CHAPTER FIVE TEACHING AT YPSILANTI'S NORMAL COLLEGE The abundant campus of the Normal College which sprawled care­ lessly over ten acres of hillslope to the west of the Huron River, was an important part of the town. To insure the selection of Ypsilanti as the site of the State Normal, the citizenry of the 1840's, had guaranteed $13,500, temporary rooms, and the salary of the principal teacher of the model school for five years.! Ypsilanti was thus chosen in 1849 as the site of the State Normal notwithstanding requests from the towns of Jackson, Marshall, Gull Prairie, and Niles. Sixth of its kind established in the United States and first normal to open its doors west of the Allegheny Mountains,2 the school published its earliest catalogue in 1853. Desire to emulate European normal school example probably provided the initial impetus for the appearance of geography in the Michigan Normal curriculum. Students entering the two year English course were required to "review Mitchell's Geography" over a seven­ teen week term in the first year, and "St. John's Geology" in the second year and geology in the third year. It is not known who taught the geography courses from 1853 to 1860 but in the latter year John Goodison commenced the teaching of three geography courses and some drawing, a position3 he held from 1860-1861, 1862-1869 and 1885 until his death in October 1892. Goodison's sudden death in 1892 led to the hiring of the twenty one year old Charles T. McFarlane, recently graduated from New York State Normal College. McFarlane rapidly won for himself a name in geography throughout the state; in Educators of Michigan one may read: 4 Although among the youngest members of the Normal faculty he has already proven himself to be one of the most efficient before classes. 78 / MARK JEFFERSON: GEOGRAPHER As presented in this department Geography takes on a wholly new dress. Its effects are educative as they were not once, and are not in places supposed to be. The training partakes of the close observation and abundant inference of the sciences; of much of the close reasoning of physics and mathematics; and the rich insights into the ground of history and the social life. Geography with Professor McFarlane is among the popular subjects of the school, large classes electing them beyond all requirements. Indeed, Isaiah Bowman who had commenced teaching in 1896 in the rural schools of St. Clair County, Michigan, attended teachers' institutes where he heard McFarlane "giving his enthusiastic speeches on geogra­ phy." John Munson, President of the Normal 1933-1948 and one-time student roommate of Bowman, claims that Bowman derived his initial inspiration for geography from McFarlane.5 Indeed, under McFarlane's guidance several students became very interested in geography: three such pupils were H. H. Barrows, R. D. Calkins, and D. H. Davis, later respectively geography department heads at the University of Chicago, Central Michigan College, and the University of Minnesota. McFarlane gave heavily of his time to geography, followed closely the recommen­ dations of the Committee of Ten, 1892, and selected his geography assistants with care-Miss Averett, H. Barrows, R. Calkins, and Miss Lodeman. In 1897, at a time when no other state-supported institution of higher learning in Michigan was offering geography and when only eight uni­ versities in the country were offering any geography,6 Ypsilanti's Nor­ mal was one of several such schools assuming a very responsible charge in behalf of the development of geography in America. Empowered to award the bachelor's degree-the first teachers college in the United States to receive this authority---the pedagogical influence of the Nor­ mal College was unequalled in the State of Michigan. In 1898 McFar­ lane availed himself of a sabbatical leave, traveled to Europe and stud­ ied under Penck at the University of Vienna for one year. He returned in 1899 to experience the fiftieth anniversary of the founding of the State Normal School, was elected to the Faculty Council, and witnessed the graduation of the 3,347th student who had studied geography at the Normal. The Normal library under McFarlane's insistence was by 1900 subscribing to the Geographical Journal, Journal of School Geography, National Geographic Magazine, Petermann's Mitteilungen, and the Scottish Geographical Journal. McFarlane had brought youth, vigor, and administrative ability to the service of geography at the Normal. The following year McFarlane left Ypsilanti to assume the principal­ ship of the New York State Normal School, Brockport; by this time he TEACHING AT YPSILANTI'S NORMAL COLLEGE /79 had managed with his assistants to offer eight courses in geography: Elementary Geography, Physical Geography, Teachers Geography, Geographic Material, Physiography I, Physiography II, Geography of the U.S., Geography of Europe. In the same year, 1901, the Michigan State Board of Education awarded