Schoolmaster of Yesterday: A Three Generation Story, 1820-1919

viii, 359 pp. Black-and-white illustrations by Howard Simon. The Kennedys were a dynasty of schoolmasters. Millard Fillmore Kennedy and his father and grandfather beforew him held sway in Indiana district schools from the period when the Midwest was still the frontier to the time when the Machine Age had begun in earnest. Thomas Kennedy started teaching in 1820, when there were no textbooks, little papers, and few slates. The schools were isolated log cabins with earthen floors and backless benches.