George Bancroft

America's first great popular historian was George Bancroft, born October 3, 1800 in Worcester. He moved to Northampton in 1823 and, with Joseph Cogswell, founded a school for boys aged 9 to 12. Round Hill School attracted children of the national elite. Tuition was nearly triple that of Harvard College and few local students attended, but the town appreciated the school as a major intellectual enterprise. While Cogswell counseled students and led them on field trips, Bancroft, whom they called "the Critter," drew well connected visitors and wrote articles in periodicals. While the school was innovative in many areas, it was the first educational institution to have physical education as part of its daily routine and the first to have a physical education instructor as part of the faculty. In 1828, Northampton selectmen invited Bancroft to deliver a July 4th oration. His erudite but democratic speech delighted citizens. A write-in victor in the next state legislative race, he declined election by the "too liberal" Northampton voters. He was thus drawn into writing articles for the Workingman's Party, a way-station for voters unhappy with the Whigs but unable to accept Andrew Jackson's leadership. Eventually Bancroft went to Washington D.C. where he met and admired Jackson. In 1834, he saw the closing of the Round Hill School, published the first volume of his monumental History of the United States, and ran for the General Court with Workingman's Party support. He lost badly to the Whigs. In 1835, he moved from Northampton and began another nine volumes of his History. He found political success in appointive posts: Collector of the Port of Boston, where he gave Nathaniel Hawthorne a job; Secretary of the Navy and founder of the Naval Academy at Annapolis; Ambassador to England; and Ambassador to the German Empire. He died in 1891.

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