learned from her the circumstances of the family. The doors of the "Old
Stone Academy" were opened to William H. McGuffey and he there obtained
his first start in a preparation for college. But his labor could not be
wholly spared on the farm so lately won from the surrounding forest. He
worked in the fields in summer, continuing his studies and walked many
miles once a week to recite his lessons to a kindly clergyman.

W.H. McGuffey's father was too poor to aid his son in obtaining a
collegiate education, and the latter soon turned to teaching as a means
of obtaining money to support himself in college. When prepared for
college he went back to his native county and entered Washington
College. He was in his twenty-sixth year when he graduated with
distinguished honors from that institution.

It was at Washington College that W.H. McGuffey first met with a great
teacher and former of character,--Dr. Andrew Wylie, then the president.
It was considered by Dr. McGuffey one of the most fortunate events of
his life that he came at that time under the influence of Dr. Wylie's
forceful mind and elevated character.

[A College Professor]

Dr. McGuffey was obliged to suspend his collegiate course for a year to
earn more money for his support. He taught a private school at Paris,
Ky., in 1823 and 1824. There he met Dr. Robert H. Bishop, the president
of Miami University at Oxford, Ohio. Dr. Bishop was so impressed with
the character and mental power of the young teacher that on March 29,
1826, even before McGuffey received his bachelor's degree from
Washington College, he received his appointment as professor of Ancient
Languages at Miami University.