Cambria County Pioneers, 1910, by James L. Swank, Cambria County, PA - Samuel Bell McCormick
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CAMBRIA COUNTY PIONEERS
HON. CYRUS L. PERSHING
A Collection of Brief Biographical and other Sketches
Relating to the Early History of Cambria County, Pennsylvania.
by JAMES M. SWANK
PHILADELPHIA: No. 261 SOUTH FOURTH STREET, 1910.
124 CAMBRIA COUNTY PIONEERS.
SAMUEL BELL McCORMICK.
COMMUNICATED TO THE JOHNSTOWN TRIBUNE IN APRIL, 1901,
DURING MR. McCORMICK'S LIFETIME.
RECENT references in the columns of the Tribune to the old-time schools and
school teachers of Johnstown and its vicinity prompt me to compile from data in
my possession the leading facts in the career of Samuel Bell McCormick, a noted
teacher of fifty years ago in Johnstown.
S. B. McCormick, as he has always written his name, was born on a farm a short
distance south of what is now Larimer Station, on the Pennsylvania Railroad, in
Westmoreland county, on June 18, 1817. His father, Andrew McCormick, was a
native of the north of Ireland and came to this country with his father, John
McCormick, and the remainder of the family in 1790, when he was six years old.
The McCormicks came directly from Ireland to Larimer with a large colony of
Scotch-Irish, the Griers, the Baxters, the Boyds, the Irwins, and others. They
built a church on Matthew Osborn's land, and there are yet in the church-yard
forty tombstones of McCormicks, although the church was torn down long ago. S.
B. McCormick's mother, whose maiden name was Ann Campbell, the daughter of James
Campbell, at one time a rich and prosperous Philadelphia merchant, was born in
Philadelphia in 1786. The Campbells were also Scotch-Irish, James Campbell
coming from the north of Ireland to this country before the Revolution. In
course of time James Campbell, with his family, also moved to Western
Pennsylvania, the Campbells finally settling in the Redstone settlement on the
Monongahela river. We give these details partly to illustrate the prominence of
the Scotch-Irish element in the early settlement of Western Pennsylvania.
Andrew McCormick became the owner of a piece of land near Larimer Station.
From the Larimer farm Mr. Mc-
SAMUEL BELL McCORMICK. 125
Cormick's father moved to Murrysville, where the family resided for seven years.
Thence Andrew McCormick moved to Warsaw, in Jefferson county, in 1835, and died
there.
S. B. McCormick was almost wholly self-educated. He was never a student at
either a college or an academy. Gifted with an acute intellect, ambitious, and
studious, he was not satisfied with the limited opportunities afforded by the
subscription schools of his day and aspired to better things. He studied
geometry with his oldest brother, Latin with a preacher named Marshall and with
the Reverend W. W. Woodend, Greek with Thomas B. Keenan, and astronomy without
any assistance except that which he first obtained from a "geography of the
heavens." When Mr. McCormick was a young man land surveying was one of the
learned professions; a surveyor of farms and roads was a person of consequence;
so S. B. McCormick studied surveying with an expert surveyor in Brookville,
Jefferson county, after the family had removed to that county. But prior to
going to Jefferson county Mr. McCormick began in Westmoreland county his life
work as a teacher.
S. B. McCormick's father was an Associate Reformed Presbyterian, and having
many religious books the son was posted in Bible history and theological
questions. For a time, soon after he had commenced teaching, he was a member of
Dr. David Kirkpatrick's Bible class at Poke Run Presbyterian church.
In 1840 Mr. McCormick taught school near New Alexandria, Westmoreland county.
One of his pupils was the present Judge A. D. McConnell, of Greensburg, who
learned his A B C's at Mr. McCormick's knee. About 1844 Mr. McCormick began the
study of law with Hon. Joseph H. Kuhns, of Greensburg, at one time a Whig member
of Congress, and was admitted to the Westmoreland bar on September 3, 1846. On
September 5, 1846, he was married to Eliza Kemp and moved to Ligonier, where he
taught school, practiced law, and started a newspaper. In 1852, with his wife
and two children, he moved to Johnstown and began his career as a Cambria county
teacher. From that time until his removal to California in 1874 he taught school
at Johnstown and Millville, except during a period
126 CAMBRIA COUNTY PIONEERS.
of five years when he served as superintendent of common schools for Cambria
county. Mr. McCormick lives at Oakdale, Stanislaus county, California, where for
many years he was a local magistrate, with the honorary title of judge. He
taught school for two years at Oakdale. His son, Winfield Scott McCormick, had
preceded him to Oakdale.
Mr. McCormick's long career as a teacher in Johnstown was a most honorable
one. Thoroughly understanding all the branches of study that were embraced in
the sensible common-school course of those days he was very successful in
leading his classes up the hill of science and in developing in hundreds of boys
and girls who are now getting to be old men and women the ambition to do their
best in the school-room and in the wider spheres which they were soon to enter.
