GROVE HIGH SCHOOL
1908-09 SCHOOL PROGRAM and COMMUNITY DESCRIPTOR
FACULTY
J. Floyd Collins
Principal
R.K. Pitts,
Miss Pearl McGehee,
Miss Mary Parker,
Assistants.
Directress of Music
(To be selected.)
GO HERE for photos of the above listed faculty.
LOCATION
Paris is a beautiful, well-kept little city of some 5,000 inhabitants, 116 miles west of
Nashville, and 12 miles from the Kentucky line, on the Nashville, Chattanooga & St.
Louis and Louisville railroads. It is the county seat of Henry County. Being free from
malarial influences, and with an abundance of pure water supplied from deep wells, it is a
healthful place. One of the first impressions a stranger gets is a pervading air of
cleanliness. Like so many of our Southern towns, the principal business portion is built
around a square, in the middle of which sits the court house. Scattered over the city
there are many lovely homes, that bespeak for their inmates the possession of refinement
and culture. All these things, together with the usual church privileges, furnish
important educational influences to young people reared at a distance from town.
THE BUILDING
Our building was erected by the county and city at a cost of $45,000, and has been
pronounced by a well known educator "the finest preparatory school building in the
South." It is of white pressed brick, two stories and basement. Besides the basement
rooms there are 14 rooms, including a commodious chapel, all heated with steam and fitted
with the necessary plumbing. The school is connected with city waterworks by special
pumping arrangement, and has its own stand-pipe, or tank, from which fresh water is
constantly supplied to the building.
Half a mile south of the square, on a hill which is said to be the highest point in West
Tennessee. Grove School shows conspicuous from afar. From its front porch the view is one
of almost unequaled beauty, with the shade-embowered city 119 feet below, and off to the
west and north and east a semicircle of hills alternating with field and forest, among
which a faint line of trees shows across the Tennessee River 20 miles away.
ORIGIN
The school owes its existence to the generosity and unselfish public spirit of Dr. E.W.
Grove, who resided in Paris for many years and remains a staunch friend of Paris and of
Henry County. He gave for the founding of the school the sum of $80,000 as a perpetual
endowment.
PURPOSE
It was designed by the munificent founder that the school should furnish, absolutely free
of cost, a first-class high school education to every boy and girl in Henry County. This
laudable purpose was endorsed and confirmed by the honorable County Court and the city of
Paris when they conjointly erected a magnificent modern building, well-fitted in every way
to become a famous seat of secondary education.
WHAT IS EDUCATION?
It would be perhaps the part of wisdom to take our bearing at the outset, and ask
ourselves what we propose to do - what ideals we have set before us. For instance, what is
education? It is not, we take it, so much English, so much Latin, So much mathematics: but
so much training. But what must be trained? The whole man - the body, the mind, the
spirit. The body so that it may, with the greatest ease and excellence, meet with all
requirements of the physical life; the mind so that it may properly guide the actions, and
properly effect the most satisfactory solution of all the multifarious problems of life,
and the spirit so it may, as nearly as possible, apprehend God as the source of all
knowledge and inspiration of all worthy effort, and enable us to determine the scope and
character of our relations to time and to our fellow man. Recognizing the existence of
this three-fold nature, we shall endeavor to cultivate it in its entirety. The mind will
be systematically and thoroughly trained, the body will be strengthened and built up, and
spiritual training and development will be stressed as the most important of all.
While we shall do our utmost that our pupils shall excel in accurate and thorough
scholarship, we shall not forget that there is something even better than making scholars,
and that is making men and women. Therefore, the work of character-building will always be
held of primary importance.
DISCIPLINE
The discipline of the school will be mild and reasonable, but it will be firm. There will
be no effort to adjust it to individual pupils who have never known restraint at home. The
principal has usually accomplished all he wished by private, face to face reasoning and
expostulation, by direct appeals to personal and family pride and the elementary
principles of right conduct; but those failing, he will not hesitate to resort to sterner
measures. In case any pupil is persistently disobedient or refractory, or refuses to avail
himself of privileges of the school; or, through committing an overt act of disobedience
or insubordination, makes himself habitually disagreeable, the right is hereby reserved to
dismiss him without preferring any formal charge against him.
