account of the City of Philadelphia, written in 1697, records, "In the said city are several good schools of learning for youth, in order to the attainment of arts and sciences, as also reading, writing, &c." It may be without design that his following sentence has it that "here is to be had, on any day in the week, tarts, pies, cakes, &c.," as his thoughts naturally would turn to the latter upon the consideration of children's schools and their lunches. And later he says, "the Christian children born here are generally well favored, and beautiful to behold;" and "of lawyers and physicans I shall say nothing, because this country is very peaceable and healthy;" also "jealousy among men is here very rare, nor are old maids to be met with; for all commonly marry before they are twenty years of age."
The earliest Friends' school of which we find mention is in the minutes of a Council held 26 December, 1683, at which William Penn was present, when having taken into their serious consideration the great necessity there is of a School Master for the instruction and sober education of youth in the town of Philadelphia, sent for Enoch Flower, an inhabitant of the said town, who for twenty years past hath been exercised in that care and imployment in England, to whom having communciated their minds, he embraced it upon certain terms, [but this only included the rudiments of an ordinary English education]; for boarding a scholar, that is to say, diet, washing, lodging, and schooling, Ten pounds for one whole year [But at a council held on the 17 January following,] it was proposed, that care be taken about the learning and instruction of youth, to wit: a school of arts and sciences.
Following these efforts came in 1689 the Friends "Publick School, founded by Charter in ye town and County of Philadelphia in Pensilvania," under William Penn's Charters of 1701, 1708, and 1711, which confirmed the charter of 1697, granted by William Markham, Lieutenant Governor, and which we know to this day as the Penn Charter School, whose reputation in efficiency and success in imparting a good and true education make it rank with the best schools in the land. Its first teacher was a native of Aberdeen, and a graduate of the University of his native city, of which the first Provost of the College and Academy of Philadelphia had been a matriculate.
