In 1853 Reverend Doctor John P Gulliver, an educator and minister, sent letters of solicitation to the “wealthiest and noblest” people in the Norwich area. In this letter Gulliver outlined his plan “to establish a free academy to provide education for mechanics, navigators and agriculturists…that young ladies shall be educated here…to offer to the poorest boy in the community, who aspires to pin himself to the noble fraternity of scholars, the opportunity to fit himself for the university or the scientific school…” - Reverend Dr. John P. Gulliver
At the time, bustling Norwich, Connecticut, had more millionaires than any other town in New England. Dr. Gulliver appealed to ten of these millionaires and asked for a donation of $7,500 from each of them. Forty people made donations ranging from $500 to $7,500 and by 1855, $76,000 had been donated. This money was then earmarked in the following manner: $50,000 would establish an endowment to cover teachers’ salaries, $8,000 would be used to purchase 5 ½ acres of land and $18,000 would be used for building construction. (An additional 7 ½ acres of land were donated by General William Williams, and a fund of $10,000 was raised for equipment.)
After it was petitioned by a member of the founding group, the Connecticut Legislature passed an act of incorporation for the new academy. This act provided for 25 corporators and a board of 12 trustees chosen from the corporators. Each trustee would hold office for three years, and four were elected each year. - Elbridge Smith
In 1856 Dr. Gulliver and the original Board of Trustees persuaded Elbridge Smith to leave Deerfield Academy and become Principal of The Norwich Free Academy. Mr. Smith had difficult tasks before him: to set the standards for a new school and to lead that school through the period of the Civil War. He also had to take on the role of teacher for the third and fourth year Greek classes.
The building in which Mr. Smith and his faculty of five set to work was dedicated on October 21, 1856. The 11-room structure was located on the donated parcel of land. - The Academy's First Building
The ground floor contained the Peck Library and three recitation rooms, while the second floor held the boys’ and girls’ coatrooms and the main assembly or study room. The third floor had five additional recitation rooms, and the tower held the administrative office and one small seminar room. During the Smith administration and up until 1932, admission to the school was through the successful completion of the entrance examination. This exam covered spelling, word definition, grammar, geography and arithmetic. In September 1857, the local newspaper reported that of 35 candidates, 19 passed the entrance exam. The Academy provided 3 courses of study comprising 18 subject matter fields: College preparatory focused on classical subjects and prepared students for a university education, while scientific focused on mathematics and prepared students for further study in science institutions. The third course of study was designed for students who would end their education at The Norwich Free Academy; it focused on practical life skills.
In 1858 the school day started at 8:30 a.m. and closed at 1 p.m. with one-half hour for lunch. Each class was 45 minutes long, with 15 minutes each day given over to devotional exercises and spelling. On Wednesday music was available to students from 8 to 9 a.m. Special studies were also offered at this time. During the first two years, Special Studies included Rhetoric; this is recitation from text plus short exercises. Later, formal composition was offered every two weeks, with an hour’s consultation on each theme. Also an exercise in reading was held each week, and the students read before the entire school every two weeks. The program also included penmanship once a day and fine arts once a week. Students attended school from the middle of September to the middle of July, graduating just before the July break. Although it would seem that the school year then was longer than it is today, it was not. Although the summer break was shorter then, vacation periods throughout the year were longer than they are now. - William Hutchinson
In 1865 Elbridge Smith resigned, and the Trustees invited William Hutchinson to become Principal. A graduate of Yale University, Dr. Hutchinson also held a Divinity degree. He had taught at Yale and Lawrence Academy, as well as overseas in Turkey. He was a member of the Norwich Board of Education, Otis Library and the Broadway Church.
During his term at the Academy, a local businessman, William Slater, expressed an interest in finding a way to honor his distinguished father, John Fox Slater, a benefactor to education. Dr. Hutchinson suggested a building for The Norwich Free Academy, and Mr. Slater provided $100,000 for its construction.Designed in the Richardsonian-Romanesque style by Worcester architect Stephen Earle, the building housed a large auditorium on the first floor with library rooms and classrooms on the second floor. A large balcony on the second floor provided additional space. - William A. Slater
Dr. Hutchinson’s interest in community betterment through education abruptly ended with his early death in 1885. Turning once again to a Yale graduate, the Trustees called Dr. Robert Porter Keep to become the third Principal. Dr. Keep had been an honor student at Yale, and then he had taught at West Point before returning to Yale as a tutor. Following this position, he served as U.S. Consul General in Athens. It was in this post that he deepend his knowledge of the cultures of Greece and Rome. At the end of this diplomatic tour, he returned to teach at Williston Seminary, from which place he accepted the position at The Norwich Free Academy. All of this early experience was to be used in his new position. His first major action was to persuade William Slater to contribute a collection of Greek and Roman casts for the new Slater Hall. - Dr. Robert Porter Keep
The Academy’s curriculum began to grow during the 1890’s. The Norwich Art School was formed in 1890 to make the Slater collections more useful to the school and the community. The first classes met in the Slater Building, where the cast gallery provided an excellent laboratory. As the art school classes became more popular, it was decided that the art school deserved a building of its own. The director at the time, Ozias Dodge, and his wife called on Colonel Charles Converse, who was a wealthy manufacturer with a strong interest in art and the Academy. They asked him to fund the construction of the building, when they were told by the Principal that funding would be an issue, and he agreed. Reflecting the growing importance of business skills, bookkeeping was added to the curriculum in 1890. Then in 1891 Isiah Olcott began teaching an industrial arts class. The group met in the Slater basement daily, and their first task was to provide work- benches for their own use. - Manual Training Building
Impressed with the work of this class, the Trustees voted in 1893 to provide “a simple building” to house a Manual Training Department. When completed in 1895, the structure provided space for carpentry, machine work, printing and mechanical drawing; it also contained a farrier’s shop and a cooking school.
When Dr. Keep resigned in 1903 to work with an aunt at a school in Farmington, Connecticut, the Trustees asked Henry A. Tirrell to become the fourth Principal in 1904. Mr. Tirrell had himself graduated from the Academy in 1890 and was an excellent student and athlete. He received his B.A. from Wesleyan University and taught in Pennington, New Jersey before teaching at the Academy.
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