against parsimony and prejudice, the establishment of the first free High
School in the West.




Samuel Raymond.



Samuel Raymond was born in Bethlem, Connecticut, March 19, 1805. Like most
of the sons of New England, his boyhood was passed in plowing among the
rocks on one of the stony farms of that rocky and hilly State. At the age
of sixteen he commenced teaching the village school, and continued
teaching for six years, a portion of that time being spent in New York
State, in one of the many pretty towns that are scattered along on either
side of the Hudson. Returning to Connecticut at the end of his six years'
trial of teaching, he was employed to keep the books of the old and
wealthy firm of Messrs. A. & C. Day, dry goods commission merchants, at
Hartford. The late Governor Morgan, of New York, was, at the same time, a
salesman in the house.

In 1833, Mr. Raymond married Mary North, daughter of James North, of New
Britain, Conn.

In the Spring of 1835, he determined to try his fortune in the Far West,
away out in Ohio. With Kansas as the present geographical centre of the
Union, it is difficult for us to conceive of the New Englanders' idea of
the West at that time. It was something of an undertaking. It was a
journey of weeks, not a ride of twenty-three hours in a sleeping coach or