August 1884
The Florida Times-Union reports that “Dr. A.H. Gillet with a party are touring in Florida looking for a suitable
locality for a winter Chautauqua.”
The New York Chautauqua had proved enormously popular. But it was only possible during the summer months, when
the weather was good and the breezes from Lake Chautauqua provided comfort from the summer heat. Rev. Gillet was seeking
a site for a national Chautauqua that could meet sometime during the remainder of the year, and where the climate would be
equally suitable and provide relief from New York winters.
The Notice caught the attention of citizens in the town of Lake de Funiak. They dispatched C.C. Banfill to
Jacksonville to induce Dr. Gillet to consider their city.
Lake de Funiak was a placid circular lake surrounded by prime forests amid rolling lands. It was located halfway
between Pensacola and Chattahootchee, on the newly built Louisville and Nashville Railroad. This railroad line provided
a trans-panhandle route across upper Florida, connecting Pensacola, Mobile, and New Orleans with eastern cities of Jacksonville
and St. Augustine.
The Original surveying parties thought Lake de Funiak could become a hunting resort or site for
a college
The town was initially designated a supply depot for railroad construction crews, but even the original surveying parties
thought Lake de Funiak could become a hunting resort or site for a college. The Louisville and Nashville Railroad began
selling lots there. By 1884 there were about 200 people in the small village.
Banfill brought the selection committee to Lake de Funiak. Despite several days of rain, Dr. A.H.Gillet of Cincinnati,
Ohio and Rev. C.C. McLean of Jacksonville, Florida decided hat the first meeting of the Florida Chautauqua would be here.
To be held in February 1885, it would be “a winter Assembly in the land of summer.”
Like the “Mother Chautauqua” in New York, the Florida Chautauqua would be an educational institution known
as an assembly “with courses of lectures and class instruction in art, science, philosophy, history, literature, theology,
and morals, and other branches of study.”
From Sunday School to Chautauqua
The average education of Americans after the Civil War was sadly deficient. Only a few could afford the luxury
of private schools. The quality of instruction in public schools was low. Teachers were untrained and poorly paid;
facilities were substandard; attendance was not mandatory.
Proper education required regular and consistent attendance,
adequate facilities, and teachers trained both in educational methods and in the subjects to be taught. In most communities
after the Civil War only one organization met these standards—the church. In addition to being a place of regular
attendance by all ages, and a sources of scriptural and moral education, most churches offered a Sunday School.
In the 1870s, Lewis Miller, an Akron, Ohio inventor and layman, grasped these facts and began making the Sunday School
the means of educating young people in basic literacy. He upgraded the instructional quality, introducing graing, held
weekly conferences with the teaching staff, and broadened the curriculum to include science and nature.
About the same time, John Heyl Vincent, a Methodist preacher, organized a training institute for Sunday School teachers
in Joliet, Illinois. Training teachers was his key to creating Sunday Schools which could educate the young who worked
all week. Vincent shortly found himself appointed the first General Agent of the Methodist Sunday School Union.
His charge was to organize Sunday School institutes on a national basis.
Vincent soon discovered Lewis Miller. The two, sharing the same goals of making Sunday Schools educational
centers, became fast friends. They wanted to take the institute into the woods, away from the distractions of the city.
Looking for a site, they located a Methodist owned camp-meeting place on the shores of Lake Chautauqua, New York.
On August 4, 1874, the Sunday School Normal Assembly of the Methodist Episcopal Church opened for two weeks of addresses,
conferences, sermons, crayon sketches, and speeches by lecturers and authors, all followed by an examination at the end.
Thus the Sunday School movement gave birth to “Chautauqua,” and the New York Chautauqua became sanctified in terms
like “Mother Chautauqua.”
The Chautauqua organizers soon recognized the need to offer education and intellectual stimulation for the families
and friends of those attending. At the same time, the curriculum was broadened into an “intellectual summer camp.”
The
idea caught the popular spirit. President Grant visited the New York Chautauqua in 1875. With his presidential
blessing, Chautauqua was on the map! Chautauqua quickly became the religious, educational, and recreational standard
for America. “Chautauqua” spread across the land.
All that was left was to find some way to sustain the summer excitement of Chautauqua during the dormant months.
So, in 1878, the Chautauqua Literary and Scientific Circle (CLSC) was formed. Established as a correspondence course,
CLSC selected an outstanding array of classic, contemporary, and religious books for reading during the year. Communities
across the country formed CLSC societies to read, review, and debate the great books selected for that year.
But this was not enough. “Mother Chautauqua” began looking for another site, a place similar to
Lake Chautauqua, where permanent building and grounds could be erected, and where the winter climate and atmosphere were conducive
to the outdoor living and fresh air so important to creative learning. And so, Gillet came to Lake de Funiak.
