Claim:   An 1872 list of rules for public school teachers is genuine.

Status:   False.

Example:   [Collected on the Internet, 2000]

RULES FOR TEACHERS - 1872 1. Teachers each day will fill lamps, clean chimneys. 2. Each teacher will bring a bucket of water and a scuttle of coal for the daily' session. 3. Make your pens carefully. You whittle nibs to the individual taste of the pupils. 4. Men teachers may take one evening each week for courting purposes, or two evenings a week if they go to church regularly. 5. After ten hours in school, the teachers may spend the remaining time reading the Bible or other good books. 6. Women teachers who marry or engage in unseemly conduct will be dismissed. 7. Every teacher should lay aside from each pay a goodly sum of this earnings for his benefit during his declining years so that he will not become a burden on society. 8. Any teacher who smokes, uses liquor in any form, frequents pool or public halls, or gets shaved in a barber shop will give good reason to suspect his worth, intention, integrity and honest. 9. The teacher who performs his labor faithfully and without fault for five years will be given an increase of twenty cents per week in his pay, providing the Board of Education approves.

Variations:   Sometimes the document includes a list of equally onerous rules for students as well:

1. Respect your schoolmaster. Obey him and accept his punishments. 2. Do not call your classmates names or fight with them. Love and help each other. 3. Never make noises or disturb your neighbors as they work. Be silent during classes. 4. Do not talk unless it's absolutely necessary. 5. Bring firewood into the classroom for the stove whenever the teacher tells you to. 6. If the master calls your name after class, straighten the benches and tables, sweep the room, dust and leave everything tidy.

Origins:   Another "the way we were" document of dubious origin intended to demonstrate by comparison how much better off we are today, one which anecdotal evidence indicates has been circulating since at least the 1930s. We're expected to marvel at the grimness of a late nineteenth century American schoolteacher's lot: the profession was lowly regarded, the work was physically demanding and involved long hours on the job, the position paid poorly, retirement benefits were non-existent, and teachers were expected to be among the most morally upright members of their community.

Hmm . . . maybe things haven't changed that much after all.

The bottom line is that nobody has ever been able to verify the authenticity of this list of rules. It has appeared in countless newspapers and museums throughout North America, with each exhibitor claiming that it originated with their county or school district. It is also offered in a number of different guises, such as a list of rules for sales clerks at W.T. Stewart's department store in New York, or for the employees of a New England carriage works

Like the infamous 1895 Exam, all attempts to trace this document inevitably dead end with a photocopy or printed sheet of indeterminate origin (and of suspiciously modern vintage). We do wonder why these documents always include a heading that mentions the year, such as "RULES FOR TEACHERS - 1872." If these documents were genuine, why wouldn't the headings simply read "RULES FOR TEACHERS"? Did the rules change so frequently that including the year was necessary to avoid confusion? Was this document an important revision to the "RULES FOR TEACHERS - 1869" list?

Perhaps this piece tells us more about our contemporary vision of life in the 1870s than it does about life in the real 1870s.

Last updated:   9 July 2007

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  Sources:

    Brunvand, Jan Harold.   Curses! Broiled Again!

    New York: W. W. Norton, 1989.   ISBN 0-393-30711-5   (pp. 240-242).

    Smith, Jack.   "The 'Chimney' That Flue Over His Head."

    Los Angeles Times.   30 June 1988   (View; p. 1).

    Weller, Joan.   "School Tough Now? Check the Past."

    The Ottawa Citizen.   20 August 1994   (p. J6).

    The New York Times.   "Fit to Parent, Fit to Teach."

    27 December 1982   (p. A18).

    The Phoenix Gazette.   "Rules for Teachers."

    4 January 1995   (p. B4).