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HISTORY OF ERIE COUNTY 243
be provided for each class. An unclassified school was therefore added
to the grades and was found to be of such practical value in relieving
the other grades of transient pupils and of conferring far greater benefits
upon the same pupils Avhile they did remain, that a single school of this
character Avas continued until 1871, or later—twenty-one years or more.
THE SANDUSKY HIGH SCHOOL
It will be remembered that the building intended for the high school
Avas first occupied for this purpose in 1845.
Nothing appears upon the records of the qualifications for admission,
or the studies to be pursued, but the school report for that year SIIOAVS
that, in addition to the common branches, classes AA'ere taught in "Latin
and Philosophy."
In 1846, the sciences taught, besides the common branches, Avere
philosophy, chemistry, physiology, and the Latin and French languages.
In 1847, algebra and astronomy Avere added to the above list, and
140 pupils enrolled as members of the school.
While there was much gratification felt among parents that Sandusky
had, at last, a high school for her own where something more
than elementary branches could be studied Avithout sending their children
from home, still the school directors found that such a school without
any fixed and known rules and conditions of admission, and without
a regular course of study, made their position a very awkward and embarrassing
one. Hence the grading of all the schools at the close of
this year, 1848, and the adoption, a little later, of such a course of
study for the high school as the wants of the public seemed to require.
It is believed that one of the most delicate and difficult duties which
superintendents of school boards have had to perform in Ohio for the
last twenty-five years has been to make up the best possible course of
study for their respective high schools. For it is to be remembered
that no human wisdom can frame a course of study for a public high
school that would be suited to all tastes, or adapted to all localities. And
it is also to be remembered that twenty-five years ago the high school,
as a component part of the common school system, AA'as ah experiment
and a problem to be solved, and that it AA'as necessary to proceed Avith
great caution in introducing sciences or extending studies that involved
an additional tax upon the public treasury.
In our OAVII city, the study of the languages had fallen into such disfavor
that a resolution- Avas adqpted at a public meeting of the taxpayers-and
qualified voters of the city, April-8, 1848, "That all of the
school houses IIOAV in the district, and IIOAV proposed to be built, shall
be used only for common school, excluding all except the English
branches." It Avas necessary, therefore, in preparing a eourse for our
high school, not only to omit the Latin, ahvays and everyAvhere so essential
to good scholarship, but also the Greek and modern languages. The
natural sciences and mathematics must be extended considerably out of
proportion to meet this, then, popular prejudice. The early graduates,