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Martha Schofield Papers

 Collection
Identifier: SFHL-RG5-134

Scope and Contents

This collection contains biographical information, personal correspondence (1856-1916), and writings (primarily diaries, 1858-1903) by Martha Schofield, a Pennsylvania teacher who taught free blacks in South Carolina and founded the Schofield Normal and Industrial School in Aiken, S.C. Also included are financial and legal papers and School bulletins, annual reports, and some other papers. Among the correspondents are Martha Schofield's extended family and Susan B. Anthony.

Dates

  • Creation: 1853-1944 (bulk 1856-1916)

Creator

Conditions Governing Access

Collection is open for research.

Explore Digitized Content

The bulk of this collection has been digitized and is available in our Digital Library. Explore this collection online.

Conditions Governing Use

Some of the items in this collection may be protected by copyright. The user is solely responsible for making a final determination of copyright status. If copyright protection applies, permission must be obtained from the copyright holder or their heirs/assigns to reuse, publish, or reproduce relevant items beyond the bounds of Fair Use or other exemptions to the law. See http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/UND/1.0/.

Biographical / Historical

Martha Fell Schofield was born Feb. 1, 1839, near Newtown, Bucks County, PA. She was the daughter of Oliver W. Schofield and Mary (Jackson) Schofield who were married at Darby Meeting in 1834. Both her parents were involved in a number of reform activities, including abolition, temperance, women's rights, and improved education. The family included twin older sisters, Sarah Jane and Lydia, born 1835, a brother, Benjamin, born 1837, and Eliza, a younger sister born in 1840. Of the four sisters, only Sarah Jane married, to Samuel Shinn Ash.

Martha was educated at the schools at Newtown and Byberry and the Sharon Female Seminary in Darby, Pa., which was operated by their mother's brother, John Jackson, and his wife, Rachel. Martha began her own career in teaching at age eighteen at Bayside, Long Island, N.Y., where her aunt, Eliza (Jackson) Bell, lived. She also taught in Harrison, Westchester Co., N.Y., in a school connected with Purchase Monthly Meeting.

In 1865 Martha Schofield went to the islands off the coast of South Carolina to help educate the newly freed African Americans. She found the malarial conditions devastating to her health and moved inland to Aiken, South Carolina, where she founded what became the Schofield Normal and Industrial School in 1868.

The School was partially supported by the Pennsylvania Friends Relief Association, headquartered in Germantown, Pa., and was headed by Sarah Fisher Corlies (sister of Deborah F. Wharton) and Elizabeth Dorsey. The School received some state aid for a number of years. By 1882 there were over 200 pupils, and in that year, the School was incorporated.

Need for financial aid were constant through the years, and a number of people from the Hicksite branch of Philadelphia and New York Yearly Meetings supported the school. By 1883 there were over 400 pupils who, in addition to their education, were taught a trade. In 1884 a boarding department was opened, as well as a student aid fund. In 1887 Edward Hicks Magill and Howard M. Jenkins of Swarthmore College were among those serving on the Board of Managers, and the school house was partitioned into a dormitory for boys. In 1890, the Deborah F. Wharton Industrial Hall, with half of the cost donated with by her sons, was completed.

By 1910 the school occupied two entire blocks of the town of Aiken, with three large brick buildings, two large frame buildings, and various other improvements. In addition, the school owned a 280 acre farm three miles outside of Aiken with its buildings. The running expenses were principally made up by annual gifts from voluntary subscribers. With the exception of the headmaster or headmistress and Martha Schofield, who served as Business Manager, all departments heads and teachers were black graduates of the School.

The night before the School was to celebrate the 77th birthday of its founder, Martha Schofield died in her sleep. She died in February 1, 1916 in Aiken, S. C., and is buried in the Darby Friends burial ground in Darby, Pa.. The Schofield School was absorbed into the public school system in 1952.

Extent

3.75 linear ft. (8 boxes)

Language of Materials

English

Abstract

Martha Schofield (1839-1916) was a Hicksite Quaker teacher from Pennsylvania who founded the Schofield Normal and Industrial School in Aiken, S. C., in 1868 to provide education for formerly enslaved people. The School gradually evolved into a boarding school for training young blacks in industrial trades or to become teachers. It was absorbed into the public school system in 1952. Martha Fell Schofield was born Feb. 1, 1839, near Newtown, Bucks County, PA. She was the daughter of Oliver W. Schofield and Mary (Jackson) Schofield. Both her parents were involved in reform activities, including abolition, temperance, women's rights, and improved education. She died Feb. 1, 1916. This collection contains biographical information, personal correspondence (1856-1916), and writings (primarily diaries, 1858-1903) by Martha Schofield. Also included are financial and legal papers and School bulletins, annual reports, and some other papers. Among the correspondents are Martha Schofield's extended family and Susan B. Anthony.

Arrangement

The collection is divided into eight series:

  1. Biographical and genealogical materials
  2. Correspondence
  3. Writings
  4. Financial and legal papers
  5. Shoefield Normal and Industrial School
  6. Memorabilia
  7. Clippings
  8. Pictures

Physical Location

For current information on the location of materials, please consult the Library's online catalog

Immediate Source of Acquisition

Donors: Eleanor Jenkins Zendt and James L. and Herbert Dresser, 1980, 1985

The collection was preserved by Martha Schofield's niece, Mary Schofield Ash who married George H. Jenkins. It was given to Friends Historical Library by her daughter Eleanor Jenkins Zendt and the family of her daughter, Elizabeth Jenkins Dresser.

Related Materials

See also:

  1. Schofield Normal and Industrial School (Aiken, S.C.) Records, RG 4/060
  2. Smedley, Katherine. Martha Schofield and the Re-education of the South: 1839-1916 (Lewiston, N.Y., 1987).

Processing Information

Partially processed by Katherine Smedley Yelling who used the papers in writing a biography of Martha Schofield, published 1987. The collection was re-foldered and a new finding aid produced in 2009. The pictures were removed to PA 142.

Title
An Inventory of the Martha Schofield Papers, 1853-1944 (bulk 1856-1916)
Author
FHL staff
Date
1980
Description rules
Describing Archives: A Content Standard
Language of description
English
Script of description
Latin
Language of description note
English
Sponsor
Encoding made possible by a grant by the Gladys Kriebel Delmas Foundation to the Philadelphia Consortium of Special Collections Libraries

Revision Statements

  • 2020: Updated outdated, harmful terminology related to enslavement, except where it appears in a title, quotation, or subject heading.
  • 2024: This finding aid was reviewed in order to change or contextualize any outdated, harmful terminology related to Indigenous Peoples, except where it appears in a title, quotation, or subject heading.

Find It at the Library

Most of the materials in this catalog are not digitized and can only be accessed in person. Please see our website for more information about visiting or requesting repoductions from Friends Historical Library of Swarthmore College Library

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Swarthmore Pennsylvania 19081 USA