A Brief History of the Sunday School of Evangelical Lutheran Church in Frederick, Maryland by Francis Reinberger

A Brief History of The Sunday School of Evangelical Lutheran Church in Frederick, Maryland By Francis Reinberger Preface This brief history is prepared to honor the founder of our Sunday Church School, the Reverend Doctor David Frederick Schaeffer, and to pay tribute to all the men and women who, with devotion and love, have served as the officers and teachers of the Sunday Church School. Obviously, no attempt is made here to be exhaustive; that task will await the future historian. The writer is pleased to acknowledge his indebtedness to the late Abdel Ross Wentz, the author of The Lutheran Church of Frederick Maryland, 1738 – 1938. Where possible, the records of the Mathenian Association (1820- 1837) and later the Sunday School were examined. Included here as an appendix is the address of the writer on the occasion of the 160th Anniversary celebration of the Sunday Church School, held on April 20, 1980. Any errors in the following belong solely to the writer, who welcomes any corrections. 1. A School is Born “At a meeting of Gentlemen favorable to the establishment of a Lutheran Sunday school in Fredericktown held on Saturday evening, September the sixteenth in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and twenty…” So began the records of the Sunday School of Evangelical Lutheran Church in Frederick Maryland, one of the oldest institutions of this kind in Western Maryland, perhaps in the entire state. This meeting of Christian “Gentlemen” – one wonders why ladies were not included—led to the formation of the Mathenian Association, a name testifying to the scholarship of the guiding spirit of the new institution, the Reverend David Frederick Schaeffer, the pioneering pastor of the Frederick Church. The term “Mathenian” was taken from the Greed mathētēs, meaning “learner” or “pupil.” (A disciple of Jesus was a mathētēs.) The new school retained this name until 1837, when it was changed to the Evangelical Lutheran Sunday School Association of Frederick City. This event took place just forty years after Robert Raikes had established the first Sunday School in Christian history in 1780 in the city of Gloucester, England. The purposes to be served by the Mathenian Association were very similar to those of Robert Raikes. Let its first constitution speak for itself: “The object of this association shall be to instruct children to read, to improve their morals and contribute everything possible to make them useful members of society and the blessed children of our heavenly Father and to obtain in some degree the object in view particular attention shall be paid to religious instruction according to the holy scriptures and the catechism of the Lutheran Church.” The school met in the beautiful gray limestone church of the Lutheran congregation, which had replaced the log church in 1762 on the spot where the present parsonage stands. The larger part of the old stone church still stands as the rear portion of the present church building, housing Trunk Memorial Hall and choir rooms. Each Sunday afternoon the session of the Mathenian Association “opened and closed with singing and prayer.” The boys and girls of the congregation and community who were enrolled in the school were grouped into classes according to their ability to read and spell. These groups were broken down into sections of six, each with a teacher, 1 who was appointed for a term of six weeks. Those students who could not read were taught the letters of the alphabet, then reading and spelling. Those who could read were expected to memorize portions of scripture, verses of hymns, and answers to the catechism of the Lutheran Church. The schedule for the classes was laid out with definite order. After the opening of school with singing and prayer, the classes met with the teacher first hearing the memory work of the boys and girls. After this the students read one or two chapters of scripture which the teacher then explained to give moral and spiritual instruction. The exercise of discipline in the school must have held a high priority. Teachers were instructed to keep strict order. Students were not permitted to leave their seats “more than once during school except in a case of great necessity.” If students broke this rule, they were not allowed to stand by the stove after recess in cold weather. An example of the regulations governing the Mathenian Association is the following, taken from the Record for September 8, 1821. “The committee (i.e., the Committee on Superintendance) being desirous that the church and surrounding premises may not sustain any injury in consequence of the school being held therein have adopted the following regulations to be strictly and rigidly enforced… The children shall on the opening of the church or as soon thereafter as they may attend take their respective seats and observe silence and order until taken charge of by the teacher. It shall be the duty of the teachers to command the scholars of their respective sections not to injure the pews by scratching or soiling them in any manner, under the penalty of forfeiting one blue ticket.” “What blue tickets?”, the reader will ask. For a long period of its history the Mathenian Association, later the Evangelical Lutheran Sunday School Association, used a system of rewards and punishments. According to its revised Constitution of 1837, the following schedule of rewards was practiced: one blue ticket for attendance; one blue ticket for good behavior; one blue ticket for memorizing a hymn or six verses from the Bible; two blue tickets for memorizing page of the Catechism. Six blue tickets could be exchanged for one red ticket. These could be used to “buy” books, Bibles, testaments, and hymn-books. It must have required quite a clerical system. The government of the school was in charge of a “Committee of Superintendance” (sic!), consisting of the officers and six additional men. These persons managed the school in all respects. Taking turns they also served as the weekly moderators, opening and closing the school, maintaining its discipline, and overseeing its instruction. Even within this government strict discipline was exercised. On December 9, 1821, “Jacob Hart was fined twelve and a half cents for neglect of duty as moderator in August last.” Two years later the fine for a neglectful moderator was increased to twenty-five cents. The progress of the school was steady and must have been gratifying. The first annual report, delivered in 1821, showed that during the first year twenty nine boys and twenty five girls had memorized 30,462 bible verses, hymn verses, and answers to the Catechism. Three years later 263 students were enrolled, who memorized 71,206 verses. Around the same time as the establishment of the Mathenian Association in Frederick, the few Sunday Schools already in existence in the cities of the Easter seaboard—Boston, New York, Philadelphia,--acted to form the Philadelphia Sunday and Adult School Union. On March 24, 1821 the Lutheran School in Frederick applied for membership in the Union and was admitted. For many years thereafter, the local school secured its study materials, books, tracts Bibles, and hymnbooks from the Union. These items were shipped by boat from Philadelphia to Baltimore and hauled by wagon to Frederick. 2 The success of the Lutheran School soon caused other churches in Frederick County to establish similar schools. Two years after its founding the German Reformed Church founded a Sunday School. By 1824 enough Sunday Schools operated in the County to ally the formation of the Frederick County Sunday School Union, which the Mathenian Association joined, leaving to lapse its membership in the Sunday School Union (the old Philadelphia Union). With the passing of the years a wise policy was adopted by the Committee on Superintendance to assure the school of a supply of teachers. Urged on by the growth of the school and the limitations of space, the Committee determined that when girls reached twelve years of age, and boys fourteen years, and had attained proficiency in the subject matter, they were “dismissed as scholars and reserved as teachers.” Thus, by 1828 nearly the whole of the teaching force of the Mathenian Association had been students in the school. The leadership of the Association never stopped seeking ways to increase the benefits of the school. In 1826 it established a Library Association “in order to secure to the rising generation of this city the blessing derived from the perusal of good and valuable books…” Each year certain monies were appropriated for the purchase of additional volumes, while a special committee was given the responsibility for making a careful selection of the titles to be added to the growing collection. Not all was joy in the progress of the school. In that day of less developed medical and sanitary methods there were occasional outbreaks of disease. Inevitably death entered the circle of the Mathenian Association. It happened first less than a year after the school opened. A lovely, bright young girl was taken mortally ill. Parents, Pastor, and physicians had to look on helplessly while the fever drained away her life. After her death, the entire Sunday School moved in sad procession from the old stone church to accompany their young friend to her resting-place in the churchyard. Thus the beginning years passed, and all were gratified by the achievements of the Sunday School. Dr. George Diehl, a later pastor of Evangelical Lutheran Church, summarized the feelings of all in an address at the fiftieth anniversary of the Sunday School in 1870: “They believe that much good has been accomplished. The teachers have in the main been faithful, and the scholars diligent.

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