From Humble Beginnings to a Historic Mansion

The last decades of the nineteenth century and the early decades of the twentieth were turbulent ones in the history of Negro education. A philosophical debate between two prominent black leaders set the stage for the future actions. W. E. B. DuBois, an intellectual who was the first African American to earn a PhD. from Harvard (1895), and Booker T. Washington, "the most prominent black American of the nineteenth and twentieth century," were both deeply concerned about strengthening the economic position of Negroes in American society.

DuBois proposed that preference be given to educating a "Talented Tenth" of the black population. These well-educated members of the race could in turn uplift the other nine-tenths. Washington, however, was a strong advocate for manual industrial education and believed it to be the model most likely to enhance the employment opportunities of blacks. For Washington, this educational model was the path of least resistance against racism and offered the greatest opportunity for the economic advancement of the race.

"The greatest problem facing the nation fifteen years after the Civil War was the education of a race of people who were treated as sub-humans in a racially hostile environment." When the post–Civil War program (the Freedmen's Bureau) to educate freed slaves ended in 1876, many former slaves still remained uneducated.

In the North, Quakers and colored churches assumed the responsibility of educating blacks. One example of a devoted advocate for the education of black people was the African Methodist Episcopal Church (AME). Although the church had been educating black children through its Sabbath School Program, it realized that there were many more children needing such opportunities. Thus, in 1876 a group of New Jersey affiliates of the church assembled to plan a special mission. This mission began in New Brunswick, New Jersey, where meetings were conducted to decide whether to open a private manual training and industrial boarding school. Emerging from the efforts of this group was a document designated as the "Articles of Incorporation." My grandfather, Rev. Walter Allen Simpson Rice, was chosen to play the central role in the development of the boarding school. However, it was not until ten years later that he actually began to make progress toward the establishment of the proposed institution.

Renting two two-story frame houses on West Street in Bordentown, Reverend Rice launched his bold venture with only eight students. Small and ordinary-looking, these houses became the school's first site. The minister, his wife, his students, and members of his church began an experiment in the education of colored children that in later years would develop into a highly respected and valued educational institution.

Walking the streets of Bordentown and its nearby community, Fieldsboro, Reverend Rice began recruiting homeless, abandoned children and those whose parents were working and had found no appropriate educational facility for them. As a result of his efforts, the student population grew quickly. By the end of the 1894–95 school year, enrollment had reached forty-two students. But from the beginning it was evident that larger facilities were needed. Without them, there would be no way for the young minister to continue to provide colored children with educational opportunities that would lead to economic empowerment. Other properties were available in the Bordentown area, making it possible for Rice, with the help of state appropriations of $3,000, to lease seven small buildings in different parts of the city of Bordentown. Yet in a short time, funds became extremely low, and the young minister spent much of his time soliciting voluntary contributions from whatever sources he could find. During a decade of struggling to keep his school going without adequate funding to support his ambitious project, there was always the threat of failure hovering overhead.

Reverend Rice's willingness to accept leadership in founding a school was admirable but somewhat idealistic. It was idealistic because there were limited funds to support his dream, and resources from church officials were either meager or nonexistent. Nevertheless, his dedication to building a solid financial foundation for his school was unwavering.

There are no known records indicating how the young minister felt about the challenges he faced in attempting to create a manual training and industrial school for colored children during a period of history that was characterized by severe racial discrimination. Undoubtedly, he was too busy to keep a journal or a written account of his early struggles, as did one of his contemporaries, Dr. Laurence C. Jones, who founded the Piney Woods School, a black boarding school in Piney Woods, Mississippi, in 1909. Nevertheless, as knowledge of the school spread, officials at the state level became more interested in supporting Rice in his efforts to make education a reality for at least some of the state's Negro population.

New Jersey was a northern, highly industrial state with abundant opportunities for labor in the trades and domestic service jobs. By 1898, the Negro population of the state was reported to be sixty thousand.

