Fighting for Her Students: Prudence Crandall and Her Forbidden Schoolhouse

In the Forbidden Schoolhouse ( Houghton Mifflin, 2005), author Suzanne Jurmain revisits an almost forgotten incident in the 1830's. Prudence Crandall's name should be an easily recognizable one, especially to those in the education field. As an education major, I had never heard or read anything about this courageous woman and her fight for equal education. Crandall lived over 100 years ago, and caused a huge scandal in her small town of Canterbury, Connecticut in the middle 1830's. Her actions resulted in mob riots, fights, two trials, and arson. Prudence Crandall was shunned by merchants who would sell her neither food or other goods, and she spent one night in jail. Her crime? Teaching African American girls and young women reading, grammar, science and mathematics.

Suzanne Jurmain's book, geared toward ages 9-12, details the powerful story of Prudence Crandall, and the impact her defiance to do what she felt right led to a law called Black Law (1833), a Connecticut state ruling that said Crandall was breaking the law by educating African American females from other states. Despite all the mounting problems the townspeople continued to cause her, Crandall was not deterred. She educated these girls for 18 months, enduring abuse, two trials, and the near fatal house fire that might have resulted in her death and 20 of her students. In her fight, Prudence gathered the support of many abolitionists, including William Lloyd Garrison, editor of the Liberator and the Reverend Samuel May, a Unitarian minister ( and also the uncle of author Louisa May Alcott). Her stand to teach her "colored sisters" at first right alongside white girls, was the first attempt for an integrated classroom, and should be remembered as such. In fact, many of her defense attorney William Ellsworth's arguments were cited over 100 years later by attorney Thurgood Marshall in the historic civil rights case, BoBrown vsBoard of Education of Topeka, in the 1950's. Marshall asked the U.S. Supreme Court to overturn state laws requiring separation of white and black students in public schools, and he introduced many of the same arguments for human equality and equal education that recalled Prudence Crandall's defense. Marshall's fight was victorious, but Crandall almost did not live to see the impact her fight had in history. After a defiant battle, Prudence gave up the fight, closed her school, married and moved out of Canterbury. Fifty years later, 112 residents of Canterbury petitioned for the state of Connecticut to clear her name, and repay her for the financial losses incurred because of the Black Law (later repealed) and forcing the closure of her school. They were ashamed of the terrible way that Prudence and her students had been treated, and wanted to make amends. Even renowned author, Mark Twain, lent his support to Prudence's cause. Eventually, the state did clear her name, and allotted Crandall a yearly stipend of $400 until her death at the age of 87, in 1890. In 1995, Prudence Crandall was named the state of Connecticut's Female Hero, and her home is now a museum.

The Forbidden Schoolhouse is a compelling historical biography, one which I found myself engrossed in start to finish. Suzanne Jurmain has truly captured the spirit of Prudence Crandall, and the impact her actions have made on the fight for equal education. The appendix includes information on what happened to the students and other major story players, long after Prudence left Connecticut, which readers will love. Readers should know this extraordinary woman's story and her fight for equal education, and never forget Prudence Crandall's Forbidden Schoolhouse.