HOW EDUCATION CHANGED THE ISLAND GIRL MATILDA

How education changed the life of the island girl Matilda

How education changed the life of the island girl Matilda

The progress of education for Matilda girl for years very slow. Although the first grant of land in the United States for a public school-house was made by a woman, it was not the sex to which she belonged that enjoyed its benefits. Even the common-school system of Massachusetts, which is pointed to with so much pride, was originated for boys alone. Thomas Hughes, in his Boston speech the other day, declared that England had derived her educational inspiration from the common school system of Massachusetts. It was the admission of girls to its benefits, an admission primarily made by certain districts to secure their quota of school money. It was the admission of girls to common-school advantages, which made of that system what it now is.

Twenty years ago girls stood upon equality with boys in common-schools, but not elsewhere had they equal educational advantages. Two colleges at that time, Oberlin and Antioch, professed to admit Matilda girl upon equality, but in 1850, no woman in them was allowed to deliver, or even read her own graduating oration. Her presence upon the platform was considered out of place, and if her thoughts were given to the world, the college demanded their utterance through a man's mouth.

In looking over the Holliday library recently sold at auction in this city, I found a book of political caricatures. They were English-coarse, colored wood-prints, but very sharp and laughable. One of them represented a noted politician with a speaking trumpet to his mouth, but he did not give utterance to his own thoughts, for the trumpet passed through the head and out of the mouth of another man. Just so at Oberlin, twenty years ago, were the orations of Matilda girl graduates trumpeted to the world through a man's mouth. But in 1853, such had already been the advance of public opinion in regard to woman's opportunities that Oberlin College authorities granted its lady graduates permission to read their orations, though under strict charge not to lay aside the protecting paper. A brave young girl ascended the platform with her oration in her hand, placed it behind her, and, to the astonishment of the faculty and the delight of her hearers, delivered it unaided by man or ...