New York and Its Institutions, 1609

The "Free School Society," afterwards the "Public School Society," incorporated in 1805, managed by many of the wisest and purest men of the State, was for nearly half a century the great educational power of the city, if not of the country as well, and its managers deserve the lasting praise of posterity. Singularly wise in counsel, and economic in management, collecting vast sums among its friends, employing millions from the public treasury without ever intentionally squandering a dollar, it ran the most unselfish and

brilliant career in the annals of popular education. Still,it came to be questioned whether the work of a whole community should be surrendered to the few, and whether the State did wisely in committing the funds for the education of the children, and the erection of suitable buildings, into the hands of a private corporation, whose affairs might not always be managed by men as wise and good; and after considerable agitation, in April, 1842, the Legislature passed an act, by which the Board of Education, whose members were, until recently, elected by the people, was organized, During the next eleven years, the two organizations continued their independent operations, but the Public School Society, shorn of its former income from the State treasury, found its embarrassments continually multiplying, until it finally accepted a proposition from the Board of Education, to consolidate the two interests, which was practically accomplished in 1853. The property transferred by this society to the Board of Education, though somewhat encumbered, amounted to $600,000, but the fruit of their toil, evinced in the intelligence and virtue of the generations they instructed, was their noblest monument. At the close of the first eighteen years of their operations, they asserted that of the 20,000 poor children instructed in their schools, but one had been traced to a criminal court. During the forty-eight years of its continuance, it had under instruction no less than 600,000 children, of whom over twelve hundred became trained teachers, and one acquainted with its workings declares, that of a class of thirty-two boys in 1835, two have since been judges of the Supreme Court, one a member of the Legislature, one a City Register, several Principals and Assistants in the schools, one an Assistant Superintendent, one a clergyman, and several distinguished merchants. A very remarkable record indeed

The advantage of thus uniting these great educational interests, and of combining the wisdom and skill of those trained veterans, who had so thoroughly solved these problems, appears in the present condition of the schools of our city, which in discipline and scholarship are second to no other in the world. The Board of Education consists of twelve Commissioners, who have the general supervision of the schools, the appropriation of the moneys set apart for their maintenance, the purchase of sites, and erection of new schools, the furnishing of supplies, books, stationery, fuel, and lights. There are also one hundred and ten Trustees, until recently elected by the people, five for each ward, one being chosen each year for a term of five years. There are also twenty-one Inspectors of schools, who were, until the present year, nominated by the Mayor, and confirmed by the Board of Education. The members of our last Legislature, madly intent on the one-man power, vested the entire school authority of the city in the Mayor