JOHN SMITH WOODMAN.
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��1S45 the following appears in his diary ; •'Spent the summer in close teaching and in the study of literature. Studied Johnson, Addison, Pope. Have written a good deal." In the winter of 1846 Mr. Woodman gave up his position in Charlestown, and in April started for Europe.
He was now twenty-seven, but mature far beyond his years. From boyhood he had been a close student, and was well prepared to profit by foreign travel. He spent sixteen months abroad, traversing France, Belgium, Holland, Switzerland, and Italy, making long trips on foot. The observations and impressions of the journey were embodied in a series of letters to the Charleston (S. C.) News and the Neiu Hampshire Patriot. He seems to have been especially interest- ed in the art and agriculture of the countries which he visited, and on these and kindred subjects he gathered a vast amount of information. "While prizing books at their full value, he was never a book-worm, and fully re- cognized the fact that they contain but dead knowledge, which can best be vitalized by the friction that comes from contact with the world, and by the observation of men and things. He felt that the scholar especially needs the advantages of travel, and while without them he is likely to become illiberal and narrow-minded, he above all others is in condition to profit by them to the fullest extent.
Mr. Woodman now returned to his law studies, which he had never wholly laid aside, completing them with Hon. Daniel M. Christie, of Dover, and was admitted to the Strafford county bar at the January term, 1848. Two of his college classmates were now settled in Salmon Falls, the one as a pastor, the Rev. S. J. Spalding, d. d., of Newburyport, Mass. ; the other as a physician, the late Dr. John E. Tyler. Through their influence, though he had already opened an office in Dover, Mr. Woodman settled in the then small but growing manufacturing town of Salmon Falls.
��Clients in Mr. Woodman's office were not numerous, but the cases intrusted to him were faithfully attended to and ably managed, and his spare time de- voted to severe legal studies. He was soon regarded as one of the best read lawyers at the Strafford county bar.
In June, 1S50, he was appointed commissioner of common schools for Strafford county, and in August elected secretary of the state board of educa- tion. In this capacity he wrote the first report of the board of education, a report abounding in sound sense and practical suggestions.
In January, 185 1, he was chosen professor of mathematics in Dartmouth college, to succeed his old teacher, Prof. Stephen Chase, then recently deceased, who for thirteen years had filled the mathematical chair with distinguished ability. This position he occupied for four years, resigning in July, 1856, to resume the practice of law. When Prof. Woodman enter- ed on the duties of his office at Dart- mouth, there were two hundred and thirty-seven students, with eight pro- fessors and one instructor. These were Profs. Haddock, Young, Hubbard, Brown, Sanborn, Noyes, Woodman, and Putnam. E'rofs. Shurtleff and Crosby had resigned, but their names still appeared on the catalogue ; the former as Professor Emeritus of Moral Philosophy and Political Economy ; the latter as Professor Emeritus of the Greek Language and Literature. Cle- ment Long was at this time instructor in Intellectual Philosophy and Political Economy. The president was Nathan Lord, who succeeded Bennett Tyler in 1828, and for thirty-five years served the college with rare fidelity and signal ability. Of the members of the academic faculty, as then constituted, Profs. Hubbard, Brown, Sanborn and Noyes, are still living. The latter re- signed in January of the present year. Prof. Hubbard, having removed to New Haven, Conn., in 1865, resigned in 1866, but continued his instruction in the medical college, where he was
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