McFarlane an honorary Master of Pedagogics degree, and he was appointed associate editor of The Bulle­ tin of the American Bureau of Geography. Later, McFarlane was awarded a Doctor of Pedagogics degree from his alma mater (1903) and his name became associated with Teachers College, Columbia, and the Brigham-McFarlane "Essentials of Geography" series. Shortly be­ fore McFarlane left Ypsilanti, the student newspaper proclaimed, "The Normal is again to lose one of its best teachers, this time from the geographical department. Prof. McFarlane has been called to Brock­ port.. ."7 W. M. Davis at Harvard was quite aware that geography was being fostered and nurtured by the normal schools of the country. Guyot had lectured geography at Princeton (1854-1880) and Gilman at Yale (1863-1872), but as Dryer has observed "not incident to any general growth, but as local and personal sportS."8 It was with patience that American geographers had to await the founding of the first university department of geography in the country at the University of Chicago, 1903. In the following decades a large number of the country's universi­ ties created departments of geography. But the movement was slow, and the normal school continued to remain responsible to the teaching of geography.9 The contribution of the normal school in helping geogra­ phy win acceptance as a subject worthy of a place in higher education remains unwritten. The work of many normal school geographers in the early years of this century has remained a matter of local lore, but a few dedicated spirits necessarily win mention: R. M. Brown (Worces­ ter, Massachusetts); R. D. Calkins (Mt. Pleasant, Michigan); J. F. Chamberlain (Los Angeles, California); E. Van Cleef (Duluth, Minne­ sota); S. W. Cushing (Salem, Massachusetts); C. R. Dryer (Terre Haute, Indiana); W. M. Gregory (Cleveland, Ohio); G. J. Miller (Mankato, Minnesota); W. J. Sutherland (Platteville, Wisconsin); R. H. Whitbeck (supervising state normal schools in New Jersey). Davis did not wish to see geography decline in Ypsilanti with the departure of McFarlane. lO He requested Harvard secretary Hurlburt to inform Jefferson immediately of the vacated position. Jefferson ad­ vanced his candidacy at once, and with Harvard support, was awarded the post. By 1901, the Normal, an appellation that was understood throughout the state, had enrolled over 1,300 students, boasted twelve departments, 80 I MARK JEFFERSON: GEOGRAPHER a library of 22,000 volumes, and a faculty of 53 members. Only three years previously the institution had awarded its first bachelor's degree, and assumed the name, Michigan State Normal College.ll It was in the classrooms of the Normal between the years 1901 and 1939, that Jefferson was to leave such an impress in the matter of teaching geogra­ phy. Soon after his arrival, Jefferson was introduced to the President of the Normal, a former professor of mathematics, Elmer Lyman. Extend­ ing his hand, the President announced he was glad to shake the hand of the new drawing and geography department head, but Jefferson would not respond to the toast. Eventually President Lyman shook hands with the Head of the Department of Geography. Drawing had become a separate department. There were few schools in the U.S.A. of 1901 that could boast an autonomous department of geography and fewer that grew with the firmness and rapidity of the department at Ypsilanti. Jefferson's longev­ ity as department head at Ypsilanti's "nursery of geographers" augured well for a continuity in growth and philosophy that was not unfulfilled. In 1902, Jefferson was offering a variety of eight courses in geography during the year different in content from those offered by McFarlane; by 1912, he offered twelve courses in the catalogue, by 1925, an ex­ panded staff consisting of three full-time members jointly offered 25 courses, an offering that may be recognized as one of the largest in the United States at that time. Between 1901 and 1939 the Department offered 65 different courses; Jefferson, sooner or later, personally taught over 60 of these. I2 Geography was offered at extension centers as far north in the state of Michigan as Traverse City, Cheboygan, and Bad Axe by Margaret Sill and Ella Wilson. Between the years 1901 and 1939 it is probable that Jefferson personally addressed himself to the task of teaching 15,000 different students at the Normal. His colleagues, Margaret Sill and Ella Wilson, together with other assistants, probably addressed a further 7-8,000 different students. It is conservatively esti­ mated that 80 per cent of the Normal's graduates entered the teaching field, that Jefferson directly influenced 12,000 teachers, and that the Jefferson department influenced 18,000 teachers. In turn, Jefferson and geography were passed on to another generation of students through the influence of these teachers, many of whom used Jefferson's text books and notes taken in his classes.