This small booklet, held together by a red-and-silver ribbon, came from the first triennial (every 3 years) reunion of the Model School Class of 1904. The booklet outlines some speeches given by members of the class and the names of each student. A partial transcription of the autographs is included.
This grouping contains two items from very early Model School commencements. The first is a small invitation to the 1878 commencement ceremony at Taylor Opera House, in Trenton. The second is a (partly torn) booklet from the 1880 commencement, including a list of events and the names of the graduating students. No transcriptions, as the documents are typed.
This collection of four receipts for tuition, room, and board at the Model School gives insight into how much it cost to attend the de facto elite institution. The first two vouchers, made out to a John McCormick and from around 1862, show that the Normal School charged about $8.00 in tuition in its first decades. According to census statistics, an average New Jersey laborer spent about $2.50 per week on bread, so this was not an unsubstantial amount of money!
Forty years later, in 1902-1903, George Hildebrecht (owner of Trenton's Hotel Hildebrecht) paid $10.50 for per quarter for his son Albert. At this time, based on census statistics, this would have equaled about half a day's wages for the average Trenton industrial laborer.
No transcriptions, as the documents are largely typed.
New Jersey State Normal School (Trenton, N.J.)This scrapbook includes photographs, illustrations, commencement and class day booklets, correspondence, report cards, and ephemera collected by Emma R. Kerns, Model School Class of 1916. It offers insight into the daily lives and school careers of the Model students throughout the school's final years before its closure after the 1917 academic year. Later annotations also appear; some are perhaps by Miss Kerns before her death in 1977, but others most likely were added by past Trentoniana librarians following the book's donation ca. 1977. Any additions in a clearly different hand have been rendered in italics. Some of these italicized annotations simply read "index," probably referring to Trentoniana's card catalogue.
Due to the volume's bulky nature, it was not possible to digitize without disbinding the entire volume and scanning pages individually. Two photos of the book before this process are included at the end of the PDF. Pages have been scanned in order, skipping any blank sections; as a result, page numbers may appear to jump. Kerns also pasted many booklets and folded items into these pages, and these items sometimes required multiple scans to entirely capture. Finally, note that file size limits have required a significant amount of compression to host this PDF, and may negatively affect the quality of the images. An unaltered version is available through Trentoniana upon request.
A partial transcription of the handwritten sections is included.
Kerns, Emma R. (Emma Rebecca), 1896-1977Content warning: While the vast majority of this work contains no harmful content, one "joke" on page 141 includes insulting language about African-Americans.
This scrapbook includes photographs, illustrations, commencement and class day booklets, correspondence, ephemera, and manuscript materials collected by Grace B. Fletcher, Model School Class of 1907. It offers insight into the daily lives and school careers of the Model students throughout the first decade of the 20th century. While the bulk of the items pasted into the work date to around 1907, some date to as early as 1901. In addition, some annotations must have been added later, at least as early as 1916.
Due to the volume's bulky nature, it was not possible to digitize without disbinding the entire volume and scanning pages individually. Two photos of the book before this process are included at the end of the PDF. Pages have been scanned in order, skipping any blank sections; as a result, page numbers may appear to jump. Fletcher also pasted many booklets and folded items into these pages, and these items sometimes required multiple scans to entirely capture. Finally, note that file size limits have required a significant amount of compression to host this PDF, and may negatively affect the quality of the images. An unaltered version is available through Trentoniana upon request.
A partial transcription of the handwritten sections is included.
The following notes relate to specific pages of the document:
- The Class Day booklet on page 121 has not been scanned, as it is identical to one on page 87.
- The clippings found on pages 136-139 were not pasted into the book and may have originally been placed elsewhere.
This single page leaflet marks the transition between the Normal and Model Schools in Trenton and the modern institution known as The College of New Jersey in Ewing. Aside from celebrating "Alumni Week-End" (the equivalent to today's homecoming, though held in the Spring), the celebrations marked the schools' 76th anniversary and the cornerstone-laying for the first building at Hillwood Lakes, Green Hall. No transcription.
New Jersey State Teachers College at TrentonThe circumstances surrounding this clearly satirical newspaper, and its relationship with The Signal, remain partly unknown. However, it probably relates to a student production of the comedy "Beggar on Horseback" by George Kaufman and Marc Connelly. The rather morbid cover story seems to be a riff on the events of the play, with students appearing under the names of the characters they played. Other "news" stories appear throughout, alongside "advertisements" with the names and members of school organizations, as well as illustrations. Several advertisements related to buying bonds to support the United States in World War Two also are present. No transcription.
unknownThis program booklet dates from the cornerstone laying of the Hillwood Lakes campus's first building, Green Hall. This event marked a transition point for the college away from the city of Trenton, and several notables were invited to attend. No transcription.
New Jersey State Normal School (Trenton, N.J.)This small booklet records the Class Day exercises for the Model School's Class of 1904, depicting the class roster, the order of exercises, and the names of students performing. A reproduction of the corresponding commencement booklet can be found in "History of the Model Class of 1904" (see related materials below). No transcription.
New Jersey State Normal School (Trenton, N.J.)This booklet from the 1903 Model School commencement includes lists of graduating students, their home towns, and their area of study. It also contains the list of commencement exercises. Of some note is the mention of an essay given by honor student Charlotta Miller on the Black poet and author Paul Lawrence Dunbar, which has unfortunately not survived. The student roster also includes several surnames that appear in other classes from around this period, namely Britton, De Cou, and Bosworth; these students may be siblings of those sharing their name. Some students from the Class of 1904 also appear. No transcription.
New Jersey State Normal School (Trenton, N.J.)