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Christian Heritage Week Table of contents Facts

During the War for Independece, Congress approved the importing of 20,000 copies of the Holy Bible. Congress took this action as "the use of the Bible is so universal, and its importance is so great ..." Congress made the Holy Bible availabe to its citizens. The first 106 of the 108 colleges in America were begun and administered by Christians. Here are a few examples --- 1636 Harvard (Congregational Church) 1693 William and Mary (Anglican Church) 1701 Yale (Congregational Church) 1746 College of New Jersey, later Princeton (Presbyterian Church) 1751 Philadelphia Academy, later the University of Pennsylvania (non-denominational) 1754 King's, later Columbia (Anglican Church) 1764 Brown (Baptist Church) 1766 Queens, later Rutgers (Dutch Reformed Church) 1769 Darthmouth (New Light Congregational Church) 1775 Hampden-Syney (Presbyterian Church) Thomas Jefferson was the first to set up an education system in American which was adopted by Washington, DC. The main texts (if not the only texts at times) were the Holy Bible and the Watts Hymnal. (NOTE: Government schools were not initiated in the United States until after the War Between the States. It also must be recognized that there were huge pockets in the USA that did not have governmentment schools but continued with community schools well past 1910. My maternal and paternal grandparents, for example, never attended government schools even though their children were forced to attend). 1800 Thomas Jefferson comments on education           "Most young Americans ... can read, write and cipher. Not more than four in a thousand are unable to write legibly --- even neatly; while in Spain, Portugal, Italy, only a sixth of the population can read; in Germany, even in France, not more than a third; in Poland, about two men in a hundred; and in Russia not one in two hundred.           "England, Holland, and the Protestant Cantons of Switzerland, more nearly approach the standard of the United states, because in those countries the Bible is read; it is considered a duty to read it to the children; and in that form of religion the sermons and liturgies in the language of the people tend to increase and formulate ideas of responsibility. Controversy, also has developed argumentation and has given room for the exercise of logic ... It is because of this kind of education that the Americans of the United States, without having more great men than other countries, have the great advantage of having the larger proportion of moderately well-informed men; although their education may seem less perfect, it is nevertheless better and more equally distributed. But that does not mean the general education cannot be improved."

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