1890 Buchanan and Delaware Counties History pgs. 690-692

FRANCIS W. DUNHAM. "Thank God there are no free schools in this province, nor printing press; and I hope we shall not have for these hundred years," said Berkeley, the royal governor of Virginia, in 1671. His hope was realized in respect to the schools and largely, also, in respect to the printing press. But, to the great honor of the Pilgrim fathers, this hope found no lodgment in the colonies founded by them. On the contrary, it was one of the first public labors to be performed, in planting the New England colonies, to provide adequate facilities for the proper training of the young, and the printing press followed, in the course of time, as soon as the population and wealth of the community would warrant it. This idea, too, of laying the foundation of the commonwealth in the intelligence of its people has been carried out in all those states and territories which have since been founded by off-shoots from the New England stock. They understand that public virtue lies in public intelligence, and they act upon that knowledge.

The subject of this sketch was a New Englander by birth and training, a pioneer settler and one of the founders, of a colony, a builder of schools, an enthusiastic and accomplished educator. His name is familiar to the older citizens of Delaware county, among whom he labored for more than ten years prior to his untimely death. An outline of his career will here be attempted in order that his name may be placed among those worthy to be remembered in connection with the early settlement of this county.

Francis W. Dunham was a native of Vermont and a descendant of New England ancestry. He was the eldest of a family of four children, who came West, born to Joseph and Paulina (Joiner) Dunham, both natives also of the
"Green Mountain State." His father is remembered as one of the early settlers of this county, moving here in 1856. He resided at Almoral, where he died October 31, 1864, aged sixty-eight. He was a thoughtful, industrious, useful citizen, a man of superior intelligence, quiet in his habits and marked for his sturdy Christian character, having been a life-long member of the Congregational church.

The mother of Francis W. Dunham, who was a native of Royalton, Vt., was married in her native place, and afterwards accompanying her husband to this state, became one of the pioneer women of Delaware county, and here displayed to good advantage some of the best qualities of her sex, as she stood side by side with her husband and helped him fight the battles of the pioneer. She died in Almoral in October, 1871, at the age of seventy, having also been from her early years a zealous member of the Congregational church. Of the nine children born to Joseph and Paulina Dunham, only one now survives, that being Joseph Bicknell Dunham, now a resident of Almoral, the two youngest -Abbie Eliza, afterwards wife of Major William Henry Keeling, dying May 3, 1866, and Buel G., October 8, 1861, the latter from disease contracted in the union army during the late
war. The other five died before they became grown.

Francis W. Dunham was born in Bakersfield, Vt., July 20, 1830.   He was reared in his native place.    In youth he exhibited a fondness  for books and an aptitude for study not common to his years. He received a good common-school training, and was prepared for college in the local academy at Bakersfield, entering the university   of   Vermont   at   Burlington when past  his seventeenth  year,  where he designed to take a thorough collegiate course and prepare himself for a teacher. But his constitution, never vigorous, gave way under the rigid application to which he subjected himself and he gave up his studies and quit college before he had entirely finished his course.

He married  in  1855,  October 3, and that same month came West and settled in Bowen's prairie, in Jones county, this state.   He resided there till the spring of 1856, when he, with a number of others, moved to Delaware county and started a settlement where the town of Almoral now stands.    The country was then new, and   there were no towns of any consequence   in the county.   Each newly settled place of a few families had high hopes of becoming a town of note, and Almoral was not without its anticipations. It was founded on a sound idea - that of making it an educational center.    It was laid out on a generous plan, being surveyed and  platted and  a  considerable act of land set  aside for an academy The school was to be under the auspices of the Congregational church.    The new town's claims  to recognition  were presented to the public by enthusiastic and able representatives; the school's interest by no less zealous and efficient workers. Francis W. Dunham was one of the chief of this number.   He labored earnestly, as did also his associates, and they met with  sufficient encouragement for some time to lead them to believe that   their efforts would be crowned with abundant success.      But failures in the matter of securing railway facilities, and other    failures of    lesser consequence, but still vitally affecting their town, upset their well-laid plans, and Almoral lost its hold on
the attention of the  public, never realizing the  high anticipations of its founders  as an educational   center.    The school,  however, was started, and Mr. Dunham taught one year in the new institution, moving at the end of that time to Earlville, where a larger field was open to him.    He taught in Earlville for two years, when the principalship of  the public  schools of Manchester was offered him, and he moved there to accept that position.    He taught in Manchester for three years, devoting himself assiduously to the labor of building up  the
educational   interest of  his adopted home; at the end of which time he was warned by the impaired condition of his health, that he must seek a change of occupation or soon relinquish his hold on life.    In the fall of 1867 he was elected by his appreciative fellow-citizens superintendent of public instruction for the county; resigned his position as principal of the public schools of Manchester, and prepared to enter upon the discharge of the duties of his office with much enthusiasm, believing that the change would not only benefit his health, but would afford him an opportunity to still further assist in carrying forward the educational purposes to which he had resolved to devote his life. But in this he was disappointed. He took charge of his office the first of
January, 1868, and on the 7th he died. His death was recognized as a sad loss to the community, and one which, in respect to the educational interests of the county, not easily repaired. The county board of supervisors, at the next meeting after his death, passed the following preamble and resolutions of respect and condolence:

" WHEREAS, The Allwise Dispenser of events has seen fit in His providence to call from the active duties of life to just rewards, our much esteemed fellow-citizen and superintendent of schools, Francis W. Dunham, therefore,

Resolved, By the board of supervisors in session, that we bow with becoming     humility to the stern decree of Him who is too wise to err and too good to be unjust.

Resolved, That we recognized in our deceased brother an active and accomplished teacher, patriotic citizen and consistent, devoted Christian gentleman.

Resolved, That we tender to his deeply afflicted family our heartfelt sympathies, in  this, their hour of trial and deep distress.

Resolved, That a copy of these resolutions be sent to the Delaware County Union for  publication, and a copy to the family of deceased."

Mr. Dunham left surviving him a widow and two children. These are still living, the widow since having married, being now the wife of Cummings Sanborn, a sketch of whom appears in this work. The children, a son and daughter, now grown and married, are-George W. Dunham, attorney-at-law, of Manchester, and Mrs. Laura E. Barrett, wife of Charles H. Barrett, of Vermillion, Dak.

There are  a number of   names  that stand out more conspicuously in connection with the early history of Delaware county than that of Francis W. Dunham,  but there are none that are held in more grateful
remembrance by those who knew  him well, and who were in a position to know of the service he performed to the youth of his day, and through them to other generations.   His disinterested labors and unselfish
devotion to the cause of education have borne abundant fruit in the characters of many of this county's most honored citizens.  As one who plants a tree  places to  his name a monument which renews itself with each
returning season, so he who sows the seed  of knowledge places to his name that which will grow, and with its gathering strength shed a softer fragrance upon his memory than any that ever exhaled from the flora
of this earth.   Hand in hand with the labors of the school-room, Francis W. Dunham carried the labors of his church, that church in which he had been reared and of which his parents had been lifelong  members.    He  was not a minister and  never   assumed the duties  which belong especially to that high order; but he was an active, zealous and efficient layman, believing in those great principles of moral conduct and  fundamental truths concerning the future which were taught by "him who spake as never man spake" and he gave to this belief the weight of a personal example, illustrating the every day use and necessity of those teachings in a manner equalled by but few men.

 

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