Radio Script #326
Little Talks On Common Things
January 6, 1957
We have taken strong steps in recent years to increase teachers’ salaries in Maine, but we are sti II at a great disadvantage compdi~u wiTII Tne reSi of the nation. The latest statistics on teachers’ salaries for the 48 states and the District of Columbia are for the school year 1953-54, which of course make the figures two years behind. Salaries were substantially increased in Maine both in 1954-55 and 1955-56, for which years national figures are not yet avai 1- able. But we must bear in mind. that al I of the other states have also increased teachers! salaries during the past two years; so Maine’s comparative standing is probably about the same as it was in 1953-54. Anyhow here are the facts about that year.
The average salary for total instructional staff, including supervisors, principals, teachers, and al I others engaged directly in the instruction of pupi Is, in all the public schools in f’.1aine, was $2,427. Now comes the shocking fact. On th i s bas is of average sa I ary, rvla i ne stood 47th among the 49 un its (the 48 states and D.C.>. Only Arkansas and Mississippi stood lower. The deep South has never been famous for its educational systems. In that region we expect to find the lowest paid teachers. But what do we actually find? The average salaries in Alabama, South Carolina and Georgia, as wei I as in North Car-01 ina, Lou is i ana and Tennessee, are higher than in fila i ne.
Compared with the Maine average of $2,427, the average salary in 15 states exceeds $4,000. Leading the nation is California with $4,787. The four states standing next to California are New York, 1f/ashington, Connecticut and New Jersey.
Now let us take a di fferent criterion — the money expended per pupi I in a II pub Ii c schoo Is of the state. In 1953-54 that per cap ita cost in r·1a i ne was $199.33, lower than any other state except in the South, where the per capita figures fo r A I abama, Arkansas, Georg i a, Kentucky, [\In ss i ss i pp i, North Caro I ina l South Carolina, Tennessee, Virginia and West Virginia (10 states) do not come up to iVlaine’s $199. Thus, whi Ie Maine stands 47th in respect to average sa lary of teachers, she stands 39th in respect to pupi I per capita cost. But Maine is situated in New England, or in what the national Office of Education designates more broadly as the Northeast. In both of these important criteria Maine lags far behind the other northeastern states. Vermont, a state with which Maine is frequently compared, had average salaries of $2,820 along side Maine’s $2~427~ and pupi I per capita cost of $245 beside Maine’s $199.
Of course it costs money to operate our schools. Of course it costs a lot more money than it did n/enty years ago, just as it costs a lot more to operate our homes. Somehow we must find the necessary money so that the deplorable situation of Maine, compared with the other states, shal I not taunt us year after year with be i ng the on I y state in the Northeastern area that lags far beh i nd in the education of its boys and girls.
In the 1830’s al I of Maine and many other parts of the nation were emotionally sti rred by the Mi Ilerite rei igious movement. Let us see if we can describe Tonight just what happened.
Wi II i am Mi Iler, a member of the Baptist church in Low Hampton;- New York, was licensed to preach by that church in 1833. He immediately began to preach the early coming of the end of the world. He had almost no education, but became an earnesT, self-taught student of the Bible, especially of the Old Testament prophets. He worked out a complicated calendar from various prophecies. He interpreted the 70 weeks mentioned in the ninth chapter of Daniel as 70 weeks of years, or 490 years. Since that period obviously began with the decree of King Artaxerxes of Persia, pennitting Ezra to return from captivity to rebui Id the temp Ie at Jerusa lem in 457 B.C., that peri od, accordi ng to Mi Iler ‘s reckoning, ended with the crucifixion of Christ in 33 A.D.
In the eighTh chapter of Daniel the prophecy is made that the sanctuary wi II be cleansed and the desolation ended after 2,300 days. rJ.i Iler said that the l:days1! meant years, and since 2,300 years after 457 B.C. would be the year 1843, he proclaimed that the world would end in that year. A Baptist historian says, “The earnestness of Mi Iler’s presentation of his views, his evident fami I iarity with the Scriptures, and the confidence with which he asserted his interpretation of Their teachings, made a deep impression wherever he went, and other men affected by his spirit accepted his views and went everywhere preaching the gospel of the world’s early end.”
Mi Iler’s fi rst appearance in Maine seems to have been in Portland in jv1arch, 1840, when he was invited there, not by a Baptist, but by the minister of the Christian Church. He held a great revival, converting several hundred persons to his views. His influence was by no means confined to the Christian denomination. BaptiSTS, tv1ethodists and Congregationalists all saw some of their members jo i n the Mi II eri te cause.
1\P,j Iler was in Port land aga i n in 1842, and in September of that year he was in Castine. He also published a paper, proclaiming the Second Coming in 1843, and that paper carried his gospel to almost every town and hamlet in t\1aine. Not all ministers and devout laymen became victims of tv1iller t s delusion.
