CHAPTER 10. 



PUBLIC SCHOOLS. 



Among the earliest laws of Massachusetts was one compelling all 

 the towns containing fifty householders to support a public school. 

 Gloucester at quite an early date contained the requisite number, 

 but the}'' were so far apart that it was deemed well nigh impossible 

 to gather the children into one school ; and the town's neglect fpr 

 several years to comply with the law, was no doubt overlooked. 

 Private or domestic instruction was not lacking, but it was not until 

 1698 that we find a record of the employment of a public teacher, 

 when, in town-meeting, Thomas Riggs, sen., was chosen to that of- 

 fice, " to have one shilling and sixpence a day during the town's 

 pleasure, and the said Riggs' likeing to carry it on." At that time 

 there was but one Meeting House in town, and there, till 1708, the 

 school was kept. At this date a school-house, twenty-four feet by 

 sixteen, with a height of stud of six feet, was built. This building 

 was erected "to keep a good school in for the godly instruction of 

 children, and teaching them to read and write good English." Until 

 1793 the privileges of the public schools of Gloucester seems to have 

 been confined to the boys of the town, the School Committee of 1790 

 recommending " that provision be made for the education of females, 

 a tender and interesting branch of the community that have been 

 neglected in the public schools of this town." 



In 1804, the town increased its facilities for imparting instruction 

 to all its children, by creating eleven school districts, to defray the 

 expenses of schooling in which, it expended the first year $2,000. 

 This system continued for forty-five years, the districts increasing in 



