The Teacher in District No. 3

THE CONTRIBUTORS’ CLUB

His name was E. Y. Savage. He came originally from a small college somewhere in Maine. His methods, as I look back on them, were those of genius. The school in District No. 3 under a succession of dry-as-dust principals had degenerated, and the new committee, entering proudly into office, had declared that the coming year should see a change. They wrote boldly to a New York agency. The concrete result was E. Y. Savage. He arrived one windy day in September driving a little nondescript horse attached to a light sulky. He explained that he had to take exercise, and that he was especially fond of this little mare. Later, when it was discovered — with the accompaniment of misplaced dollars — that the little mare’s paces were far from nondescript, the preference was understood.

Mr. Savage engaged board at the most expensive place in town, and took a seat for the year in the First Church. These preliminaries arranged, he settled down to the steady business of enlivening the school in District No. 3. His methods, as I have intimated, were unique. Under preceding instructors, we had ground away at arithmetic in orderly fashion. Beginning each term where we had left off the term before, we had worked drudgingly through rule and application. We had seasons of review and examination. The dim hope that we should some time reach the last page of Greenleaf’s Practical had never consciously appealed to us. It was too remote and shadowy. Without enthusiasm, therefore, we heard the first command of the new campaign, “Take your slates and arithmetics.” We filed into the small recitation room, filling it to the last bench. The Savage — as we soon learned to call him — placed his armchair across the doorway. Arranging his slippered feet against the doorcasing, he opened a book and proceeded to teach arithmetic. The method had no apparent sequence or order. Example and rule, application and answer, chased each other from seat to seat. We came out dazed, but alert. Faint glimmerings of practical application floated before our blinking eyes.

“Gymnastics” was the next order. We marched and counter-marched to the tune of a wheezy old organ, heretofore consecrated to morning worship. It was a little backward, at first, like the rest of us, in catching this new pace. Our exercise the first day must have been entirely “free-hand.” Later,wands, rings, and dumb-bells found their way up the stairs. The gymnastic hour became an escape valve for energy generated in the small recitation room. The term “ gymnastics ” covered many forms of exercise. It included a figure very like a quadrille, and approached at times what, in evening dress, might have resembled a waltz.

Each morning we were marshaled into the little room. Instead of devoting a fraction of a day to each study, we worked all day on the same subject. Even the dullard of the class was cornered and educated. If he failed too ignominiously, a particularly bright little girl would be summoned from the primary room. She would peep shyly in, frightened, and more than half pleased. The Savage would explain very carefully and gravely the point at issue and demand “what the answer was and how she got it ? ” The prodigy would recite in a high bashful treble. The Savage would chuckle, pat her on the head, and send her back to her books with an injunction not to grow too fast; and we would return to arithmetic.

What caused Mr. Savage to sever his connection with District No. 3 I have never known. Three eventful years he ruled over us. Two years in succession pupils went from our high school to college, a thing never before known in the history of the town. But at last something happened. It may have been fate. It may have been the little mare. Mr. Savage drove away from District No. 3, leaving only a breezy memory and a sense of gratitude. As years have passed the gratitude has deepened that for three years, at least, education in District No. 3 had a little wholesome neglect.