The School at Thomas Run, Also Known as Clark’s Chapel
The school at Thomas Run, also known as Clark or Clark’s Chapel, is less well attested in the Freedmen’s Bureau records than the schools at Havre de Grace, Bel Air, or Churchville, but a basic outline of its founding and operations may still be discerned.
The earliest documents about the school relate to its construction. On October 1, 1867, the Baltimore Association sent more than 1900 feet of lumber to Thomas Run, along with ten windows, a door, roof shingles, and thousands of laths to anchor plaster to the walls and ceilings. On October 13, school trustee Elijah Stewart wrote to Freedmen's Bureau disbursing officer Samuel J. Wright. Stewart told Wright that the carpenters had been too busy with other work to labor on the schoolhouse, and that at any rate they did not have enough materials to complete it. He requested 1000 feet of weatherboarding and 800 feet of sheathing (the layer of wall beneath the exterior weatherboarding), along with enough lumber to make desks and chairs. On October 14, Wright, after being authorized to supply the school by a special order from the Freedmen’s Bureau assistant commissioner for the state, ordered over 1800 feet of pine and hemlock lumber from John C. Turner & Co. of Baltimore to fulfill Stewart’s request. He did not order additional material for the furniture.
There is no further evidence for construction or furnishing at Thomas Run until May, 1868. On the 22nd of that month, Special Order 24 ordered the new disbursing officer, Edward H. Monteith, to furnish materials to complete schoolhouses at several locations, including Thomas Run. Three days later, Monteith wrote to Thomas Run trustee Elijah Stewart, asking him if to forward a copy of a deed entitling them to the property for school purposes forever, without which he could not provide any more materials. As of August 25, 1868, there had been no further action. On that date the education superintendent for the state, John Kimball, wrote to Monteith that he had recently spoken to some people from Thomas Run. They must have told Kimball about their continued need for classroom furniture, because Kimball asked Monteith if he intended to supply it. No response has been located, nor have any further documents been located relating to supplies for this school.
On November 12, 1868, Supt. Kimball sent John Core of the Baltimore Association a list of three places where schools would be opened soon, the implication being that they would need teachers. Thomas Run was one of the three locations. In April, 1869, the Baltimore Association appointed Joshua G. Jordon to teach there.
Eight monthly teacher’s reports have survived for the school, the earliest dated May, 1869, and the latest dated March, 1870. Attendance varied from a high of 51 in February and March of 1870, to only 10 in June, 1869. Joshua G. Jordon filed the reports for May and June, 1869. He started a sabbath school in June, and organized a temperance society among some of the students, which he called “Morrisons” on his June report. This may be a reference to Lucie Ann Morrison, a West Virginia temperance reformer and supporter of freedpeople’s rights. Jordon did not report having an industrial school.
There is a long gap in the montly reports until January, 1870, by which time J. F. Pierpont Dickson was teacher. Her reports indicate that during her tenure, or at least up through her final report in June, 1870, she organized no sabbath or industrial school, and no temperance society. Neither teacher made any detailed comments on their reports, other than Dickson consistently stating that her school was gradually improving.
Neither Joshua G. Jordon nor J. F. Pierpont Dickson wrote many letters to the Freedmen’s Bureau. Perhaps they were in closer contact with the relief organizations that employed them. Jordon wrote a brief letter to Supt. Kimball upon his arrival at the school in April, 1869. In that letter, he says he has been appointed by the “educational board at Baltimore,” which is probably a reference to the Baltimore Association. Dickson’s sponsor was the New England Freedmen's Aid Society (aka the New England Branch of the Freedmen’s Union Commission).
Joshua G. Jordon’s April, 1869, letter also reported that the future prospects of the school were, in his opinion, “of the most auspicious nature.” He described the area as thickly populated with freedpeople, all eager for education and “denying every moment of pleasure for study.” Jordon does not appear to have written any further letters to the Bureau, and he has not been identified with confidence in census records.
The second teacher, J. F. Pierpont Dickson (or Julie Dickson), was similarly infrequent in her communication with the Freedmen’s Bureau, besides submitting her monthly teacher’s reports to the D.C. headquarters. However, in January, 1870, Dickson sent a letter directly to General Oliver O. Howard, superintendent of the Freedmen’s Bureau, seeking redress for an incident that took place in October of 1869, when Dickson was teaching at a school in Dorcester County. Wishing to visit a friend in Salisbury, Wicomico Co., she was boarding a train with other passengers, when the brakeman, Charles Stewart, approached and told her that she must ride in the smoking car. Dickson refused, whereupon Stewart called out to the conductor, Daniel Muze, and again insisted that the car she was boarding was “for white folks” only. As this was happening, Stewart unlocked the door for some white passengers to enter, and as Dickson attempted to enter with them, he grabbed “violently” by the arm, tearing her cloak and gloves, and dragged her away from the train, throwing her against the platform railing. Still, Dickson refused to board the smoking car. She threatened to sue, and was told by Stewart to “sue and be damned.” She ended up standing on the open area at the end of the train car for the journey, and told Howard that she was still suffering from the ill effects of her exposure to the cold. No response or action on the part of the Bureau has been found in the records of the commissioner's office.
Although the Freedmen’s Bureau records do not provide a comprehensive picture of the school at Thomas Run, they are more numerous than those relating to the most obscure of the Harford County schools (such as Lagrange or Forest Hill). Significant in the story of Thomas Run school is the long period of time it took to move the school from conception to operation. The Baltimore Association supplied building materials in October, 1867, but it was not until April, 1869, that the school was ready to receive its first teacher.