1851 – Letter from the Principal of the Willoughby Female Seminary requesting a former student to take a part-time teaching position at the school
Willoughby, Ohio: 1851. Envelope or Cover. This three-page letter on illustrated school stationery is dated September 1, 1851. It was sent by Alvan Nash, the Principal of the Willoughby Female Seminary in Ohio to Miss Ellen E. Pierce at Hamlet, New York. It is enclosed in its original mailing envelope which bears a circular Willoughby, Ohio postmark dated September 1 along with a “Paid” handstamp and a manuscript “3” rate mark. In nice shape.
The large letterhead illustration depicts a front-on view of the six-columned school building with about 40 women and one man gathered on its porch or adjacent front yard.
In the letter, Nash asks, actually begs, Ellen to return to the seminary as a part-time teacher. It reads in part:
“Much esteemed Youth – I regret that Miss Jenny did not ‘fix you fast.” It was our expectation she would do so if your father’s health was such as would allow of r leaving home. Miss J. has written to me twice and had not at the last found just such a Teacher as she desired. . .. I believe it must be her expectation to be depending on you. At least we know it to be her desire that you return. . .. Her only fear is that our expenses will be too much increased. But this matter is ours and not hers – therefore we will decide it, and without one moments hesitancy – you must come. . ..
“We will allow you’re your board and tuition in all you desire for the service of assisting . . . as Mis Jenny may desire . . . not to exceed half a day in teaching. If the terms as before will not be satisfactory, or if in case of emergency more labour shall be required of you, we will be honorable with you. . ..
“We shall be very happy to receive you here again and hope it may be to your advantage. . ..
“Please forward my kind regards and sympathies to your afflicted father, whom I love for your sake.”. Very good. Item #010795
The seminary, founded in 1847, was the first college-level women’s school to open in the Western Reserve (a 3-million-acre strip of land in northeastern Ohio claimed by Connecticut under its original colonial sea-to-sea royal charter). It was patterned after Mount Holyoke in Massachusetts and offered a three-year course that included mathematics, music, art, ancient and modern languages, and philosophy. One hundred young women enrolled during its first year, and the school continued to thrive until a fire destroyed the three-story building shown on this letterhead in 1856. When the Willoughby citizens were unable to raise the funds needed to rebuild, those of Painesville stepped in and the college relocated there renamed, the Lake Erie Female Seminary. It still exists today as Lake Erie College.
A nice example of a teacher recruitment letter from an important early women’s college.
Price: $150.00