-51-
have 31 such
persons. In that year Oxford ranked 40th in the
state's 167 towns and cities in the percentage of average
attendance in
winter, as compared with the number enumerated.
The annual reports of the school visitors
for the
year 1881 show that most expenses incurred in each of the
districts
were for teachers wages, with a lesser amount spent on fuel
and
incidentals in each district.
Thomas Osborn, of the district committee of
the
Center district, said of the condition of the school house,
"In any
other town in our State our School house would be considered
poor. As
our grandparents received their intellectual culture within
its walls,
it is reasonable to infer that our grand children may be
compelled to
pursue their studies inside the self same structure. It's
location
being on the bank of a stream, mud hole in front, no shade, no
play
grounds. School room low, poorly ventilated with scarcity of
room for
recitations. Reforms have been made from time to time, such as
roofing,
& Etc., but repair all we will its the same old building
still,
with all its inconvenient surroundings.
That school district reported a total of
$303.18,
with 280 in teachers wages, $11.02 in fuel, $3.06 in repairing
the
school house and $11.10 in library and apparatus.
The Center District was the only school
reporting
any expenditures other than wages, repairs and fuels,
indicating that
none of the other districts purchased books, maps or globes
during that
year.
Repairs made during that year, within the
13
districts, were also made by the third, ninth, and tenth
districts.
In 1885, the annual report urged that
districts be
consolidated, urging that only eight districts be kept. By the
year
1889, Dr. Barnes was severe in his criticism of the district
schools
and urged a take-over by the town.
"In most of the
districts it is difficult to find any one who is willing to
act as a
District Committee, and those who act as such take but
little interest
in the schools. The school registers show no visits from any
of them
during the past year. Perhaps the better way would be to
leave the
whole matter of our schools in the hands of our school
visitors and our
selectmen. At present our committees only hire the teachers
and procure
the fuel. It seems as if these services could easily be
performed by
the joint board, and a saving of labor be made. A law
tending toward
consolidation was before the last legislature. We ought to
hail any new
method and be willing to attempt a trial of anything that
promises good
results, for we are, in our present indolent methods of
doing, far from
showing our children that the public is soon to look to
them, or in
impressing them that the public sentiment of the community
will soon be
reposed in them, and if it is to a healthy sentiment it must
emanate
from half trained or ignorant minds."
The state report published in 1890,
lists
Oxford as having 13 schools, with seven of them in poor
condition, and
only two of them having libraries. In those two libraries were
a total
of 40 books. The report lists the total enumeration at 248
students,
about 30 less than a decade prior to that date.
