Horace Mann

American educator and politician of the 19th century

3 quotes in the MindQuotes library.

About

Horace Mann, born May 4, 1796, in Franklin, Massachusetts, to a poor farming family, was largely self-educated. He entered Brown University at age 20 and graduated as valedictorian in 1819. After studying law, he was admitted to the Massachusetts bar in 1823. He served in the Massachusetts House of Representatives (1827–1833) and Senate (1833–1837), becoming Senate president. In 1837, he was appointed the first secretary of the newly created Massachusetts Board of Education, serving until 1848. He personally inspected over 800 schools, founded and edited The Common School Journal (1838), and wrote twelve influential Annual Reports advocating free, universal, nonsectarian, tax-funded public education.

Major works

Annual Reports (1837-1848)reports
The Common School Journal (1838)journal

Key milestones

1837Appointed first secretary of the Massachusetts Board of Education.
1839Established the first normal school (teacher training) in the U.S., in Lexington.
1853Becomes first president of Antioch College, a coeducational, nonsectarian institution.

Themes

Public educationSocial reformAbolitionismTeacher trainingEqual opportunity

Sources: sec.state.ma.us · britannica.com

“If you always do what you've always done, you'll always be what you are now. 5 mmmk A habit is like a cable: we weave a thread of it everyday, and at last we cannot break it - so we must form good, positive, and productive habits.”

— Horace MannTheme · Personal Development

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“If any man seeks for greatness, let him forget greatness and ask for truth, and he will find both.”

— Horace MannTheme · Wisdom

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“In vain do they talk of happiness who never subdued an impulse in obedience to a principle. He who never sacrificed a present to a future good, or a personal to a general one, can speak of happiness only as the blind speak of color.”

— Horace MannTheme · Personal Development

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