FROM an educational standpoint, Oswego is one of the foremost cities in the State.  The public schools have an enrollment of 3,532 pupils, and about 800 are enrolled in the parochial schools. To take care of this large attendance the city has a school system that includes thirteen buildings, four annexes and a corps of ninety-one teachers.  The cost of maintaining the public schools in 1905 was $61,ooo, of which $42,750 was paid to teachers.  The High School takes a high rank among the High Schools of the State and its system and curriculum is strong, attractive and complete.  The statement of the President of a celebrated university that Oswego's High School students are better prepared for college than are most of the students received from other cities is worthy of note.  The present building which has been in use forty years is crowded to its capacity and an idea of the growth of the High School may be obtained from the fact that the number of teachers and pupils has doubled during the last ten years.  A new and more commodious High School promises soon to be a reality and an energetic Alumni Association is working to this end.  The Secretary of the Board of Education and Superintendent of Schools, George E. Bullis, who is a graduate of every department of the Oswego schools, including the Normal, inaugurated the present school system.  Charles W. Richards, who has been Principal of the High School for thirty-five years, is an educator of prominence and ability.

     The institution which is perhaps most characteristic of the city's development and which has a world-wide reputation is the State Normal and Training School, which was formally adopted by the State in 1867. The graduates of this institution have risen to positions of responsibility and prominence in the educational world.  Noted throughout the world its success in training teachers, it attracts students from every quarter.  The school has been one of the most potent educational influences of this generation.  In past history and present attainment, in its high aims and its facility in realizing those aims, the Oswego Normal School stands in the lead of institutions of its kind and is an enduring monument to its beloved founder and first principal, Dr. Edward Austin Sheldon.
 

     The Normal School celebrated on February 28, 1906, the fortieth niversary of its entrance into the building it now occupies.  The inception of the school was in the City Training School for Teachers, founded n 1861 by Dr. Sheldon, who had been called to the Superintendency of Oswego public schools in 1854.  Dr. Sheldon established the training school on lines followed with success by the Toronto Normal School.   He secured Miss M. E. Jones, of the Home and Colonial School of London, as the first instructor in his new venture.  Miss Jones had been for many years an instructor in the Pestalozzian principle.  The school was opened on May  1, 1861, in the old High School building with nine pupils, which number increased to thirty-nine within five months, all of whom graduated in June the following year.  Miss Amanda P. Funnelle, at present a member of the Normal faculty, was graduated in the first class.  A majority of the teaching force in the Oswego public schools were trained in this institution and its influence is strongly felt in the community.  The honor of being the parent of the training school system of the State belongs to the Oswego Normal and its methods have been widely copied.  The crowning features of its work are exhibited in its method teaching and practice school features which make it distinctive among similar institutions of the country.

     The faculty is composed of the most capable and experienced instructors obtainable, men and women of broad culture, and includes Dr. Isaac B. Poucher, A. M., Principal; Charles S. Sheldon, Miss C. L. G. Scales, Miss Amanda P. Funnelle, Amos W. Farnham, Mary L. O'Geran, Dr. Richard K. Piez, Harriet E Stevens, Lydia E. Phoenix, Mary H. McElroy and Katherine A. Hayes.

     The Welland, the handsome dormitory maintained in connection with the school for the accommodation of students from other cities, is the center of the student's social life.

The State has recently appropriated $25,000 for the purchase of a new site for a new Normal and Training School and a splendid modern edifice is a plan of the future.

Source:  Oswego Yesterday & Today, A Souvenir of the Celebration of Old
Home Week and of the Re-Garrisoning of Fort Ontario, published under the
auspices of The Chamber of Commerce, Oswego, NY, 1906, including the photograph of Dr. Sheldon and the Welland Dormitory.