, moreover, by the encouragement and support he received from certain German Baptist Brethren who appreciated the value of higher education and felt the need to train for church leadership, and who, furthermore, wanted a school controlled by their denomination. Among those advocates of higher education was Mr. Flory's uncle, Martin P. Miller,7 with whom he discussed at length his project of opening a school, and in whose home (near Spring Creek) he was lodging when he taught at the Beaver Creek public school and when he started his school at Spring Creek.8 Announcement of Normal Schools Mr. Flory proceeded to carry out his plan. He issued a printed announcement of a six weeks' summer school for public school teachers that he would conduct at Spring Creek from July 19 until August 27, 1880. That session would devote itself to "methods of instruction and the public school branches."9 His four-page brochure also announced another school that he would conduct at Spring Creek from September 6, 1880, until July 1, 1881, a period of 42 weeks, "to aid young men and women to secure a good, practical education, and fit them for a higher sphere of usefulness in after life," and to give special training to "those who are preparing themselves for the responsible duties of the school room." The fall term, of 16 weeks, would end on December 24, 1880. After one week's Christmas vacation, the winter term, of 13 weeks, would run from January 3 until April 1, 1881, and then the spring term, also of 13 weeks, from April 4 until July 1. The tuition charge would be $3.00 per month; "board in private families, including fuel and light," $10 per month; and "washing," $1.00 per month. 10 Although designed for German Baptist Brethren and under their immediate control, the Spring Creek Normal School was opened to young men and women of all sects and creeds. It offered a hearty welcome to all who sought knowledge.11 Not all who attended were German Baptist Brethren. 5AnMM, pp. 54, 138, 139. 6BC (1905), p. 12. 7Men of Mark, p. 259. Martin P. Miller was the maternal grandfather of Warren D. Bowman, president of Bridgewater College, 1949-64, and of Rufus D. Bowman, president of Bethany Biblical Seminary, 1937-52. 8BC (1930), p. 1. 9c, 1880-81, p. 3. 10lbid., pp. 2-3. 111bid., p. 2. 4 Beginnings at Spring Creek: The Spring Creek Normal School, 1880-1882 TITLE PAGE OF THE FIRST CATALOGUE OF THE SPRING CREEK NORMAL SCHOOL 11880 - 1881 I THE Spirit of the Valley Print, Harrisonburg, Va. Bridgewater College: The First Hundred Years, 1880-1980 5 The Founder Daniel C. Flory was a young man 26 years old, unmarried, and not yet an ordained clergyman. The son of Isaac and Susan (Miller) Flory, he was born on April 3, 1854, on a farm near New Hope in Augusta County, Virginia. He married Catherine S. Driver, daughter of Samuel and Anna (Myers) Driver, of Augusta County, on December 23, 1880, a few months after the opening of the Spring Creek Normal School. He joined the German Baptist Brethren Church in August, 1877, and was elected a minister in that church in March, 1888.12 He had a striking appearance and manner. "He was a big broad-shouldered, square- jawed, self-confident man," wrote Weldon T. Myers. "I can see him yet as he thundered his judgment from the college pulpit. .." He had a powerful voice and a dominating personality.13 The young school founder had certain strong convictions about education. He was a staunch believer, first of all, in co-education. He declared the "co-education of the sexes" to be "the only true method of education." The "reciprocal influence" of young men and women, he believed, would be beneficial "in the Chapel, Dining Room, and Recitation Rooms."14 During his school's first session (1880-81), young women were in attendance, as they have been in every session since. Mr. Flory stood for the development of all aspects of man's nature, the moral, the physical, and the social, as well as the intellectual. He regarded religion and education as "mutual allies in the fulfillment of human possibilities," and believed that "the integration of religion and science" is essential to a developing civilization. He was also convinced that "the effective education of the human mind demanded the highest possible standards of scholarship and the unrestricted opportunity for study, meditation, and expression."15 He had obtained a liberal education. Besides training received at home and in the schools of his community, he studied Latin, Greek, mathematics, modern languages, and natural philosophy through three sessions, 1875-78, at the University of Virginia, where he made a commendable record.16 Interestingly enough, he financed his university education from his patrimony of $1,000, which he received upon reaching the age of 21in1875.17 The School's First Annual Session Six students, "five boys and one girl," entered the Spring Creek Normal School when it opened on September 6, 1880.

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