Miss Mary Anna, a born educator

As students and parents prepare for the coming school year, consider the half-century career of educator Mary Anna Longstreth.

Born in Philadelphia, Longstreth (1811-1884) began her schooling at 2 years old, "according to the strictest traditions of the Society of Friends," as recorded by the Mary Anna Longstreth Alumnae Association. At 13, Longstreth was already instructing her younger sisters in Latin.

"Her early training made work the habit of her life," recounted a future colleague.

At only 18 years old, Longstreth founded a Quaker school for girls. Moving into a private residence at 3 N. 11th St., the School of Mary Anna Longstreth counted five pupils on its inaugural roster.

As many educators will confess, teaching is often more of a vocation than an occupation. For Miss Mary Anna, as Longstreth became affectionately known, "the guidance of youth was . . . a privilege and work of love."

Word of Longstreth's compassion and competence quickly spread. The school's student body doubled, and then tripled. Longstreth's younger sisters - perhaps to make up for all of those Latin lessons - volunteered to help. Within a decade, the school began the first of many moves to accommodate growing enrollment.

Unlike many other schools for young girls at the time, Longstreth's curriculum advanced far beyond household subjects. History and science took the place of sewing and other domestic arts.

In a far cry from the standardized testing of today, Longstreth studied the disposition of each student and held private monthly meetings to discuss issues and improvements. She strongly objected to public examinations as "tending to superficiality rather than thoroughness," witnessed Helen Ludlow, a former student and author of Memoir of Mary Anna Longstreth.

"So much that is today thought essential to the well-being of a child was omitted . . . and the result was so unequaled in its success that one pauses to consider whether, after all, the old way was not as good as the new one," lamented Mary Moss, an assistant at the school.

In the spring of 1877, Longstreth decided to close her school. After having taught for half a century, her "strength no longer matched the strain," according to Margaretta Archambault, a close friend.

More than 1,000 girls were alumnae of the School of Mary Anna Longstreth. In her final years there, Longstreth's classes often included the grandchildren of the school's original students.

Longstreth passed away in 1884 and is buried at South Laurel Hill Cemetery.