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INTRODUCTION OF THE LANCASTERIAN SYSTEM INTO
NEW YORK

It was but natural that the public spirited men who formed the
New York Free School Society in 1805 should be influenced by the
much heralded work of their fellow Quaker in London.
The Lancasterian system was put into operation in         Adopted by

their first school, opened 1806, and in every succeeding           '^'^'^ So^ciet°

school.   It remained the official system of the schools
of the Society until 1853 when the Board of Education assumed con¬
trol of all the pubhc schools.

As the New York Free School was the first to employ the Lancas¬
terian system in America, it has been assumed that the first teacher
employed by the society, William Smith, must have
learned the system in England.'   But there is no         instruction

record to this effect. The method of introdaction was
no doubt as stated by Lancaster himself in the Baltimore edition of
his "Lancasterian System of Education."' "In 1802, a Friend by the
name of Perkins, from the city of New York, visited Joseph Lancaster
in London, and published an edition of his first book upon his return to
America. This induced a private teacher to attempt the plan, and B.
Perkins continued to give his advice grounded on what he had wit¬
nessed in practice. Such a degree of success attended this early
effort that, in process of time, about three thousand children have
been educated in schools in that city. Without undervaluing the
aid given to the cause by private individuals, the governor, DeWitt
Clinton, has fully established his reputation, as the first public man
who officially rendered services to the introduction of a system of
which he is a steady friend and supporter." The Benjamin D. Per¬
kins here referred to was the first secretary of the Free School Society,
 

' Palmer, A. Emerson, New York Public Schools, p. g.

' Lancaster, Joseph, The Lancasterian System of Education with improve¬
ments by its founder, Lancaster Institute, Baltimore, Md., Wm. Ogden Niles,
printer, 1821, p. xiv.

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