LETTER.

DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR,

BUREAU OF EDUCATION,

Washington, D. C., July 3, 1875.

SIR: The accompanying pages contain the information collected by this Office respecting the orphan, reformatory, and charitable schools of the United States. While some of these schools are supported by States and cities, most of them are private charities.

The work was undertaken at the request of officers of many of these schools who found themselves unable to procure the information they desired respecting the experience of others, and yet found that such information would be of great service to them in the prosecution of their work.

So little of a permanent or satisfactory character has heretofore been published in an available form, and the statements published were found to vary so much in their scope and character, that, in order to render this publication most useful and authentic, from personal observation, it was determined to put the collection of the material into the hands of a qualified person. Mrs. S. A. Martha Canfield* was selected for this purpose, and this account is prepared by her. She has visited two hundred and forty-eight of the schools and charities mentioned in this pamphlet, personally inspecting their regulations, arrangements, work, and supervision.

Reformatory schools began in this country in 1825, under the name of houses of refuge; later, institutions of this description were called reform-schools, and recently they have been established as industrial schools. These changes of names are significant. In the best institutions of this kind, at the present time, the children are subject to family-discipline, in preference to prison-discipline, and are taught useful trades. The self-respect of the children is thus better preserved and they are better fitted for actual life.

Schools for orphans were first established in this country at Charleston, South Carolina, in 1790.

The great danger to the children in these institutions is that the routine and seclusion to which they subject their inmates may prove

* Mrs. Canfield is the widow of the late Colonel Herman Canfield, Seventy-second Ohio Volunteers, (infantry,) and foundress of the Canfield Home for Colored Orphans at Memphis, Tenn.

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unfavorable to their proper social and mental development. The late war gave rise to an interesting class of these institutions, the soldiers' and sailors' orphans' homes and schools, for which, however, the necessity is passing away.

Another sort of charity for children, the infant-asylum, is also noticed in these pages. Hospitals for children and various miscellaneous charities for the benefit of the young are also mentioned.

Many of the schools and charities above referred to are almost entirely industrial in their training, some of them wholly so.

As an illustration of the importance attached to this care of the young, I have appended material kindly furnished by Elisha Harris, M. D., corresponding secretary of the Prison Association at New York, showing the loss and injury sustained by the community through the ignorance and vice of a certain family. (See Appendix A.)

I have also appended the statistical tables respecting orphan and reformatory schools which appear in the annual report of this office for 1874. (See Appendix B.)

I recommend the publication of these pages as a circular of information, and am, sir, very respectfully, your obedient servant,

REFORMATORY SCHOOLS.

CONNECTICUT.

THE CONNECTICUT INDUSTRIAL SCHOOL FOR GIRLS, MIDDLETOWN, Is designed as a temporary home and school for neglected, vagrant, and viciously inclined young girls, between the ages of 8 and 16 years. It is not a prison or place of punishment, to which its inmates are sent as criminals and by a criminal process, but a house of refuge, to which they are sent as the unfortunate, exposed, and friendless children of the State. They are there to be physically, mentally, and morally trained and fitted for positions of honorable self-support, usefulness, and respectability.

The institution is a private corporation, composed originally of the donors of its funds. By them its affairs were committed to a self-perpetuating board of directors.

It is employed and paid by the State for the custody and education of its dependent and exposed children, thus rescuing them from a life of crime and shame and preparing them for respectability and useful

ness.

The form of committal is by a civil rather than a criminal process. Parents, guardians, selectmen, grand jurors, or any two respectable inhabitants of the town where the girl is found, may present a written complaint to a judge of probate or of the criminal or police court of any city or borough sitting in chambers, or to any justice of the peace of the town where the girl is found, who must thereupon take cognizance of and determine the case.

The form of commitment reads, "to the custody and guardianship of the institution till she is 18, unless sooner discharged according to law." Any two of the directors may discharge a girl for sufficient reasons or bind her to service, still retaining the right of control prescribed by law.

The system of discipline and education is specially adapted to the condition and wants of the girls. It aims to be as nearly as possible that of a well-regulated Christian family. Its culture is physical, sanitary, educational, industrial, and truly christian, but not sectarian.

It was incorporated in 1868, received its first inmates January, 1870, was formally opened the 30th of June following, and both homes were occupied in October.

Its present condition is in the highest degree prosperous and encour

aging. It has a beautifully-located, well-cultivated and stocked farm, two large family-houses, designed for 72 inmates, but capable of accommodating 80. It has a school-building containing two school-rooms, a chapel and box-factory, a superintendent's and farmer's house, two barns, and other valuable buildings. It has a full and well-organized corps of teachers.

More than forty different towns in the State have committed girls to its care. The discipline has generally proved salutary and successful. It is believed that not less than 75 per cent. of the inmates will become respectable women.

The box-factory is an important department of the school and a valuable accessory to its discipline and usefulness. It not only aids greatly in the support of the girls, but will afford to them a respectable means of livelihood in addition to the knowledge of domestic duties acquired by them.

The educational department affords excellent instruction in the elementary branches usually taught in the best common schools.

A matron has the charge of each house, its general superintendence and discipline, under the supervision and with the advice and aid of the superintendent. The assistant matron is also the teacher; she has charge of the sewing-room in the morning and the school-room in the afternoon. There is also in each family a housekeeper, who instructs the girls employed with her in the domestic concerns of the home.

Every girl has some specific duty for each day, and all duties are to be performed promptly and thoroughly. Cleanliness of person and neatness of dress are constantly enforced. No girl is kept from school without the permission of the superintendent, and in all cases the teacher is notified at the opening of school. Each one is considered as in charge of some officer, whose duty it is to know where she is at any time.

Punishments are inflicted by giving demerit-marks; by deprivation of amusement, favorite articles of food, privileges, or indulgences; by imposing some irksome duty; by solitary confinement in room or lockup; and, when absolutely necessary, by corporal punishmeut inflicted by the superintendent or under his direction.

A record of the time, manner, and circumstances of each case of solitary confinement is kept.

All persons employed in the institution, in whatever capacity, are required to devote their entire attention to the performance of their duties. They reside constantly at the institution, and no officer can leave the premises without permission from the superintendent.

The discipline is that in which obedience and order are maintained with the least reproof and punishment. Self-control and christian love are its foundations.

The recent action of the board of directors is worthy of notice: "We also petition that the act of incorporation may be so amended