THE BIS BEGAN WITH TEN BOYS January 30, 1858

Once the initial thrust of activity began with a dream or idea in the mind of Charles Gustav Reemlin after his trip to France, the wheels of progress began to turn and that history is described in these words, “The suggestions made by Charles Reemelin [see note below about diminutive names] of Cincinnati, upon his return from Europe, where he spent some time in the examination of reformatory institutions for youth, gave the first effective impetus to the project in Ohio. In 1858 an appropriation was voted, commissioners appointed, and a site purchased. Cheap log buildings were forthwith erected and fitted for occupancy, and on the 30th day of January, 1858, ten boys were brought from the House of Refuge of Cincinnati, and placed there.”
From a House of Refuge to log cabins in the hills south of Lancaster, Ohio. The dictionary defines REFUGE as a “shelter or protection from danger, difficulty” and with the meanings of words, these ten boys were placed in a family situation based on ideas Charles Reemelin brought back from France. Now, those ten boys were given more than a refuge or shelter from danger. In that long trip from Cincinnati in a horse drawn wagon could only wonder what the future held for them. In reality they were going to be placed in a log cottage and treated like family. Not one of those boys tried to escape on that long wagon trip. Apparently they believed this new place was worth giving it a chance to improve and reform their lives.

If the log cabins were anything like David L. Schmeltzer (Lancaster, Ohio, Artisan) pictured as he built the above model, we can only imagine what the House of Refuge may have looked like, compared to the newly built log cabin they would live in. From a very humble beginning in January, 1858, when ten boys were brought from Cincinnati and placed in the first crude wooden cabins the farm grew into a place of gigantic proportions and beauty. The idea seems to have been popular from the start. It was not long until the need of more room became apparent. The attention of the State Legislature was awakened and ample appropriations were not wanting. The log structures soon disappeared and fine brick buildings took their place.
Honesty or facts of life demands a description of that early Ohio State Reform Farm that is simple: Every where you looked there was plenty of work for improving the grounds. Records from those early years describe the land, “The Ohio Reform Farm consists of 1170 acres…the surface is exceedingly rugged .. cut with sharp ravines with out-cropping sand rock. The soil, for the most part, is poor, being mixed all over the farm with the grindings of the old red sandstone, which underlies the entire surface. The timber is chestnut, white and pitch pine, scrubby oak of several varieties, laurel and whortleberry. There are some belts of fair soil. The hill slopes are well adapted to grape and peach growing, while the upper tablelands have been recovered, and are used for gardening and vegetables generally. Small quantities of wheat and oats can be produced.” All these comments could be called “the bad news” but the “good news” was there were plenty of boys to provide the manpower to convert all this into productive acres to provide for whatever was needed. After about a dozen years had passed by this time, that original number of ten boys multiplied yearly and in Commissioner Howe’s annual report to the governor for 1876, the number who had passed through the institution, from the beginning to date, was given at 2,019. Four years later that number, from the first, is given at 3,170. In June, 1881, the number of inmates there exceeded 550. With hundreds of young strong men, taking care of farm and orchard work made all the improvements mentioned above possible.
Through hard work, which is always a proven discipline, in 1880 the boys developed 30 acres of garden area, nursed 8,000 peach trees into being, besides working up about 400 acres of tillable ground.
Although productive, work was not all the boys were brought to the Ohio State Reform Farm; their lives were in need of a different outlook on society and that was not put aside. Modes of discipline are vital in reform schools and since the early group of boys had been in the system of the House of Refuge and a different style called, “the open system” was adopted. The time of the boys was divided between work of some kind, school, and recreation. Every boy is half the day in school, and the other half at work. There was an hour for dinner. Recreation was after supper, on Saturday afternoons and sometimes on holidays.
Each cottage family was under the management of an officer, or the elder brother, who’s wife, with few exceptions, was the teacher. The branches taught were those of a common school English education. In just three years a grammar school department was added. The boys were held to close and rigid discipline but treated with uniform kindness and trust whenever trust could be extended. One motivation of discipline is to inspire the inmates with the ambition of earning a good reputation and become trustworthy. Some freedoms were permitted such as coming and going and even to transact business.
In the 14th Annual Report of the Commissioners this specific report was given: “For eleven years we have sent, almost daily, one to six boys with teams (of horses) to Lancaster, a distance of six miles. Not one of those boys ever betrayed our confidence by escaping and we never heard a single complaint of bad conduct.”
Moral instruction was a part of the educational program and biblical principles and precepts were taught by using the Bible as a text-book. Passages from the Scripture such as, “the testimonies of the Lord are sure, making wise the simple,” and that “the law of the Lord is perfect, converting the soul,” the boys were encouraged to read, mark, learn and inwardly to digest the teaching of Divine revelation, and as another passage taught, “to hide its principles in their hearts.” regarding those principles as a “lamp to their feet and a light to their path.” (Psalms 119:11, 105)
Discipline always involved some kind of corporal punishment and was only resorted to in extreme cases and “always with the rod”. (Any boy reading this who spent time on the Hill knows this method obviously changed through the years. In later years a leather strap was among the objects used for discipline, as well as paddles. This subject is too involved to cover everything about discipline at one setting and will be addressed in other articles about the BIS.)
In addition to education and moral guidance, manual labor on the farm, mechanical branches were also taught. Through the years, and according to the needs of the times, these shops were a part of the boys’ education: Shoe & boot manufacturing, a brush factory, a tailor shop, a cane-seat making department and a telegraph office. Naturally, as years and needs changed, the institution adapted shops to provide a training for employment once the boys left the reform school (farm).
Expressions such as “waste not, want to” and similar aphorisms can be seen as we study the pages of history describing the Boys Industrial School, as the State Reform Farm was later called. And years later the name was adapted to hopefully describe goals, like the Fairfield School for Boys. The work ethic of boys was important and was vital to the institution’s very existence. Throughout the 122 years of its existence, for many years the only things brought in from the outside were coal and medicine; everything else was grown, raised and cared for or harvested “for the table” and even their trade schools. At some times the boys even sewed their own clothes as well as making their own shoes and later shops in metal work and wood work skills were developed so the boys could continue a trade for the rest of their lives.
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NOTE: Diminutive words, e.g., Charles and Carl are similar to names of our own day, like Hank, Henry or Pete, Peggy, Betty – there is a more proper name from which other names are formed; Carl is the German form of Charles. The last name or surname has also gone through different spellings and pronunciations through the years. Charles Reemelin himself was often surprised and not pleased to find his name pronounced or spelled differently; he says that in his autobiography he wrote when he was 75, just three years before he died..
THE WORDWRIGHT gives attribution to routine historical records of the State of Ohio as they appeared in various annual reports from Commissioners and Superintendents of the Boys Industrial School in the years covered in the above article. Also much material in this article was gleaned from the 1974 Edition of A.A. Graham’s “History of Fairfield and Perry Counties, Ohio.” Publishing date 1883, Chicago, W. H. Beers & Co. Also the engraving of Charles Gustav Reemelin was obtained from the Internet via www.archive.org.