Elk Falls, Prudence Crandall

  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prudence_Crandall

Prudence Crandall  

 (September 3, 1803 – January 27, 1890) was an American schoolteacher and activist.  

She ran the first school for black girls ("young Ladies and little Misses of color")  

in the United States,  

located in Canterbury, Connecticut.   

When Crandall admitted Sarah Harris, a 20-year-old African-American female student in 1832 to her school, 

 she had what is considered the first integrated classroom in the United States. 

 Parents of the white children began to withdraw them. 

 Prudence was a "very obstinate girl", according to her brother Reuben. 

Rather than ask the African-American student to leave, she decided that 

 if white girls would not attend with the black students, she would educate black girls. 

 She was arrested and spent a night in jail. Soon the violence of the townspeople forced her to close the school. She left Connecticut and never lived there again. 

Much later the Connecticut legislature, with lobbying from  

Mark Twain, 

 a resident of Hartford, passed a resolution honoring Crandall and providing her with a pension.  

Twain offered to buy her former Canterbury home for her retirement, but she declined. 

___ 

"After the death of her husband, Crandall relocated with her brother Hezekiah to Elk Falls, Kansas,  

around 1877, and it was there that her brother eventually died in 1881. 

A visitor of 1886, who described her as "of almost national renown, with "a host of good books in her house", quoted her as follows:

"My whole life has been one of opposition.  

 I never could find anyone near me to agree with me.  

NoEven my husband opposed me, more than anyone. He would not let me read the books that he himself read, but I did read them.  

I read all sides, and searched for the truth whether it was in science, religion, or humanity. 

 I sometimes think I would like to live somewhere else. Here, in Elk Falls, there is nothing for my soul to feed upon.  

Nothing, unless it comes from abroad in the shape of books, newspapers, and so on.  

There is no public library, and there are but  

one or two persons in the place that I can converse with profitably for any length of time.  

No one visits me, and I begin to think they are afraid of me.  

I think the ministers are afraid I shall upset their religious beliefs, and advise the members of their congregation not to call on me, but I don't care.  

I speak on spiritualism sometimes, but more on temperance, and am a self-appointed member of the International Arbitration League. 

 I don't want to die yet. I want to live long enough to see some of these reforms consummated. "

Dear Prudence, won't you come out to play?

Dear Prudence, greet the brand new day 

The sun is up, the sky is blue

It's beautiful and so are you 

Dear Prudence, won't you come out to play? 

Dear Prudence, open up your eyes

Dear Prudence, see the sunny skies 

The wind is low, the birds will sing

That you are part  

of everything 

Dear Prudence, won't you open up your eyes? 

Look around, 'round ('round, 'round, 'round)

('Round, 'round, 'round, 'round, 'round)

Look around, 'round, 'round ('round, 'round)

('Round, 'round, 'round, 'round, 'round)

Look around (ahh) 

Dear Prudence, let me see you smile

Dear Prudence, like a little child 

The clouds will be a daisy chain

So let me see you smile again 

Dear Prudence, won't you let me see you smile? 

Dear Prudence, won't you come out to play?

Dear Prudence, greet the brand new day 

The sun is up, the sky is blue

It's beautiful and so are you 

Dear Prudence, won't you come out to play? 

Source: LyricFind

Songwriters: John Lennon / Paul McCartney 

___ 

Crandall was uncertain about whether to admit Harris, whom she liked, she consulted her Bible, which, as she told it, came open to Ecclesiastes 4:1:

'So I returned, and considered all the oppressions that are done under the sun:  

and behold the tears of such as were oppressed,  

and they had no comforter; 

 and on the side of their oppressors 

 there was power; but they had no comforter." 

"As word of the school spread, African-American families began arranging enrollment of their daughters in Crandall's academy. 

 On April 1, 1833, twenty African-American girls from Boston, Providence, New York, Philadelphia, and the surrounding areas in Connecticut arrived at Miss Crandall's School for Young Ladies and Little Misses of Color. " 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prudence_Crandall 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prudence_Crandall