The best of the old-time, one-room schoolmasters was a man who had no formal education.
Samuel Litch was born in Winchendon, Mass., in 1781. In 1790, after his father died, he moved to Weathersfield, Vt. to live with his grandfather.
“He had never attended school, and there he had no opportunities for study until his day’s work on the farm was done,” reports Jaffrey’s 1937 town history. “Books were few in that locality, but he made the most of those that came to his hand. He perseveringly saved all the pitch pine knots that he came across in his work, and with these burning in the open fireplace for a light he stretched himself on the floor during the long evenings and pored over such books as the neighborhood afforded.”
When Litch turned 18, he went back to Winchendon, where for the first time in his life he enrolled in school.
School in Winchendon was not very successful that term; the schoolmaster was unable to keep order and quit after six weeks. Litch, however, apparently made quite a positive impression on his schoolmates, who voted to install him as teacher.
“This arrangement was permitted by the school authorities, and thus began a lifelong service in the interest of education,” states the history.
In 1806, Litch came to Jaffrey, where he taught school for 19 years in various districts in town. Some of his students were so attached to him that they followed him from one schoolhouse to the next, often walking many miles just to study with him.
Teaching, in those days, was only a portion of the job of keeping school. “The position of schoolmaster in his day was not a sinecure,” reports the history. “He rose in the winter season long before dawn and attended to the multifarious duties of his farm. Then he walked from two to six miles, often through the snow and over unbroken roads, to his school. Very likely he had then to build the fire, shovel out the snow from the schoolhouse, and chop the wood. There were very few text books in use at the time and, as a consequence, many of his exercises for the school had to be written on the blackboard. He not only set copies for the writing exercises, but even made the quills from goose feathers for his pupils’ use and in many instances wrote the text books that were used in his school.”
One term, Litch presided over a school of 105 pupils in all grades. He also went to surrounding towns to lecture, and was well regarded as an orator and debater. He also published pieces in the local press under the pen name “Estremadura Valasco.”
“There seems to have been no insubordination in the schools under his administration,” the town history states. “He was the recognized master, and if sometimes his flying ruler came dangerously near the head of some idle or mischievous pupil, his explanation was that the pupil needed it for his mental awakening and he had no time to offer it in any other way. To be constantly on the alert for such pedagogical offerings would of necessity inspire in the mind of the pupil a solemn sense of the uncertainty of life and the value of time and would effectually dissipate the spirit of repose so fatal to intellectual attainment. Master Litch was distinguished for discipline and aptness as a teacher.”
A Look Back originally appeared in the Monadnock Ledger.