When some as yet unborn historian of education takes it upon himself to examine and assess the story of American public education, he may be both comforted and astounded. He will find the number of landmark events staggering and the dramatis personae diverse. The unraveling of local-state-federal relationships will try his patience and the conflicting views on the definition and discharge of educational responsibilities may nag at his preference for clarity and order. Plagued though he may be by the nature and significance of what he surveys, this historian will no doubt realize, among other things, that public education in the twentieth century became a kind of common property.

Bias is a hard word to take, and I do not think that its use is justified in Professor Ralph W. Jones's review of my book, The History of Education (History of Education Quarterly, March, 1965, page 70). The instance he quotes is: “It is pertinent therefore to assert that Dewey rejects any such thing as a spiritual soul and a personal God. His notion of self-realization consequently must be assessed in this context.” This is a statement of fact, not a biased interpretation. The fact is of importance and deserves inclusion in the narration.

The development of education in the British penal colony of New South Wales must be viewed against the background of a penal establishment, the convict population, shortages of food and equipment, stock losses, lack of experienced farmers and craftsmen, the growth of a free element among the settlers, the struggle for economic and political power in the colony, and the forbidding physical limitations of the site of settlement The colony was established, as a receptacle for offenders, on the shores of Port Jackson, described by the first governor, Phillip, as “the finest harbour in the world in which a thousand of the line may ride in the most perfect security.” The Blue Mountains hemmed in the colony to a strip of unsatisfactory farming land, the confines of which were not breached until 1813. Stores were provided for the First Fleet to enable cultivation to commence on arrival, but untold and unanticipated difficulties impeded the attainment of self-sufficiency. The whole establishment Governor included was on short rations for several years.

This review discusses one portion of the education system of England and Wales. It does not consider Scotland which for educational purposes is quite independent and has a rather different system.

The American Revolution brought with it years of hardship for higher education in the new nation. Almost from the outset of hostilities the small colonial colleges suffered in one form or another from the conflict. At Harvard College, dormitories were converted into barracks during Washington's seige of Boston. Princeton's Nassau Hall was damaged in a notable skirmish, and the building was later used as a hospital for the Continental Army. In Virginia, a handsome Christopher Wren building at William and Mary was partially destroyed by accidental fire. Beside such physical damages, collegiate institutions also were beleaguered by interrupted school terms, departures of students and faculty, food shortages, and the steady inflationary price spiral caused by the war. When the peace settlement finally approached in 1782 and 1783, most of these institutions found themselves in tenuous circumstances.

From Reformation times it was not uncommon for the successful businessman or merchant at the end of his life to make material provision for the benefit of his birthplace. Perhaps he left money to alleviate the burdens of the aged poor, or he sought to assist those at the start of life by some form of educational endowment. Alas, many such legacies suffered from the hazards of time, from declining money values, and from inefficient trusteeship. The Dick Bequest, applicable to education in the rural parishes of North East Scotland from the early years of the nineteenth century, was one of the most remarkable and rewarding of endowments. Shrewdly administered, it was through the years adapted to changing circumstances to nourish and sustain the best traditions of the past.

Those interested in the progress of teacher education will profit from reading Elsie A. Hug's review of the origin and development of New York University's School of Education. Though she disclaims any intention to evaluate, she invites sympathetic understanding of the complexity of the problem of institutional growth confronting past and present professional educators. A historian less sensitive to the basically human commitment underlying the history of American teacher education as a unique social experiment might have produced either a dry factual account for data-gathering scholars or a sentimental story for celebrating alumni. Fortunately, she transcends these aspects of antiquarianism by creating knowledge of the past as a source for understanding the present and for shaping the future.