The Birth of the Florida Chautauqua
To bring the Florida Chautauqua into existence required the work of two groups of people.
Chautauqua Speakers’ Bureau and a publishing house, Cranston and Stowe—which provided programs, books,
lecture notes, and related Chautauqua literature—where in Cincinnati. Accordingly, The Rev. Dr. August H. Gillet
of Cincinnati was named Superintendent of Instruction. Working with a de Funiak Board of Directors, he devised the schedule,
speaking arrangement, and overall curriculum.
In Florida, the Board of Directors was busy acquiring lands, building facilities, insuring special railroad fares,
and getting Lake de Funiak prepared for the Assembly visitors. A key member of this Board was William D. Chipley of
Pensacola. Chipley came to Pensacola in 1880 to build the trans-panhandle Pensacola and Atlantic Railroad. Elected
President of the Florida Chautauqua, he secured special railroad rates and land concessions. Because of earlier planning
for a resort, Lake de Funiak’s new Hotel Chautauqua was ready for business and a large one story Assembly building had
already been constructed by February 1885.
The charter of the Florida Chautauqua Association was approved by the Florida legislature in time to open in February
1885. Officers of the Florida Chautauqua were:
- Reverend A. H. Gillet, Cincinnati, Ohio, Superintendent of Instruction
- Colonel J. W. Sloss, Birmingham, Alabama, President
- C.C. Banfill, Lake de Funiak, Secretary
- R.N. Cary, Jr. Pensacola, Treasurer
Management laid in a stock of tents for rental, along with chairs, tables, and other furniture. Visitors wishing
to reduce expenses were encouraged to bring their own camping equipment, tents, and supplies. Lumber could be purchased
for the erection of temporary cottages. Tent sites could be obtained without charge. Food supplies were available
for purchase or visitors could use the restaurant at the Hotel Chautauqua. The baked goods store of the to-be-opened
School of Cookery would also be available.
Some 200 acres encompassing the round lake were set aside for Chautauqua grounds.
Visitors could purchase season passes allowing them access to the grounds and all public events for $3.00 for the entire three
weeks. Five-day tickets could be had for $1.00. Single day admissions went for twenty-five cents.
The Florida
Chautauqua opened on February 10, 1885. The format of this Chautauqua remained basically unaltered for almost forty
years. Emphasis was placed on religious training and educational activities in such areas as “philosophy, theology,
art, music, elocution, and cookery.” Concerts, impersonations, lectures, travelogues, and stereopticon slide shows
provided imaginative and educational entertainment.
Chautauquans chose from several departments of instruction:
- An Art School offered instruction in figure, portrait, tapestry, and decorative painting;
landscape drawing, etching, china painting, under glaze pottery; art needlework, wood carving, clay modeling, and taxidermy.
- A School of Cookery offered lessons in the making of breads, soups, and salads; the art of cooking
meat, poultry, oysters, game, eggs, desserts, cakes, candies, and the refined art of broiling, frying, roasting, stewing,
and boiling.
- The School of Elocution offered vocal drill and was highly recommended for teachers, preachers,
and lawyers.
- The Sunday School Normal Department offered a Biblical sequence and a Teaching series.
The Biblical series covered such topics as Bible lands, geography, history of the Bible, and interpretation. The teaching
sequence focused on Sunday School management including the principles of teaching, such as how to retain students’ attention
and develop grading systems. In the Primary Teachers’ Class topics ranged from the use of blackboards to
student expectations, the teaching of singing, how to encourage attendance, and related matters.
- The Music Department offered lessons in piano and voice. A Chorus Class met twice daily,
except Sunday. The Chorus Class was similar to an open choir and provided the Chautauqua with concerts, background tabernacle
music, and Sunday church music.
- A Kindergarten was conducted daily for the children of parents attending the Chautauqua.
Each day from nine until twelve, children were entertained by lectures and illustrated stories.
- The School of Theology, which provided continuing education for preachers, was an integral part
of the New York Chautauqua School of Theology.
And for everyone there were three tabernacle lectures a day, the last being the evening entertainment. 1885 tabernacle
lectures described life in Burma, illustrated with costumes; presented prehistoric America and its mound builders; and introduced
Mohammed and the Wars of Islam. There were also stereopticon slide programs on Palestine, English Cathedrals, Scotch
Abbeys, beautiful Paris, and the land of Burns. A key speaker was Wallace Bruce, former U.S. Consul to Edinburgh, Scotland,
and a frequent speaker at the New York Chautauqua, to the great pleasure of the many Scots in attendance.
Special days
included Forestry Day, Children’s Day, Chautauqua Day, Temperance Day, and Scots’ Day.
