History of Northampton, Massachusetts, from its settlement in 1654;

533 HISTORY OF NORTHAMPTON. [1791.
The School-House.
TliG reasou foi' attempting to reconsider the
vote for building a new school-house at the
center of the town became apparent at the December meeting
in 1791. A committee reported that the old schoolhouse
at Lickingwater (South Street) was not worth repairing,
and that a new one could be built there for £38, and
the old school building. Thereupon, Capt. Russell offered
to do the work for that amount, and a vote was passed empowering
him to carry out his proposition. The schoolhouse
was built, and in it for the first time in the history of
the town, girls and boys attended school together. For
many years a master was at the head of it, female teachers
not being employed till the beginning of the present cen-
tury.
Warned out of Town. In December, 1791, more than one hundred
persons, many of them heads of
families, were "warned out of town." There was no discrimination
as to occupation, ability or position. Among
them were named day-laborers, traders, yeomen, cardmakers,
pump makers, cordwainers, blacksmiths, joiners,
wheelwrights, gentlemen, sadlers, foreigners, clock-mak-
ers, negromen, masons, tanners, bookbinders, painters,
hair-dressers, single women, and widows. Many of the
men were married and had families, so that the whole
number of persons, if they had but one child each (and
some of them had more), must have amounted to upwards
of two hundred. They were characterized as persons
" who have lately come into this town for the purpose of
abiding therein," and "not having obtained the town's
consent therefor," it was ordered "that he, she or they
respectively depart the limits thereof with their children
and others under their care within 15 days." Two years
before the law respecting the qualifications of permanent
inhabitants had been re-enacted by the Legislature, and the
town for the first time taking action under it, made a
wholesale requisition upon all who had not obtained the
proper permission to become residents. The object of this
law was to prevent transient persons or persons of questionable
morals or uncertain character from becoming resi-
dents, and thus acquiring a legal " settlement " within its