Commencement Notes, 2001

HISTORICAL NOTES Yesterday being the Day appointed for opening the Academy in this City; the Trustees met, and waited on his Honour our GOVERNOR, to the publick Hall of the Building, where the Rev. Mr. Peters made an excellent Sermon on the Occasion, to a crowded Audience. The Room of the Academy not being yet completely fitted for the Reception of the Scholars, the several Schools will be opened Tomorrow, in a large House of Mr. Allen, in Second street; Those who incline to enter their Children or Youth, may apply to the Rector or any one of the Trustees. The Pennsylvania Gazette, 8 January 1751 After more than a year of latter, the rudiments of reading, writing, preparation, Benjamin Franklin and penmanship. When these and the first Board of Trustees introductory subjects had been completed, rejoiced on the day the Academy of most students expected to step up to the Philadelphia enrolled its first students. English School, where the master taught The Founders had done their work well. "the English tongue grammatically and as a Their appeals to the City Council of Language," as well as "History, Geography, Philadelphia and the Penn family Chronology, Logic, and Oratory." The proprietors of Pennsylvania had typical student completed his work in two achieved both financial and political or at most three years in each school. By support. They had recruited a faculty of the age of fourteen, even the well-educated four, three of whom were experienced young man was expected to enter the work and well-respected masters. By June of place. The aim of the English School, in 1751 they had nearly 100 tuition- Franklin's words, was to qualify its graduates paying students. Franklin was delighted. "Our Academy flourishes for learning any Business, Calling or beyond expectation," he wrote in Profession, except such wherein September. "We have excellent Masters Languages are required; ... they will at present; and as we give pretty good be Masters of their own, which of more salaries, I hope we shall always be able immediate and general Use; and to procure such." withal will have attain'd many other valuable Accomplishments; the Time In that inaugural year the average age of ... being here employ'd in laying such the students was just nine. Those who a Foundation of Knowledge and were younger began their schooling in Ability, as, properly improv'd, may the classrooms of the Mathematical qualify them to pass thro' and execute master and the Writing master. In the the several Offices of civil Life, with Advantage and Reputation to Title page of Idea of the English School by Benjamin first they learned "Arithmetick, Franklin, 1751. Collections of the Walter and Leonore Merchants Accounts, Algebra, themselves and Country. Annenberg Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Van Pelt- Astronomy, and Navigation" and in the Benjamin Franklin, Idea of the Dietrich Library Center, University of Pennsylvania. English School, September 1751 Franklin's bold proposal for higher education in America — that a fully articulated liberal arts education could be acquired in English alone — parted ways with centuries of European practice. It also held little appeal for Franklin's fellow Trustees. Many of them intended to send their sons to England for collegiate or professional education. They hoped the Academy of Philadelphia, like prep schools throughout the British-speaking world, would serve to prepare its students for successful application to an English university. No other purpose justified the investment in an education beyond the age when most young people were expected to enter the work place. Accordingly, the Trustees insisted that the Academy of Philadelphia be modeled on the traditional British grammar school. For more than 200 years, the purpose of the grammar school had been William Birch view of the "President's House," west side of Ninth Street between Market and the preparation of its students for Chestnut. Built for President John Adams but never occupied, the President's House was purchased admission to the university or training in by the University of Pennsylvania in 1801. Penn remained on the Ninth Street campus until its move the professions. The chief academic to West Philadelphia in 1872. Drawn and engraved by William Birch and Sons. Collections of the administrator, or "Rector," was also University of Pennsylvania Archives and Records Center master of the "Latin and Greek School" at the Academy. As the senior member of the faculty, the Rector would be expected The Academy Becomes a College seven liberal arts of collegiate education. to teach Latin, Greek and "higher In 1754 Franklin recruited an ambitious Natural philosophy and ethics (or "moral mathematicks." He would have charge of young Scotsman, William Smith, to teach philosophy"), on the other hand, "Logick, Rhetorick, Ethicks, and Natural represented the "new learning" of Bacon, the oldest students — those generally Philosophy." These were subjects typically Newton, and Locke. By bundling in a between the ages of twelve and