Note 68 — MEMOIRS OF THE LIFE OF DAVID RITTENHOUSE; ANTERIOR TO HIS SETTLEMENT IN PHILADELPHIA.
Reading edition
In the year 1683, Enoch Flower undertook to teach English in the town of Philadelphia. Six years afterwards, originated the Friends’ Public School in the same town, then in its infancy; and in 1697, this school was incorporated, on the petition of Samuel Carpenter, Edward Shippen, Anthony Morris, James Fox, David Lloyd, William Southby, and John Jones, in behalf of themselves and others. In the year 1708, this corporation was enlarged and perpetuated by a new charter, under the name of “The Overseers of the Public School, founded in Philadelphia, at the request, cost, and charges of the people called Quakers.” It was further extended in the year 1711; when the three first named gentlemen, together with Griffith Owen, Thomas Story, Richard Hill, Isaac Norris, Samuel Preston, Jonathan Dickinson, Nathan Stanbury, Thomas Masters, Nicholas Waln, Caleb Pusey, Rowland Ellis and James Logan, were appointed Overseers.
As this was the earliest considerable school established in Pennsylvania, as well as the first institution of the kind, in the province, the names of its promoters deserve to be held in remembrance, among the Patrons of learning and useful knowledge in this country.
From this view of the origin of schools in the capital of Pennsylvania, it will be perceived, that the means of acquiring even the rudiments of literary instruction must have been difficult of access in country places, for some considerable time after the periods just mentioned. This is one of the most serious grievances to which the settlers in new and unimproved countries are subjected.