For several years he was superintendent of the Johnstown schools. He was also
principal of the Millville schools for three or four years. He had a special
liking for astronomy and often lectured upon this subject.
In November, 1852, soon after his removal from Ligonier to Johnstown, and
while teaching at the head of Main street, Mr. McCormick undertook the
publication of a weekly Whig newspaper, The Cambrian, which he continued until
about the close of the political campaign in the fall of 1853, when its
publication was discontinued. The printing materials were owned by some of the
leading Whigs of the town. The Cambria Tribune was established in December,
1853, immediately after Mr. McCormick's retirement. With a decided literary bent
and possessed of considerable skill as a newspaper controversialist Mr.
McCormick could not successfully teach school and edit a newspaper, either at
Ligonier or Johnstown, nor could anybody.
The common school system of Pennsylvania was not fully developed until 1854,
on May 8 of which year an act of the General Assembly was approved by Governor
William Bigler which established the office of county superintendent. The act
took effect the same year. Robert L. Johnston was the first superintendent for
Cambria county and Mr. McCormick was the second. I copy below from the official
record a list of the persons who have held this office in Cambria county from
1854 to the present time.
SAMUEL BELL McCORMICK. 127
Robert L. Johnston, elected; commissioned July 5, 1854; resigned in 1855;
salary per annum, $400. S. B. McCormick, appointed; commissioned October 6,
1855; salary, $400. S. B. McCormick, elected for three years; commissioned June
3, 1857; salary, $800. Thomas A. Maguire, elected; commissioned July 17, 1860;
salary, $800. James M. Swank, appointed; commissioned February 7, 1861; resigned
in November, 1861; salary, $800. Wm. A. Scott, appointed; commissioned January
4, 1862; salary, $800; resigned to enter the Union army; killed at
Fredericksburg. Henry Ely, appointed; commissioned August 13, 1862; salary,
$800. J. Frank Condon, elected; commissioned June 1, 1863; salary, $800; J.
Frank Condon, re-elected; commissioned June 4, 1866; salary, $1,000; resigned in
1867. T. J. Chapman, appointed; commissioned October 1, 1867. T. J. Chapman,
elected; commissioned June 4, 1869; salary, $1,000. T. J. Chapman, re-elected;
commissioned June 6, 1872; salary, $1,000. Hartman Berg, elected; commissioned
June 7, 1875; salary, $1,000; re-elected; commissioned June, 1878. L. Strayer,
elected; commissioned June, 1881; salary fixed by the number of schools, which
varied the amount of salary each year, averaging about $1,100; re-elected June,
1884. W. J. Cramer, elected June, 1887; salary, $1,500. Superintendent Cramer
died on January 23, 1888, and J. W. Leech was appointed and commissioned to fill
the unexpired term. J. W. Leech was elected and commissioned June, 1890; salary,
$1,500; re-elected June, 1893; salary, $1,700. T. L. Gibson, elected and
commissioned June, 1896; salary, $1,700; re-elected June, 1899; salary, $1,700.
It will be seen from the above record that Mr. McCormick served as county
superintendent for five years. The services rendered by him in this office were
important and valuable. Other superintendents have done good work, but he was
virtually the pioneer in a position of great opportunities and of great
responsibility. He was industrious, enthusiastic, tactful, and capable. It was
his lot not only to popularize his own office and its authority but the common
school system itself. To accomplish these results he visited every school
district in the county and became personally acquainted with directors and
taxpayers as well as teachers;
128 CAMBRIA COUNTY PIONEERS.
he visited the schools and made interesting speeches to the children; his oral
examinations of applicants for teachers' certificates were always fair and were
held in nearly every town and township in the county and in the presence of
citizens and taxpayers. He thus demonstrated the usefulness of his office. He
inspired others with his own enthusiasm. He encouraged the holding of school
exhibitions in every school district and he personally attended most of them.
These exhibitions, which usually took place in the spring of the year, joined to
his personal participation in them, had a marvelous effect in creating and
sustaining an interest in common schools in Cambria county. Taxes for their
support were more freely paid, better methods of instruction were introduced,
better teachers were employed, better school-houses were built, and a healthier
tone pervaded all educational conditions. Mr. McCormick's term of office expired
just as the mutterings of civil strife came up from the South, and there was
subsequently much demoralization in the administration of the schools of Cambria
county, as elsewhere, but this demoralization did not long continue. Mr.
McCormick's good work was not lost.
In a letter which I have recently received from Mr. McCormick he writes that
he still does some literary work and that not long ago he contributed to a local
newspaper a series of twelve articles on his favorite science of astronomy. Two
children and several grandchildren are either with him or are not far away. A
married daughter, Lenore, now lives in Germantown, Pennsylvania.
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Mr. McCormick died on May 1, 1903, at Oakdale, Stanislaus county, California,
and was buried in the Union cemetery at that place. He was 85 years, 10 months,
and 13 days old - a good old age.