Category Archives: Education

William Allen Hadley: The blind teacher who taught blind students

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William Allen Hadley

William Allen Hadley: the blind teacher who taught bllind students.

There are many dedicated educators who have spent their professional lives working with handicapped students. This is the case with William Allen Hadley, a talented educator who founded a correspondence school for blind adults.

William was born in Moorsville, Indiana, in 1860. He earned his Bachelor’s degree from Earlham College in 1881, and his Master’s degree from the University of Minnesota.

After his college graduation, William taught school in Minnesota. He also served as the Superintendent of Schools in the small town of Wilmar, Minnesota. At the conclusion of his first year of teaching, William traveled to Germany to study at the University of Berlin. When he returned to the United States, he accepted a position at Marietta College in Ohio. Later he taught in public schools in Peoria, Illinois, and at a Chicago’s Lakeview High School for another fifteen years.

In 1915, at the age of 55, William contracted a severe case of influenza, and then he suffered a detached retina which resulted in his blindness. In order to pursue his academic life, William taught himself Braille. The hardworking educator soon discovered that there were few educational opportunities available for blind adults. He felt compelled to help others acquire communication skills and further their studies. In 1920, the enterprising teacher established a correspondence school for blind students he named The Hadley School for the Blind. Among the courses he offered were reading and writing in Braille, English grammar, business correspondence, and the Bible as literature. These courses were offered free of charge.

William’s first student was a farmer’s wife from Kansas who, like William, had suddenly lost her vision and sought to regain her ability to read and write. Teaching most of the early courses himself, William began by translating textbooks to Braille by hand and personally answering lessons with letters of correction and encouragement. Within a year he was teaching about ninety students in the United States, Canada, and China. William served as the Hadley School’s president for more than fifteen years and remained active on the Board of Trustees until his death.

For this work, William received an honorary Doctor of Laws in 1931 and a Doctor of Humanities in 1933 from Beloit College. The Bosma Industries for the Blind honored him as the 2004 recipient of the Hasbrook Award, given to a pioneer in the field of blindness.

In 1941, at the age of 101, this chalkboard champion passed away. He is buried in Moorsville, Indiana.

Margaret Clark Formby: Texas Teacher and Genuine Cowgirl

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Margaret Clark formby

Margaret Clark Formby: Texas teacher and genuine cowgirl.

Not many teachers can describe themselves as genuine cowgirls, but one who can is a Texas English teacher named Margaret Clark Formby. This remarkable educator is best-known for founding the National Cowgirl Hall of Fame and Western Heritage Center in her home state of Texas.

Margaret was born in 1929 in Van Horn in Culberson County, Texas, a small town east of El Paso. She was the daughter of Fred and Mabel Clark, local ranchers. As a young woman, Margaret attended Van Horn High School, where she graduated in 1946, the salutatorian of her class. Following her high school graduation, Margaret enrolled at Texas Tech University in Lubbock, Texas. There she earned her Bachelor’s degree in English and Speech in 1950. After her college graduation, she accepted her first teaching position at Hereford High School in Hereford, Deaf Smith County, before relocating to a school in Fort Worth, Texas.

As a young woman growing up in a Western environment, Margaret believed it was important to have women recognized for their many contributions to Western culture. To this end, she founded the National Cowgirl Hall of Fame and Western Heritage Center in Hereford. The museum was originally located in the basement of the local public library, but was later moved to a building in Fort Worth. Margaret also worked as the editor of Sidesaddle, the official magazine of the Cowgirl Hall of Fame.

In addition to cultural preservation, Margaret labored tirelessly to create better conditions for young people. She was one of two women in Texas who was named to a commission to investigate child pornography. She also served on a committee sponsored by the Texas House Speaker that researched teen pregnancy.

During her lifetime, Margaret earned many accolades for her work. In 1993, the talented educator was the first woman elected to Texas Tech University’s Rodeo Hall of Fame. In 2000, her name was added  to the list of “100 That Made a Difference: History Makers of the High Plains” by the Amarillo Globe News. She also received the Pioneer Woman Award from the American Cowboy Culture Society.

Margaret Formby passed away on April 10, 2003, at the age of 73. She will forever be remembered as a hardworking educator who worked tirelessly to preserve an important part of our Western heritage.

Teacher Dolores Huerta dedicated her life to helping migrant farmworkers

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Dolores Huerta

Teacher Dolores Huerta dedicated her life to helping migrant farm workers.

Like many people who have heard of farm labor leader and civil rights advocate Cesar Chavez, I have also heard of his right-hand woman, Dolores Huerta, elected vice president of the United Farm Workers Union. But did you know she was also a teacher?

Raised in Stockton, California, Dolores graduated in 1955 with an AA and her teaching credentials from the College of the Pacific. After her college graduation, she accepted a teaching position in a rural Stockton elementary school. She had been teaching for only a short time when she realized she wanted to devote her vast energy to migrant farm workers and their families. “I couldn’t stand seeing farm worker children come to class hungry and in need of shoes,” she once explained. “I thought I could do more by organizing their parents than by trying to teach their hungry children.”

