The Public Relationship Between Dickinson and the Indian School
Introduction
In order to understand the Indian School, it is imperative to that we understand Carlisle at the time. According to the 1880 US census, one year after the School was established, Carlisle was a thriving midwestern town, with a population of 6,209 people. The shoe factory in town employed over 800 residents. There were two railroads, three banks, and ten hotels in Carlisle by the time Pratt established his school. By the late nineteenth century, there were 1,117 "colored residents" in Carlisle(1). Carlisle boasted a low unemployment rate and a high literacy rate at the time of the census.
Carlisle was an ideal location for the Indian School for a number of reasons. Firstly, it was far enough inland from the east coast so that the Indians would not be overwhelmed with urban life. However, it was not so far west that the students would be able to run away back to their families. One of the problems with the day schools that existed on the reservations in the years preceeding the Indian School was that at night, the students would return to their families and be reimmersed in their Indian culture, effectively discounting all the work done to Anglicize them that day. Therefore, when Pratt envisioned a boarding school for Indians, he wanted to make sure that they would be far enough away from Indian culture that they would have no choice but to stay. Secondly, there were vacant army barracks in Carlisle, making the town an ideal location for Pratt's school. Thirdly, the barracks were only 2.01 miles from an already well established institution, Dickinson College.
The first Indian School students arrived in Carlisle from Fort Marion on October 6, 1879. They were still dressed in tribal uniform; “for the people of Carlisle it was a gala day and a great crowd gathered around the railroad”(2). The older Indian boys sang songs aloud in order to keep their spirits up and remain courageous, even though they were frightened.
Footnotes
(1) Georgiana Rockwell. St. Katharine's Hall, Carlisle PA: The Unfolding Apostolate of the Sisters of the Blessed Sacrament.Bensalem: Sisters of the Blessed Sacrament.
(2)Nancy Van Dolsen. "Carlisle 1880: A Historical Demographical Approach." Honors History diss., Dickinson College, 1982.
St. Patrick Church
In 1879, when Pratt brought his first students to Carlisle, St. Patrick Catholic Church was the only Catholic church in town. The Catholic missionary schools that existed on the reservations provided students to Pratt's school. When Father Joseph Andrew Stephan of the Bureau of Catholic Indian Missions discovered that Catholic Indian students were being denied the right to practice Catholicism, he contacted the priest at St. Patrick, Father Ganss. Over the next three decades, the school and the church maintained a strong, though at times turbulent, relationship.
St. Patrick Shrine Church
140 E. Pomfret Street
Carlisle, PA 17013
(717) 243-4411
Learn more about the relationship between the Indian School and St. Patrick
Athletics: Dickinson vs. Carlisle
By the time the Carlisle Indian School was founded, Dickinson College had an established sports program. The students as the Indian School began forming sports teams of their own. The close proximities of the schools then created a competitive atmosphere between the two institution's athletic programs.
Learn more about the Athletic Programs of Dickinson and Carlisle
Pop Warner
Glenn Scobey Warner was born on April 5, 1871 in the town of Springfield, New York. He began his football career as a member of the Cornell University team. He began coaching immediately after graduation from Cornell, and made his way to the Carlisle Indian School in 1899. Warner left Carlisle four years later, but returned in 1907 to reclaim his position of head football coach. Warner's career at the Indian School lasted through the 1914 season.