The major purpose of Reverend Rice's school was to help former slaves receive a basic education as well as become economically self-sufficient. Toward this end, the curriculum centered on courses that would fold blacks neatly into a segregated society without antagonizing or competing with the white population. By now the state had realized that it needed to acquire a property that would allow the consolidation of all seven Bordentown School sites. Consequently, with state and federal appropriations, plus generous donations, all amounting to $5,000, the struggling school began its ascent into history.

When making his first report to the state superintendent of public instruction, Reverend Rice made it very clear what this school was going to do for its colored students and in what way its goals would contribute to the economic status of the state of New Jersey:

This school has as its object ... the training of the students for particular and useful industries falling to their race, such as plain needle-work, embroidery, dressmaking, dress-cutting, and designing, housekeeping, cookery ... in a word, domestic service in all the branches; carpentry, pattern-making, turning, and wood-carving, agriculture, and horticulture, together with free-hand drawing, typewriting, and a good English education.

The report listed the salary of the principal, Reverend Rice, as being $1,000 a year, and the five teachers he had recruited had salaries that ranged from twenty dollars to fifty dollars per month. What is most relevant about this report, however, is that the Manual Training and Industrial School located in Bordentown, New Jersey, was now under the control of the state. Subsequently, authority over the Bordentown School was passed from the State Board of Trustees to the New Jersey State Board of Education. Under this body's administration, Bordentown became a part of all the public schools in New Jersey, which included day elementary schools, junior high schools, vocational schools, high schools, schools for teacher training, and a school for the deaf. Like Bordentown, most of these schools were segregated by race. Yet the school was in a special class of its own because none of the other schools were preparing colored students for economic self-sufficiency by training them for trades and domestic services. Thus, this manual training and industrial model was the first of its kind in the Northeast, and it functioned more or less independently. Although the state did have to approve its curriculum and programs, Bordentown was autonomous in making decisions about its students, the hiring of teachers, and its day-to-day operations.

The first major step taken by the board of education was to acquire a piece of land for the school that was appropriate for manual training and industrial education. An extensive search for new facilities for the school's growing population was conducted. The result of this search was that in October 1897 the Bordentown School was moved from its several buildings in Bordentown to a thirty-three-acre plot of land known as the Parnell estate. This property had a farm and several buildings that were suitable for expanding the Manual Training and Industrial School's programs.

A series of owners had lived on the Parnell site, but only one was of particular importance to the future of the developing institution. This early owner of the property, Commodore Charles Stewart, had purchased the farm in 1816, and it had become his home for many years. Stewart was the commander of the USS Constitution. His sailing vessel, popularly known as Old Ironsides, served in the War of 1812. Because of this historical connection, Ironsides became one of the fascinating nicknames by which the Manual Training and Industrial School for Colored Youth was known. Through the years, administrators, teachers, and students developed a strong sense of pride over the historical connection between their school and important events in American history. Later, the celebratory title was adopted as a substitute for the school's original name. Considered a trademark of distinction, the name "Ironsides" became an integral part of the Bordentown School community, and the state was particularly proud of the special significance it added to the colored school's reputation.

Originally, the commodore's mansion had been a one-story home. Stewart expanded it to two stories, and the commodore, his wife, and their two children, Charles and Delia, lived in the mansion. Charles became a civil engineer; Delia married John Henry Parnell, an Irish patriot. Then, in 1869, Charles inherited the property. Later, in 1874, he willed it to his sister, Delia Tudor Stewart Parnell (Pillsbury 1997). Mrs. Parnell lived on the property until her death in March 1898. The will she left designated that her estate should be leased to the state of New Jersey. An article in an issue of the student newspaper, the Ironsides Echo, commented on her death: "It was Mrs. Parnell's wish that 'Ironsides' would be purchased for the site of the Manual Training and Industrial School for Colored Youth, for which it is now leased and arrangements have been made for its purchase through her bankers in New York City."