After just one year, Dolores resigned from her teaching position, determined to launch a campaign that would fight the numerous economic injustices faced by migrant agricultural workers. Joining forces with the legendary labor leader Cesar Chavez, the intrepid educator helped organize a large-scale strike against the commercial grape growers of the San Joaquin Valley, an effort which raised national awareness of the abysmal treatment of America’s agricultural workers. She also negotiated contracts which led to their improved working conditions. The rest, as they say, is history.

Although there are several fairly good juvenile biographies of this extraordinary woman, there is no definitive adult biography about her. The closest thing to it is A Dolores Huerta Reader edited by Mario T. Garcia. This book includes an informative biographical introduction by the editor, articles and book excerpts written about her, her own writings and transcripts of her speeches, and a recent interview with Mario Garcia. You can find A Dolores Huerta Reader on amazon. I have also included a chapter about this remarkable teacher in my second book, entitled Chalkboard Heroes.

Remembering Columbine’s Chalkboard Hero and slain educator Dave Sanders

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Dave Sanders

Terry Lee Marzell examines plaque honoring slain educator Dave Sanders at the Columbine Memorial.

While visiting the Denver area last weekend, I had the unique opportunity to visit the Columbine Memorial which honors the innocent lives lost in the Columbine High School massacre. There I paid homage to Dave Sanders, a truly heroic teacher who lost his life during the shooting.

Dave was born on October 22, 1951, in Eldorado, Saline County, Illinois. He was the youngest of five children. Sadly, his father passed away when Dave was only four years old. Following his father’s death, the young boy was raised by his widowed mother in Newtown, Fountain County, Indiana.

Even as a youngster, Dave excelled at athletics. Known for being a consistent and dependable player, he participated in basketball, baseball, and cross country. After his 1969 graduation from Fountain Central High School in Veedersburg, Dave enrolled at Nebraska Western Junior College in Scottsbluff, Nebraska, where he earned his Associate’s Degree. He then transferred to Chadron State College in Chadron, Dawes County, Nebraska. He earned his Bachelor’s degree in Education from Chadron in 1974.

That same year, Dave accepted his first teaching position at Columbine High School in an unincorporated area of Jefferson County, Colorado, near the Denver suburb of Littleon. There he taught business classes, including typing, keyboarding, business, business law, and economics. He also worked with other teachers in the Business Department to organize career days and arrange for guest speakers to visit classes.

But it was as a coach that Dave truly excelled. Early in his career he coached boys’ baseball, basketball, cross country, and soccer. In his later years, he coached girls’ basketball, softball, and track. In 1995, Dave’s girls’ softball team reached the Class 5A state finals, and the same year, his girls’s basketball team qualified for a coveted berth in the annual Sweet 16 Tournament. “His ability to coach was not so much about his ability to do the sport but about his ability to analyze the mechanics of the sport, the kinesiology of it,” colleague Joe Marshall once described. “It didn’t matter what he coached. He coached kids, he didn’t coach a sport. He truly devoted himself to the athletes,” Joe continued. In addition to his coaching responsibilities for Columbine, Dave and his colleague, Rick Bath, coached basketball camps, softball tournaments, open batting cage sessions, and a B league girls’ softball program during the summers.

Dave Sanders

Chalkboard Hero, teacher, and coach Dave Sanders

Dave’s career as a teacher and coach spanned 25 years. Tragically, this outstanding educator was shot and killed on April 20, 1999, when two students carried out a mass shooting at Columbine High School. During the massacre, the intrepid teacher organized an evacuation of the area, led a group of approximately 200 students to safety, and warned unsuspecting teachers and students in other classrooms of the danger. He is credited with saving at least 200 lives that fateful day before he succumbed from his gunshot wounds.

For his heroism, Dave Sanders was honored in 1999 with the ESPY Arthur Ashe Courage and Humanitarian Award. The same year, he was recognized by the National Consortium for Academics and Sports with the Giant Steps Award for Male Coach. You can read more about him in my second book, Chalkboard Heroes.

Teacher Prudence Crandall: The Chalkboard Hero who taught African American students

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Prudence Crandall

Teacher Prudence Crandall: The Chalkboard Hero who taught African American students.

There are many examples of heroic teachers who have dedicated their considerable energy to improving the American social fabric. One such teacher is Prudence Crandall, a 19th-century educator who fought her entire Connecticut community for the right to enroll African American students in her school.

In 1831 well-known and highly-respected schoolteacher Prudence Crandall opened a boarding school for young ladies in Canterbury, Connecticut. By the end of the first year, she had earned the praise of parents, community members, and students throughout New England.

The accolades for Prudence suddenly ended, though, the day an African American student named Sarah Harris asked to be admitted to Prudence’s school. Sarah said she wanted to learn how to be a teacher so she could open her own school for black students. Prudence knew admitting an African American student would generate some resistance from her neighbors, but after some soul-searching she decided her conscience would not allow her to refuse the request.

Prudence had severely under-estimated the resistance she would face from her community. Figuring the complaint was that she was operating an integrated school, the teacher closed her academy for white girls and re-opened as an academy for “misses of color.” That just made the situation worse, causing objections that rippled all the way up to the US Supreme Court and resulting in Prudence’s brief incarceration in the local jail.

Read the gripping account of this valiant teacher in the book, The Forbidden Schoolhouse: The True and Dramatic Story of Prudence Crandall and Her Students by Suzanne Jurmain, available on amazon. I have also included a chapter about this heroic teacher in my second book, Chalkboard Heroes.