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James Robertson (1742-1825)
Schools are born of visions in the minds of men. In the case of Davidson Academy, the first vision is surely that of James Robertson. From the very founding of Nashville in 1779, Colonel Robertson was desirous of promoting his city by forwarding its interests through learning and religion. He had conceived the idea of an academy at Nashville, and, while attending the North Carolina legislature, in December 1782, he met the Reverend Thomas Craighead (q.v.), a Presbyterian minister and teacher of excellent qualifications, whom he interested in his scheme. They secured the passage of an act "for the promotion of learning in Davidson County." (See act in full in Chapter I.)
It is said that upon catching sight of the bluffs above Nashville, Robertson exclaimed, "Some day there will be a college there!" (Windrow 283). A man of vision?
According to Alfred Leland Crabb, it was John Donelson who said, "We are going to build schools and churches there." (Journey 126). And again, " ... some day, not too long off, we're going to build a school." (174). The founders of Nashville were men who envisioned a town with an educated populace.
From 1785, it was Robertson's dream that an academy would be opened for the young people of his developing community. So he asked the Reverend Thomas B. Craighead, a native of North Carolina and a graduate of Nassau Hall of Princeton University, to come to Nashville and become the teacher of the new school. This was the day school which the sons of James Robertson attended. Jonathan was sixteen; James Randolph was fourteen; Peyton was ten. David Hood, the Robertson family tutor, had taught them basic education in their earlier years. The story of these boys is an interesting one. With the opening of the new academy, the boys were up at daylight to walk the eleven miles to school. They followed the buffalo path which connected Robertson's Lick with Sulphur Dell. The route was direct and along the river's edge. After crossing the foot log at Sulphur Spring branch, they made their way to the academy ferry. When they reached the opposite shore of the winding river, they followed a path through the edge field (present East Nashville) and out to Haysborough. Jonathan was always cautious along the way. He carried his trusty rifle in case of an ambush or other emergency. Delilah, twelve, was taught her Latin at home.
In August of 1786, a Board of Trustees for Davidson Academy was organized. At once, the trustees resolved to put a subscription paper into circulation, to obtain means wherewith to erect a building and to endow the institution. They adopted a form of subscription with a special clause for donations in lands. And thus the Academy, College, and University of Nashville received several tracts, in addition to the 240 acres now included within the corporate limits of the city of Nashville.
Two "licks," with adjoining land, were to be retained for the use of Davidson Academy, for which commissioners were ordered to execute deeds to the trustees (Putnam 380). The Academy had a "two forty" on the south of town, and a "six forty" at "Gasper's Lick" (405).
Colonel Robertson remained an active, vocal trustee of Davidson Academy until May 31, 1805, when he resigned. "It seems safe to say that had there not been a James Robertson, there would not be a Nashville, and perhaps not even a Tennessee" ( Nashville: The Faces of Two Centuries, 1780-1980 , 30). Certainly there could not have been a Davidson Academy! James Robertson died, probably slain by Indians, in 1825. Charlotte Robertson, aged ninety-three, died in 1843. She was living in the home of her daughter and son-in-law, Lavinia and John Craighead.
Thomas Benton Craighead (1753-1824)
It is impossible to overestimate the value of Thomas B. Craighead, its first leader, to Davidson Academy. He came out of a long line of Scotch-Irish ministers and as the school's president of the board and teacher, he brought to Davidson Academy a love of learning and a reverence for good character which would remain trademarks of the school throughout its long and varied history.
This 1775 graduate with honors of Princeton University accepted eagerly the invitation to preach in the wilderness. As the first Presbyterian minister in middle Tennessee, and as the first minister in Nashville, he enjoyed great freedom in promulgating his ideas. As early as 1786, Mr. Craighead stood out as the patron of learning, the teacher of youth, and the counselor of the aged. And he remained Principal of Davidson Academy for more than twenty years. The academy was never large but its work was impressive.
Dr. Craighead conducted Davidson Academy as a sort of adolescent Princeton in the western wilderness (Crabb, Personality 172). The boys of the settlement learned the rudiments at home and then enrolled in the academy (See Chapter III). They had from the beginning great respect for Dr. Craighead, first out of wonder at the learning he had, and then because of the interest he could inject into their monotonous and restricted lives. Not at all did they object to the fact that Dr. Craighead taught long hours and six days a week. The same forefinger that pointed outward accenting the truth of the world pointed upward on the seventh, for on that day he preached to them the Presbyterian Gospel (172). He taught the classics and mathematics to the boys; jousted delightfully with their parents in conversation; ate pioneer food with great relish, discrimination, and capacity; and lived a good life in all of his ways.
It is enlightening to look at the life of Dr. Craighead before he became a part of Davidson Academy. The son of a Presbyterian minister, he was ordained by the Presbytery of Orange County in 1780. He was thirty-five years old and had been married only five years previously to Elizabeth Brown, the daughter of a minister from Frankfort, Kentucky.
At the very first meeting of the trustees on August 19, 1786, the Reverend Craighead was chosen president of the board ( The Craighead Family , 1876). It is notable that this group of trustees had among its members such honored men as Senator Daniel Smith and Andrew Jackson.
