Students start arriving at Noyes Academy

The trustees wrote a circular outlining their reasons for deciding to admit black students into their school. When it was printed and circulated, they felt that is was a success, and that they should continue full speed ahead to establish the school. A committee went to the Andover Theological Seminary to hire a teacher for the boys. They chose a man named William Scales, from Lyndon, Vermont. Mary Harris, from Canaan, was chosen to teach the girls.

George Kimball spent the winter of 1835 raising funds for the school. He sold his house and bought another, bigger house. He needed a bigger house because he planned to turn the back half of the house into a dormitory, and the black students would live there.

 

 School was supposed to start in March, and as winter turned to spring, Negro students did in fact arrive in Canaan.

These students came from Massachusetts, Rhode Island, New York City, and various other states. They traveled by stagecoach and boat. Their journeys sound very similar to Simeon Ide's journey to Washington, DC, with some huge differences. When a black people rode on a stagecoach, they weren't allowed to sit inside. They had to sit up on the driver's seat with the driver, in all weather. On a steamboat, black passengers weren't allowed to take cover, but had to stay out on the decks in all weather. March would be a particularly miserable month to travel that way, and the first black student arrived in Canaan on March 31.

The arrival of these black students was a wakeup call to the school's enemies. This was really happening. Young black people were going to live and study in Canaan. Rumors started flying. The whole slave population of the south was about to descend on Canaan. Freed blacks were coming to line Canaan Street with their huts. Black male students would be seen arm in arm with white girls. In July, an unruly mob descended on Canaan with the goal of tearing down the school. Henry Harris describes the scene. “They thronged the streets and fields of Canaan, clamorous and excited.” They proceeded toward the meeting house, on the way to the Academy, when Joseph Richardson, a well known and well respected deacon of the church, came out onto the front steps and started yelling at them. He gave a speech about rights and equity, and public nuisances and mobs. This had the intended affect and the mob dispersed.

Only, however, to meet on July 11^th to plan their next attack. One of the concerns of Dr. Flanders, one of the leaders, was that they were operating outside of the law. I would love to know if this Dr. Flanders was related to Louis Flanders, grandson of Simeon Ide. At any rate, they decided that if they had a legally warned town meeting, it would lend some legitimacy to whatever they decided to do, and would protect them from any legal repercussions. This town meeting was legally warned for July 31.

In the meantime, Canaan was boiling with drama. Another newspaper article in the “New Hampshire Patriot” stated that “Since the establishment of the school, it has been no uncommon spectacle to witness colored gentlemen walking arm in arm with what ought to be respectable white females. And that respectable people opposed to the school, as well as others, have been invited to parties where the colored portion of the school were also invited guests. It is said that one of the principal agitators of the slave question in this state, George Kimball, Esq., and his family, sit at table with a half dozen colored people, while a white girl attends upon them as servant. We do not wonder that the white people of Canaan should consider such an establishment a “nuisance,” and that they should adopt all lawful measures for its removal.” The tea parties were a scandal all on their own.

Wallace tells us that Mrs. Harris had a tea party and invited the blacks, and they attended. Then Mrs. Wallace had a tea party, and didn't invite the blacks, but did invite George Kimball, his wife, ( I wish I knew her name) and Mr. Scales. Henry Harris tells us that Mrs. Harris also invited Mrs. Flanders, who said, “What an insult”, and told everyone that she was so angry she was insane for half an hour, which no one doubted who knew her.” William Wallace was in his twenties while this was going on, and it appears that he remembered it pretty clearly.

Again, I strongly urge everyone interested in Noyes Academy to read Chapter 18 of Wallace's History of Canaan. It is fascinating, and anything but dry. This book was started by Wallace, but actually compiled and edited by Wallace's son.