One such was Rev. Sylvanus Boardman, father of Colby’s famous missionary, George Dana Boardman. In 1842 Dr. Boardman was I iving in New Sharon where his grandson, who was laTer to become a famous minister in Phi ladelphia, was then visiting him. Years later the grandson told what happened on that boyhood visit to his grandfather in 1842. He said that one evening, standing by a window and looking out into the dankness, he noticed a pecul iar I ight and called to his grandfather. The old man came, gazed thoughtfully at the I ight, then said to his grandson, ‘:We I I, George, it may be that Mr. Miller is ri ght, the wor I d may be coming to an end very soon; but right now I’m going to bed.” After his grandfather had left, the boy discovered the cause of the peculiar light. A large, s i I ver bu I Iseye watch hung on the wa I I, and the g I are of the I amp fe I I upon it at such an ang Ie that its po I i shed surface ref lected the light in a weird way through the window.
When 1843 passed without anything happening, Mi I ler revised his calculations, saying it was clear he had made a mistake, and that he was now sure the end would come on October 22, 1844. But that day also passed, and the world was sti I I here.
It was tragic disi I lusionment for many people. Whole families had disposed of all their earthly possessions and prepared themselves for the end. On the night of October 22, 1844, a II over the eastern part of the nati on, hundreds of people donned white robes, assembled on rooftops and in the open on hi I Is, to await the cataclysmic end of the world. But in spite of the disi I lusionment, Mi Iler sti II had a following. He was in Portland again on June 1, 1845 and addressed crowded audiences. But it was evident that curiosity rather than belief attracted the people. They wanted to see what he would say about the fa i I ure of his prophecy.
yJ i th stubborn pe rs i 5 tence f’.1 i I Ie r kept exp I a in i ng that a I I that was wrong was his computation. He kept setting one date after another, all to no avai I, but there is no evidence that he ever abandoned his conviction of the Second Advent in his own time right up to the day of his death.
So long a time has elapsed since Colby Col lege received its present name that every year severa I persons who live w ithi n a few mi les of the col lege ask me how it happens to be called f!Colby~!. Indeed that was not the original name.
The original charter, granted by the Massachusetts legislature in 1813, was to the r-1a i ne Literary and Theol og i ca I I nsti tuti on. Jerem i ah Chap I in, the first head of the institution, at once set to work to make it truly a col lege; not just a training school for the ministry. In 1821 the ~·1aine Legislature authori zed a change of name to \1atervi lie College, and that name was reta ined for 46 years, until 1867, when the Maine Legislature granted the petition of the college trustees to change the name to Colby.
Why did the trustees want to change the name? Because a man named Gardiner Colby had saved the college from closing its doors in thti:: dar-KesT time_in its whole history. The enl istment of young men in the Civi I ‘lIar, especially as The war became prolonged, had so dep leted the college enrollment that by 1864 There were on Iy a handfu I of students left. That was more than ten years before The admission of women; so it looked as if the col lege, already in debt, could not continue in operation.
It/hen the despondency of the trustees and friends of the college had reached its lowest ebb, time came for the Commencement exercises of 1864. In those days Commencement was held in the summer, and in 1864 the date was August 10. The entire graduating class numbered only nine men. In the Junior class were eight, and the Sophomores numbered only five. Vlorst of all, the new class of Freshmen had only 18 members — a total col lege enrollment of just 40 men.
On that eventful tenth of August, 1864 ~,1r. Colby was present at the Commencement Dinner, and electrified the despairing group by announcing that he would give $50,000 toward the col lege endowment provided a general campaign should raise $100,000.
A few months later Lee surrendered at Appomatox, and better Times began. The needed S100,000 was raised. Mr. Colby gladly paid his $50,000 and later added many more thousands of dollars to it. So in gratitude to Gardiner Colby, who had saved the dying col lege, the trustees voted to change the name in his honor. Though at first they had grandiose ideas and cal led it Colby University, a later petition to the legislature changed the name to Colby Col lege. That is how, for ninety years, the college in Watervi lie has borne the name Colby.
~/ho was Gard i ner Co I by and how did he become interested in the co I lege on the Kennebec? He was a Boston merchant, a dealer in what were called West Indies goods, and before the Civi I War he had amassed a fortune in the trade. He also was a staunch Baptist, so wei I known that the great missionary, Adoniram Judson, had made Colby’s Newton home his headquarters when he first returned to the States from his mission to Burma.
In January, 1867, at a prayer meeting in the famous Newton Center church — the church that has for more than a century had a close relation to what is now Andover-Newton Theological Seminary — a wei I known Baptist clergyman, Dr. Samuel Swain, told of an incident which had occurred when Swain was occupying his first pastorate in Portland, Maine. Dr. Swain said that one day, when he was entering the house of one of his parishioners, he met coming out of the house Dr. Chapl in, then president of Watervi lie College. Evidently Chaplin had been cal I ing to sol icit funds for the col lege and had not been successful, for Swain heard him exclaim, fiGod help Watervi lie College!”
Gardiner Colby was present at that prayer meeting and was deeply impressed by Dr. Swain’s story. The picture of the self-sacrificing, devoted Jeremiah Chapl in, pouring out his heart on that Portland doorstep, had turned Gardiner Colby’s attention to the college in Watervil Ie, which he, had often been asked to help and had as often refused. That night he said to his wife, l~Suppose give $50,000 to \1atervi lie College!!. And with Mrs. Colby’s approval, that is jus t what he did.
Year: 1957