PHYSICAL CULTURE
Just as soon as practicable, perhaps from the beginning of the session, a system of
Physical Culture will be inaugurated and will be conducted on a physiological and
scientific basis. The system to be employed is that devised and so long and successfully
used by Prof. D. F. Dowd, of the Home School for Physical Culture, New York City. It is
perhaps the simplest, as well as the most scientific and effective system, and its
faithful and continuous use will result in the perfect development of every muscle of the
body. Weak lungs may be strengthened, thin chests developed, weak backs made strong, and
imperfect digestion corrected. Among the many salutary effects of the system, the
Principal has succeeded in enlarging the chest girth and chest expansion of boys and girls
several inches in as many months. When physical culture, diet and scientific sanitation
receive in school attention which their importance demands, Materia Medica will go off on
a long vacation.
ATHLETICS
We believe strongly in athletics. The mens sana is impossible unless it be in sano
corpore. But the school was not established with the special purpose of fostering
athletics. In other words we propose to teach English, Latin, Greek, et., rather than
football, baseball, basketball and tennis. However, we deem it wise to encourage every
species of healthful exercise in the open air, preferably those kinds that give to the
participant a corresponding amount of pleasure and profit. Interscholastic games will nit
be debarred provide no abuses creep in, and provided the trips, going and coming, can be
made in one day - Saturday. But no boy whose class standing falls below 70 per cent will
be permitted to take part in such games. This is our motto: Books First.
CHURCH ATTENDANCE
Paris is well supplied with churches - Baptists, Methodist, Presbyterian, Christian,
Episcopal - and all students will be expected to attend on Sunday, both Sunday school and
preaching services, at the church of their choice. Without sectarianism, we shall strive
to impress upon students the fact that religion is the one thing more important than
education.
CHAPEL EXERCISES
The exercises will be open each morning with the roll call, reading of the Scriptures,
singing and prayer. The principal will take advantage of this daily assembling of the
whole student body to give informal lectures on sociological and moral questions - on
anything, in fact, that may seem to bear on the building of character, or that may quicken
or refine the spirit of the school.
EXAMINATIONS
Examinations are held at the close of each semester, and at such other times as may seem
advisable.
REPORTS
Reports are sent out monthly to the parent or guardian with the standing of each student
in scholarship and deportment.
LITERARY SOCIETIES
The two literary societies, the Hamilton conducted by young men, and the Elizabeth
Browning, conducted by young ladies, meet every Friday evening. The exercises, consist in
reading, recitations, the reading of original essays, criticisms and debates. From time to
time these exercises are open to the public.
Y.M.C.A. and Y.W.C.A.
The Young Men's Christian Association and the Young Women's Christian Association meet in
the chapel on Wednesday and Friday afternoons, respectively.
MUSIC
There will be a first class teacher at the head of this department, and those completing
the four-years' course will be well grounded in the principals of music.
ADMISSIONS REQUIREMENTS
Intending patrons will please to remember that this is a High School, and only such pupils
are desired who are ready for a high school course. A knowledge of the ordinary
intermediate branches is required.
COURSES OF STUDY
There are three courses - Classical, Latin-Scientific and Scientific - covering a period
of four years each, designed either for students who wish to take a degree at college, or
for those who expect their high school course to fit them for the battle of life.
CLASSICAL COURSE
First Year
Latin - Pearson's Essentials
Mathematics - Practical Arithmetic, Elementary Algebra, Mental Arithmetic
English - Grammar, Completed; Compositions
History - Ancient
Second Year
Latin - Caesar, four books; Latin Composition
Mathematics - Higher Arithmetic; Higher Algeria; Mental Arithmetic
English - Rhetoric, Compositions
History - Medieval and Modern
Third Year
Latin - Cicero, six orations; compositions and Sight Reading
Greek - White's First Greek; Anabasis
Mathematics - Plane Geometry
English - Rhetoric, completed; Composition; Classics
History - History of England
Fourth Year
Latin - Eneid, six books
Greek - Anabasis, four books; Iliad, three books
Mathematics - Solid Geometry; Plane Trigonometry
English - College Entrance Requirements; Grammar, reviewed
History - History of the United States
LATIN - SCIENTIFIC
This course is the same as the Classical, with the exception that French or German is
substituted for Greek.
SCIENTIFIC
In this course French and German are taken instead of Latin and Greek, and Science is
taken in each year, viz.: First year, Physical Geography; second year, Physiology; third
year. Geology; fourth year, Physics
Reading, writing and spelling will be taught throughout every course.
GO HERE for photos of the 1908-09 Faculty.