sixteen — who had either completed the English reserved for collegiate education in the single portfolio both the ancient learning School course or received primary school British universities. Their combination in and the new, William Smith appealed not education elsewhere. The curriculum a single professorship revealed the only to Franklin, but also to the most began with vocabulary and grammar and profound changes sweeping across higher conservative of Penn's Trustees. soon advanced to writing exercises in education in the 18th century, a rapid Latin. Within two years the students were transition from the "old learning" to the Within six months of his appointment, expected to "turn Latin into English, with new. Logic, rhetoric, and grammar were Smith petitioned the Trustees for an great Regard to Punctuation and Choice of the three time-honored elements of the amended charter, one which would provide Words" and thereafter to compose and medieval "Trivium." For hundreds of years for the granting of degrees. Smith argued deliver speeches in both English and Latin, European scholars had combined them that if a college curriculum were not added with arithmetic, geometry, music, and "with proper Grace both of Elocution and soon, Penn would begin to lose students to Gesture." astronomy (the "Quadrivium") to form the other institutions, where they could earn the bachelor of arts degree. The and 1776; the University of the Trustees accepted Smith's advice State of Pennsylvania graduated and soon applied to the Penn an average of eleven; but in family proprietors for a collegiate the fifteen years between 1795 charter. In 1755 the Academy and 1810, the University of became the College and Academy Pennsylvania conferred fewer of Philadelphia, and in 1757, than five bachelor of arts degrees Penn held its first Commencement. each year. Among the Academy's first It was during the last of these students in 1751, nearly thirty three periods that Penn began to eventually matriculated in the earn a national reputation as a College of Philadelphia and great university for medical fourteen of those earned the education. The Medical bachelor of arts degree. They Department, as it was then formed a very distinguished first known, had been small, class. Three quickly became graduating a total of 120 students high-ranking public officials in in its first quarter century. Like colonial Pennsylvania; three were the College, it was reorganized in elected to the Continental 1792 under the University of Congress; one was a Signer of the Pennsylvania, but unlike the Declaration of Independence; six College, it thrived in its new served as Generals or Colonels in environment. At the the American Revolution; one Commencement of 1796 the was a Signer of the U.S. number of students who earned Constitution; one was elected to the M.D. degree surpassed the the U.S. Congress; two were number who took the A.B. It appointed U.S. Federal judges; was an unheralded signpost in one was elected Governor of the University history. In the fifteen Commonwealth of Pennsylvania; years that followed, the students and eleven became Trustees of the who earned the M.D. degree University of Pennsylvania. became twice, then four times, then six times greater in number Penn in 1801: The College than those earning the A.B. Surpassed by the School Commencement Program of 1851. Among the twenty members of By 1820 the University of the College Class of 1851, the name of Joseph Van Pelt stands out at of Medicine Pennsylvania had firmly Penn today, because it was his nephew, David, who became the largest In 1779, in the midst of the individual contributor to the new University Library in 1960. Collections established itself as the first (and American Revolution, the of the University of Pennsylvania Archives and Records Center at that time, only) national College of Philadelphia became school of medical education. the University of the State of Pennsylvania through several years' training in the and thereby became the first institution of classical languages. In 1801 only twenty- Penn in 1851: The Preeminence of higher learning in British North America four students were enrolled in the Latin Medical Education Leads to Schools to take the name "University." In the years School and only six in the two-year of Law and Engineering that followed, however, the College College course. On the other hand, the By mid-century, enrollment in the Medical struggled to find its place in the University. English and Mathematical schools Department annually exceeded 450 Admission to the College remained open remained very popular, enrolling fully students, more than five times the only to those who first mastered Latin and 80 percent of Penn's 150 students. The enrollment in the College. There were two Greek, and very few Philadelphians were colonial College had graduated an average or three signature events which propelled sufficiently interested to put their sons of seven in the twenty years between 1757 Penn's reputation.

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