Page:Women of Ohio; a record of their achievements in the history of the state (Vol. I).djvu/93

Rh Former students of Woodward still keep green the memory of E. JANE WISENALL, 1915-1934, music director, whose leadership in the fine art of helping others was only one of her splendid gifts. MATILDA RABENSTEIN, 1915-1937, had the satisfaction before her death of seeing established a high school course in economics which she was mainly instrumental in planning. The above named are but a few of the women faculty members who in the past have helped to illustrate as well as to pass on the fine tradition — the Woodward spirit— alive and alert in the hearts of the students of today and of tomorrow. Avondale Public School of Cincinnati has long played an important part in the educational life of the community. Today a fine modern building occupies the same site that the early citizens of Avondale purchased in 1848 for school purposes. The first build- ing was erected in 1851 at a cost of $2,750.00. Avondale has from its very beginning ranked as one of the outstanding schools of the community. This has been due to many different influences, but primarily to the teachers who consecrated themselves to its service. Here are outlined the services of a few of the former teachers who were identified with the Avondale Public School for many years. MISS NELLIE M. STANSBURY, MISS EMMA 0. HOWARD, MISS MELANIE A. SCHUTE, MISS EVA HERBST, MISS LAURA HIBBARD, MISS GRACE E. RICHARDSON, MISS EDNA MEADE SPILLARD, MISS ANNIE LENNOX KINSELLA. Columbus was made the capital of the state of Ohio, by legislative action, in 1812. The older portion of the city, named Franklinton, in honor of Benjamin Franklin, by its founder, Lucas Sullivant, was located in 1797, adopted as their home by Sullivant and other pioneers and had grown into a thriving community by the time it was absorbed into Columbus. So records on the earliest school of the community deals with Frank- linton, where a one room log school house was built in 1806 and taught by Dr. Peleg Sisson. The schoolhouse was put up and liberally supported, as was virtually every other enterprise of the thriving pioneer community, by Lucas Sullivant, whose children were among those occupying the slab seats disposed about the big fireplace and the puncheon floor. Columbus had various difficulties in establishing a public school system it was not until 1835, according to MRS. GEORGE L. CONVERSE, in “We, Too, Built Columbus,” that women teachers were employed in the public schools. KATE REESE was the first woman teacher employed and ELIZA- BETH WILLIAMS, who became Mrs. Abel Hildredth, was the second. The first list of women accorded public school certificates includes the names of Nancy Squires, Kate Reese, Margaret Livingston, Phoebe Randall, Lucy Wilson, Priscilla Weaver, Isabella Green, Grace Pinney, Flora Andrews,