On Saturday, through the cooperation of the railroad, Chautauqua sponsored excursion trains. Chautauqua visitors
could take the train to Pensacola, the beaches, the ruins of Fort Pickens, or Marianna. Similarly, people along the
railroad lines could take the train to Chautauqua and spend the day touring the grounds and attending lectures. There
were special concerts on Saturday evenings, torchlight illuminations, stereopticon illustrated lectures, and fireworks over
the lake.
Sundays were sacred. The Assembly Sunday School met in the morning. There were usually two or three tabernacle
sermons offered during the day. There were no classes or lectures on Sundays.
Immediate Precocity
Setting up the 1885 Florida Chautauqua cost its promoters $11,000. It took in only $400. However, the literary
festival was an economic boon to the railroad, generating ticket income and land sales, ad a boost to the local merchants.
The Directors immediately began planning for 1886. As the May, 1885, Chautauqua proclaimed:
The Florida Chautauqua is a success. Four months ago we had a dubious feeling that such an undertaking would
fail of any real support in a climate which has always been so averse to adopting progressive ideas. Our healthy Chautauqua
tree, we feared, would be enervated by tropical sunshine; but it has taken root with surprising readiness.
The town name was changed from Lake DeFuniak to DeFuniak Springs by early 1886. Several professors at the
1885 Chautauqua has examined the waters of the lake and discovered its source was a springs. America was interested
in the rejuvenation provided at spas and mineral water springs. DeFuniak Springs, as a name, exuded health—both
physical and mental.
1886 also saw publication of a newspaper titled “The Florida Chautauqua. Based in Cincinnati,
it circulated primarily throughout the northeast United States, promoting the speakers, events, personalities, news and programs
of the Florida Chautauqua and DeFuniak Springs.
The Second Annual Florida Chautauqua opened on February 23, 1886, for a five week run, ending March 29th. The 1886
season mirrored the 1885 format. A new Primary Teachers Class was established for mothers and primary school teachers
and a Primary Department offered kindergarten and primary teaching methods for preschoolers. A Ministers’ Institute
was established and offered classes in New Testament, Hebrew, Greek, Practical and Doctrinal Theology, and Pulpit Elocution.
The courses and lodging were free to ordained ministers, with the only costs being transportation, food, and a season ticket
at $3.00.
Visitors in 1886 could hear Leon H. Vincent’s lecture series on Rome and Hannibal, Marius and Sulla, Julius
Caesar, Cicero and His Writings, Virgil, and Horace. Marcus P. Hatfield, M.D. of Chicago, presented a series of illustrated
lectures on health care titled “Care of the House in Which We Live,” and donated a museum of rocks and minerals
to the Association. Tabernacle lectures covered such diverse topics as Ireland, Astronomy, Scotland, Greece and the
Greeks, Florence and the de Medici, the world of Switzerland, and Love and Marriage.
Musical entertainment was provided by the Rogers Goshen Band from Goshen, Indiana. As the official musical
group, they presented concerts supplemented by the Chautauqua Chorus, guest singers, and evening concerts “on the Lake.”
Professor Warren Clarke of Tallahassee gave stereopticon slide programs on topics like “A Tour Around the World
in Eighty Minutes,’ ‘Four Years in Japan,’ ‘China and the Chinese,’ ‘A Tour Through the
Tropics,’ ‘Three Thousand Miles Through India,’ ‘From the Heights of the Himalayas to the Tops of
the Great Pyramids,’ and ‘An Evening in the Holy Land.’ Literary speaker Wallace Bruce was back with
talks on Robert Burns, Washington Irving, William Cullen Bryant, Tennyson, and ‘From the Hudson to the Yosemite.’
The Birth of Statewide Teachers’ Institutes & Florida State University
The 1886 Florida Chautauqua was the site of the first statewide Teacher’s Institute. William D. Chipley convinced
Florida Superintendent for Public Instruction, Albert J. Russell, of the value of providing teacher education at Chautauqua.
The railroad joined in by providing special rates to teachers and school superintendents. This gathering of teachers
began organized education in Florida.
By 1887, teachers from Escambia County had formed an Escambia County Teachers Association. A statewide group
followed, the Florida Education Association/United. Both organizations exist today. But after 1887 the teachers’
institutes began to move away from Chautauqua. Superintendent Russell, who complained of the “distractions”
of Chautauqua, probably wanted teacher institutes to be held in different sections of the state.
By inspiring the beginnings of teacher education, the Florida Chautauqua planted the seeds of teacher certification and
professional teacher development. These, in turn, led to the establishment of State Normal College at DeFuniak Springs.
The State Normal College would eventually change its name to Florida State College for Women, move to Tallahassee, and finally
become coeducational as “The Florida State University.”