The school was ordered to be taught in the Spring Hill Meeting House, the church in which Mr. Craighead preached. No separation of church and state here! It was located at the edge of the town of Haysborough. For those from Nashville who attended the school, early departure was necessary; it was six miles from the town square to the academy. Davidson Academy had its meager beginnings near the site of the present Spring Hill Cemetery and swelled into the great George Peabody College for Teachers.
In 1795 the Reverend Thomas Craighead built a new home on Gallatin Road, across from the Spring Hill Meeting House. At this time the teacher and preacher was also a large producer of whiskey. In the eighteenth century no one adversely criticized Reverend Craighead for the diversity of his interests.
(A Nashville newspaper article dated August, 1932, shows a picture of Craighead's home and states that the cornerstone gave the date of construction. Mrs. Emily D. Walton owned the home in 1932.)
For over ten years the Reverend Craighead had preached and taught the classes of Davidson Academy there. At the age of seventy-five, he died, honored and fondly remembered. He was a credit to his profession, learned and truly good. "He lived, preached, taught, died and is buried two hundred yards from the one-room stone building which served as academy and Presbyterian church" ( Personality 125). Nashville is still a city of schools and churches.
Andrew Jackson (1767-1845)
It is not always that highly-educated men are the most devoted to the cause of education. An example of this fact was Andrew Jackson. A man of limited formal learning, he threw himself wholeheartedly into the making and maintaining of Davidson Academy.
Although his interest in the school was present at its very beginning, Jackson did not actually become a member of its Board of Trustees until 1791 (Windrow 6). From that date, his influence became a major factor in the success of the small school, numbering a mere handful (eight or ten) of boys. He resigned from the board, but not from his interest in the school, in 1805. His interest never waned.
When Andrew Jackson became a member of the Board of Trustees, the Reverend Craighead was in the third year of his ministry to the Presbyterian Spring Hill Meeting House at nearby Haysborough. He was also heading Davidson Academy and acting as a member of its board of trustees (Crabb 23). It is clear from existing records of the school that Andrew Jackson worked in close harmony with its principal. He may surely be considered a contributing factor in the ability of the tiny backwoods school to survive.
By 1792, when the "Academy" was giving hopes of becoming a permanent institution, the school leased a ferry across the Cumberland, for $100. General Smith, another member of the board, said to General Jackson, "That is enough to pay the passages of all the Trustees across the River Styx." The then young Hickory replied, "I want but one stick to make my way."
There were no fewer than three generals in Davidson Academy's original Board of Trustees - Robertson, Smith, and Williamson. There were three Colonels - Polk, Bledsoe, and Hays. To this honored company, upon the resignation of Polk, "Mr. Andrew Jackson" was added (1791). His election was good for the academy and evidently rewarding to him. He remained a proud trustee or helper for thirty-three years.
The academy grew. On April 5, 1796, the territorial legislature passed an act, a section of which read:
Be it enacted: That the buildings of the said academy shall be erected in the most convenient situation on the hill immediately above Nashville and near to the road leading to Buchanan's Mill; and that the trustees of aforesaid shall proceed to erect buildings and employ tutors to proceed to the business of instruction as soon as the funds will permit. (See Chapter I.)
With pride patrons of the present-day Davidson Academy can look back at its beginning at the part of James Robertson, Andrew Jackson, and others in its growth!
" ... it does not seem likely that any city in the nation has been so much influenced by one man as he [Andrew Jackson] has influenced Nashville" (Personality 255).
William K. Polk (dates?)
Davidson Academy had the good fortune to have William Polk as a member of its Board of Trustees. A member for Davidson County, he was a man of wealth, sagacity, and cultivation. It was he who introduced the bill for Davidson Academy's charter and had it successfully carried through (Windrow 6).
He was the grandfather of the William (James?) K. Polk who became a president of the United States.
Daniel Smith (1748-1818)
The secretary of the first board of trustees of Davidson Academy was Daniel Smith. He was learned and astute.
Ephraim McLean
The first Treasurer of Davidson Academy was Ephraim McLean.
John Sappington
In the same year of 1785, Nashville experienced two most important firsts. Its first school, Davidson Academy, was born; and its first permanent (but only for three years) physician, John Sappington, appeared.
Dr. Sappington placed his pills on the local market. He called them mystery with a covering of sugar. Each morning the doctor stepped outside the door of his office and rang a bell to tell his patients that it was time for them to take their pills. One of his sons, Roger, practiced in Nashville until his death in 1824.
Boyd McNairy (1785-1856)
Born in 1785, Boyd McNairy entered Davidson Academy in 1797, and remained there under the tutelage of Dr. Thomas B. Craighead until he was ready for study at the University of Pennsylvania. He graduated from the academy in 1803 and entered the university the same year. Since an institution of learning owes its prestige to the quality and success of its graduates, it is well to look at the history of Boyd McNairy. For twenty-eight years Dr. McNairy served as a trustee of the University of Nashville.
Lardner Clarke
The mercantile life of Nashville began in 1786 when Lardner Clarke arrived from Philadelphia with ten horses laden with calico, linen goods, and coarse. ... It was noted that after Mr. Clarke opened his store there was an added brightness in the dresses the Presbyterian ladies wore to hear Dr. Craighead preach ..." ( Personality 26). |
