Students

Letter from by C. F. Remick, Aug. 20, 1888

“I remember well… the stone boarding house… where I used to peddle apples from our ‘honeysweet’ tree, at 10 cents a bushel when I couldn’t get more; and if I could by chance sell a bushel for 25 cents I felt as though my fortune was made…”

Reported by E. A. Stewart

When Mr. Twilight returned to Canada in 1852 he brought with him an English family named Addison…. Mr. Twilight lived in Brownington upwards of 30 years… His two sons James and Richard were favorites with Mr. Twilight. They were in his care to receive as good an education as the academy could afford; and until he was stricken down with disease they were under his constant tuition and discipline.

Letter from Jas. W. Strong, Aug. 23, 1888

…I was sent to toll the bell whenever a death occurred or a funeral procession was passing to the cemetery. I shall never forget the terribly cold and chilling winds that blew through the open belfry where with blue lips and shivering limbs I stood waiting…

Newsclipping, Aug. 17, 1932

Among the hundreds of visitors on this joyous homecoming day was one who thrilled as he trod the once familiar halls. This was Herbert H. Tracy of Closter, New Jersey, who went to school to the famous educator. His recollections showed that it was not all work and no play even in his day. He with two others, Gene Cleveland of Burlington, and A. A. Cheney of Marietta, Ohio, all Brownington boys dead, occupied the southeast room on the third floor. They boarded themselves and one night had a feast of chicken cooked to a turn. But they wanted milk gravy, and that was soon forthcoming, too. Probably the old cow was a little short on her milk next morning and the farmer’s wife, hunted high and low for a missing rooster, but that’s telling.

Newsclipping, Aug. 18, 1933

On the second floor, which was the girls’ dormitory, and where slept Lydia, “who came over the mountain from Troy,” and who brought her feather bed because she “thought it might be cold there in January…” It is interesting to note the many who come back with stories of relatives who went to the then famous school. There is the story of the boy from West Burke who drove his cow up to Brownington and bought himself a barrel of crackers.