A Florida Fixture
The 1887 session expanded to six weeks, and although the School of Cookery disappeared, there were new classes in stenography,
art exhibitions, and other activities. The Gulf Ice Company of Pensacola had an exhibit of Gulf fish, each encased in
a clear block of ice, two feet long by eighteen inches square. Hearing that the fish had been frozen while still alive,
Music Professor C.C. Chase stated that if kept frozen for 1,000 years, then thawed and released in clear spring water, the
fish would rejuvenate and swim away. The Florida Chautauqua monthly reported that this was the fishiest story told at
the 1887 session.
As each session of the Florida Chautauqua got longer, busier, and bigger, so did DeFuniak Springs. From a population
of a few hundred in 1885, the town tripled to 672 by 1890, and to 800 citizens by 1893. A number of the officers of
the Chautauqua Association constructed winter homes. Rooming houses and visitor’s residences were built.
By 1887, the Chautauqua grounds contained a Tabernacle or assembly hall (100’ x 100’), a two story college building
with three recitation rooms on the first floor and a chapel on the second; a small museum building; a building called the
Hall with rooms downstairs and ministers’ quarters upstairs; buildings for the Secretary and Superintendent’s
Offices, a bookstore, operated by Cranston and Stowe of Cincinnati.
Wallace A. Bruce of Poughkeepsie, New York, became President of the Florida Chautauqua in 1893. A graduate
of Yale and former editor of the Yale Literary Review, Dr. Bruce had been a speaker at the Florida Chautauqua since its beginning.
He faced one crucial problem; the Florida Chautauqua had accumulated a deficit of nearly $19,000. At the same time,
it faced competition from educational improvements in schools and colleges. Bruce needed a new drawing card. He
found it in entertainment.
The 1897 program featured quartets, the Rogers Goshen Band and Orchestra, instrumentalists, more lecturers, and more
entertainment acts. In 1899, the first moving pictures were shown at the DeFuniak Springs Chautauqua. The years
from 1900 to 1917 were good ones for the Florida Chautauqua. Programs featured fun and entertainment, music, fireworks,
and a return to nature. There were contests, sports and exhibits. By 1906, the sessions had lengthened to nine
weeks.
Convinced of continuing growth, Wallace Bruce began construction of a new Hall of Brotherhood with lecture halls
and a dome reminiscent of the U.S. Capitol. The 150 columns in the building were available by subscription and could
be named for a literary figure through a fee of $100. Cornelius Vanderbilt named one for George Stephenson while Senator
George Wetmore of Rhode Island procured one for General Nathaniel Greene. Though Bruce suffered a stroke during the
fund raising efforts, and not enough funds were secured to match his dreams, the Hall of Brotherhood was completed in 1909.
The building still stands.
All Good Things Come to….
Though William Jennings Bryan and U.S. Vice President Thomas R. Marshall were speakers in 1916, and the movie “Civilization”
was shown in 1919, the appeal of the Florida Chautauqua had begun to diminish. By 1920 newspapers, telephones, telegrams,
and magazines brought news of the world, debates on issues, and entertainment to every door. World War I had taken thousands
of American men to England and Europe. The world was no longer as mysterious as it had once been. Stereopticon
shows and moving pictures could be seen in neighborhood movie houses. The picturesque areas of America were becoming
available by family car.
The 1920 Florida Chautauqua, the 36th season, was the last. The Bruce family attempted to revive the Chautauqua
in 1926 and 1927, but with no success. The Chautauqua grounds reverted to the city. Winter homes became permanent
homes. The Florida Chautauqua was no more.
For 36 years the Florida Chautauqua brought to the Panhandle opportunities to learn about the world, discover the
wonders of literature and the marvels of science, be exposed to cultures of other people, and improve one’s domestic
arts, cooking, care of children, and medicinal skills. If by culture we mean the education of people to appreciate the
qualities of fine literature, art, and human expressions, and if by culture we also mean education which enriches lives through
training in personal development, hygiene, and mental stimulation, then the Florida Chautauqua was indeed the cultural center
of Florida, fostering the humanities in human expression, and bringing West Floridians from the nineteenth century into the
twentieth.
That is the endearing legacy of the Florida Chautauqua.
UPDATE (by Christopher Mitchell, 2009):
In 1996, DeFuniak Springs native, Diane Pickett, founded what is now called The Florida Chautauqua Center, Inc. with
the sole purpose of reviving the historic Florida Chautauqua Assembly. The organization has been orchestrating the newly
revised Assembly throughout the Historic District of DeFuniak Springs for 15 years, utilizing classrooms in churches, the
Hall of Brotherhood and various city facilities.
