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Communications To The Board Of Trustees Of Vassar College...
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This is a reproduction of a book published before 1923....)
This is a reproduction of a book published before 1923. This book may have occasional imperfections
such as missing or blurred pages, poor pictures, errant marks, etc. that were either part of the original artifact,
or were introduced by the scanning process. We believe this work is culturally important, and despite the imperfections,
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Communications To The Board Of Trustees Of Vassar College
Matthew Vassar
Standard Printing & Pub. Co., 1886
Matthew Vassar was an American brewer and merchant.
Background
Matthew Vassar was born on April 29, 1792, at East Tuddingham, County of Norfolk, England. According to family tradition, the name was originally spelled Vasseur and the great-grandfather was a French refugee. James Vassar, Matthew Vassar's father, and his wife, Anne (Bennett) Vassar, and his brother Thomas emigrated to America and settled in Dutchess County, New York, in 1796.
Finding the local barley did not brew good ale, the brother Thomas returned to Norfolk and obtained English barley-corn for American planting. From this time, the brewing improved, and soon the family moved in from the countryside to the brewery in Poughkeepsie. The boy Matthew ran away from home at the age of thirteen and earned his own way for three years at a farm and country store, and then returned to Poughkeepsie in 1808.
Education
Vassar never had any formal schooling.
Career
In 1811, the brewery was burned, and Matthew began an independent brewing business. In addition to his brewery, he engaged in other enterprises and financed his nephew in the colonization of land in central Michigan. This resulted in the founding of the town of Vassar, named after him. Another venture was a whaling industry. He owned a whaling dock in Poughkeepsie and was part-owner of a whaling fleet. In 1845, he went to Europe, and, in his autobiography, he stated that he visited Guy's Hospital in London, "the founder of which a family relative, " and "seeing this Institution first suggested the idea of devoting a portion of my Estate to some Charitable purpose".
His niece, Lydia Booth, was the proprietress of a school for girls in Poughkeepsie, which was later sold to Milo P. Jewett. The business of the purchase brought Jewett in contact with Vassar, and the plan of a college for women was the result. Vassar's earlier intention had been the founding of a hospital, later realized by the gift of his two nephews in 1882 to Vassar Brothers Hospital. His native prudence and sagacity stood him in good stead in the founding of his college, but it is curious to observe that his plans for the intellectual program of his colleagues were better laid than those for its material welfare. The enormous building that he erected in 1861-65 was ill-suited to a woman's college; but the program of studies under the first active president, John Howard Raymond, was fully abreast of the times and challenged comparison with the best colleges for men.
Throughout the four years, 1861-65, Vassar advertised his venture extensively; and the result was an enrollment that crowded his building to capacity from the start and produced a worldwide interest in the venture. A number of women's colleges had been founded before 1865, and several coeducational institutions were open. Vassar's advertising first brought the idea of higher education for women forcibly to the attention of the modern world, and within ten years the battle had been fought and won. It was proved that mental activity in the abstruse branches of learning did not injure woman's health and that there were many women eager for intellectual life. The English colleges for women and many other colleges in America were the result of this demonstration. Coeducation soon became the practice from coast to coast in state-supported institutions. The opening of universities on the European continent followed not long afterward. Vassar's early board of trustees included Samuel F. B. Morse and Henry Ward Beecher, and his correspondence on education with such men as Henry Barnard was voluminous. His private library shows that he also owned works by Herbert Spencer and John Stuart Mill.
He died on June 23, 1868, of a heart seizure, while reading his letter of resignation from the board of trustees at the college.
Achievements
Matthew Vassar was a founder of Vassar College. The city of Vassar, Michigan is named after him.
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This is a reproduction of a book published before 1923....)
Views
Vassar's thought ran ahead of his day; and he was less interested in demonstrating that woman's mind was equal to man's than he was in developing a curriculum suited to the needs of women in the modern world. His hopes in this direction were frustrated by the apparent necessity of the demonstration of mental equality; and the curricula of the early women's colleges therefore closely resembled those for men.
His belief in woman's suffrage and his faith in woman's capacity, however, strongly affected the life of the early students. The development of the social sciences and the application of studies to American life led many early graduates into fields of social work.
Personality
Vassar's turns of speech and poor spelling, together with his occupation as a brewer, developed a misunderstanding of the real genius of the man. This has since been corrected by the publication of his autobiography and letters, and by other records continually coming to light showing his broad vision and steady faith in his enterprise.
Many of his sayings stamp him as one of the genuinely original Americans in the second half-century of the republic. His gifts during his life to the institution amounted to over $800, 000. His two nephews, whom he had interested in the venture, increased this to a million and a quarter by their gifts.
Connections
On March 7, 1813, Vassar was married to Catherine Valentine, who died in 1863, leaving no children.
