1743, he wrote: "Because there is a great ignorance among the youth of
this land and good schoolteachers are so very rare, I shall be compelled
to take hold of the work myself. Those who possibly could teach the
youth to read are lazy and drunken, compile a sermon from all manner of
books, run about, preach, and administer the Lord's Supper for hard
cash. Miserable and disgusting, indeed! I announced to the people [at
Providence] to send first their oldest children for instruction, as I
intended to remain with the congregation eight days at a time. On Monday
some of the parents brought their children. It certainly looks
depressing when children of seventeen, eighteen, nineteen, twenty years
come with the Abc-Book. Yet I am delighted that they are possessed of so
great a desire to learn something," etc. "In Providence," Muhlenberg
wrote later on, "I have a splendid young man, who keeps school in
winter, and in summer earns his living by doing manual labor." In 1745
J. N. Kurtz and J. H. Schaum were sent from Halle to take charge of the
youth. One of the chief questions to engage the attention of the first
convention of the Pennsylvania Synod, in 1748, was: "What is the
condition of the parish schools?" Brunnholtz reported: In his home at
Philadelphia, Schaum, whom he supported, had been keeping school for
three and a half years; since Easter there had been no school, as Schaum
was needed at another place; however, before winter would set in, he and
his elders would do their best in this matter. Germantown, continued
Brunnholtz, had two teachers, Doeling, a former Moravian, being one of
them, whose schools were attended by many children, some of them
non-Lutherans. Another school near Germantown with twenty children had
been closed for lack of a teacher. Muhlenberg stated: In Providence
there had been a small school in the past year. New Hanover had a fair
school, Jacob Loeser being teacher. Though a teacher could be had for
the filials Saccum and Upper Milford, there were no schools there. When
the elders hereupon explained that the distances were too great, Synod
advised to change off monthly with the teacher, and demanded an answer
in this matter in the near future. Kurtz promised to begin a school at
Tulpehocken in winter. Handschuh reported: In Lancaster the school was
flourishing; Teacher Schmidt and his assistant Vigera had instructed 70
children. At the meeting of Synod in 1753 the pastors complained: "The
schools w