The school's new location was dramatically different from the humble, two-story frame houses in which Reverend Rice had started his ambitious project. To some, the move to an estate of many acres was quite astonishing. An elegant, picturesque, and expansive campus for colored children in times of racial segregation was hard to envision. Descriptions of the site place its location on the outskirts of Bordentown, "on a high bluff overlooking the Delaware River" (Pillsbury 1997). From its hillside, the property had a panoramic view of the river, which some say inspired visions of Commodore Stewart sailing his warship, Old Ironsides. The beauty of the Parnell estate was the envy of all New Jersey. As the school's history grew, so did its reputation. Visitors, many of them famous, were awed by its magnificent grounds and its ambiance of grandeur. Even today, with all the changes it has undergone, the Bordentown campus still maintains a majestic appearance.

ALMA MATER SONG

Music Arranged by Fred Work Lyrics by L. Granger

Round thy campus, green and lovely, Still our mem'ries wind. So shall our deeds of honor Be forever thine.

"administrators, teachers, and students developed a strong sense of pride over the historical connection between their school and important events in American history."

Expanding the Infrastructure

During the succeeding years, the Bordentown School experienced continuous growth. A transformation of the Parnell estate from a single mansion, a farm, and a few buildings to an educational institution required time and expertise. An architect named Richard C. Dixon from Union, New Jersey, was hired by the New Jersey State Board of Education to draw plans for renovating the property. Having already made a financial commitment to the school, the board decided to invest $25,000 more for a building contract. The contractor, James W. Lanning, was a resident of Trenton.

Contractual specifications required that buildings be constructed of brick, be three stories high, and be spacious enough to accommodate projected enrollments. Completed in 1903, the first building had three floors. On the first floor were workrooms for students to be instructed in cooking, carpentry, and other trades. A second floor was to house classrooms for academic instruction. Religion and moral education were not forgotten. Accordingly, the large auditorium on the third floor was reserved for chapel services.

From the original two-story mansion, the campus eventually grew to thirty-one buildings. At first, only thirty-five acres were used for student dormitories and homes for faculty, administrators, and staff. Up until 1946, the remainder of the property was used for agriculture.

Within the context of a boarding school that taught students trades such as electrical work, plumbing, carpentry, auto mechanics, farming, printing, beauty culture, dressmaking, and domestic sciences, there were always ongoing critical needs. The needs for more dormitory space, faculty housing, basic equipment for the trades, and farm equipment were the factors constantly impinging on increasing the student population, program quality, and living conditions. At the end of the school year, when principals submitted their annual reports, they always included a litany of the outstanding needs for merely achieving a basic standard of education and living conditions. This excerpt from the annual report in June 1919, under a section titled "Pressing Needs," provides a clear example of the urgent situations in which Bordentown frequently found itself:

The school is growing and this growth requires additional equipment. Even with the students now enrolled we are short of classroom space. The classes are too large, therefore requiring additional teachers. The dining room — a dark basement room in the administration building — is crowded. The new girls' dormitory and the emergency barracks for the boys which will be completed next November will relieve temporarily the over-crowded conditions. It seems that are [sic] immediate and pressing need is a large building containing a student dining room with kitchens, and auditorium capable of seating 600, and a gymnasium. This will release space in the present administration building for additional classrooms by allowing the present assembly hall to be divided into classrooms. In short, we need to provide adequate educational facilities for the present and future enrollment before further increasing our dormitory space, or substantially increasing the enrollment.

Beginning with the construction of the administration building in 1903, the rapid advancement of the school's ambitious building program radically changed the institution's facade. Everyone on the campus observed the development of its new look with great pride. The building program was highlighted in a 1922 issue of the school paper, the Ironsides Echo. Student reporters announced that their administrators were quite pleased with what had been accomplished: "The development ... has seen Bordentown grow in the past six years from a membership of one hundred pupils to one of nearly three hundred boys and girls, and from a plant of four buildings to a beautiful campus with a thoroughly modern plant of fifteen buildings." That same issue of the Ironsides Echo noted that $135,000 (from the state) had been awarded to the school for alterations on the administration building and other repairs. New classrooms, chemical laboratories, and other new features would soon be under construction.

The architectural firm Guilbert and Betelle of Newark, New Jersey — the designer of many state institutions between 1910 and 1940 — was engaged to do the construction work. This firm was hired to build many of the school's imposing structures, in "high Georgian Revival design ... They gave the site the look and feel of a small, private preparatory school."