Dorchester Illustration 2618
Today’s illustration comes from The Dorchester Beacon, Feb. 17, 1894. The artist would have been standing at the corner of Willis and Stoughton Street.
The illustration was on the front page of the newspaper with a story about the Everett School Association’s reunion at the Old Dorchester Clubhouse on Feb. 6, 1894, a few blocks away from the school. The story said the school “is commodious and attractive, but its generous arms cannot hold all who throng to them. Primary schoolhouses are utilized on both Dorchester and Savin Hill avenues, and yet, so eager is the desire to get an education, that every square foot of room is growing more precious.”
The original Everett School building on Sumner Street was made out of wood and opened on Feb. 25, 1856. The City of Boston replaced the building in 1876 with a larger structure built of brick.
The school was named for Edward Everett, a Dorchester native. Everett was a congressman, governor of Massachusetts, president of Harvard University and served as U.S. Secretary of State in President Millard Fillmore’s administration. Everett gave a two hour speech prior to President Lincoln’s two minute Gettysburg Address.
Building schools was an ongoing endeavor in the second half of the 19th century. Some of the more notable school buildings include: William Stoughton School (1855) on River Street; Christopher Gibson School (1857) on School Street; Thaddeus Mason Harris School (1861) on Adams Street; the Edmund P. Tileston School (1868) on Norfolk Street; and the Minot School (1886) on Neponset Avenue.
