Four Classes of Virginia Students, circa 1859

After reading Al’s very cool post yesterday about UVA law professor James Holcombe's 1859 intermediate examination, I couldn’t help but click through and read the referenced The Virginia University magazine article in its entirety.  If you haven’t looked at it yet you should, as there are several gems, including a discourse on the “peculiar mode of conducting examinations at this institution,” which renders UVA not “as at other places, a matter of time and connexion, but one of merit exclusively.”

My favorite part is the division of UVA students into “four distinct classes”:

1.  Real students – i.e. “those who come here for the purpose of taking advantage of the unusual facilities afforded for acquiring a thorough education.”

2. Bad students – i.e. “those who come with as full a determination to study as the others, but who unfortunately have not the gift of continuance, or application, . . . and after intermitting efforts, finally become discouraged and careless.”

3. Slacker students – i.e. those who “for decency’s sake, together with a well-bred respect for the request of professors . . . attend lectures and study when they have nothing else to do.”

4.  “Mama’s” boys – i.e. those who were “pets at home” and “’Mama’s big baby,’ and are sent here to wean them.”

(All emphasis in original)

I’ll leave it to Lounge readers who are UVA professors, alums, or students to opine on the changed class composition, if any, during the intervening 150-odd years.

Comments

[Alfred]

Love this, Kim. Further evidence that if you want to know something about an institution, look at its literary output! (Like the literary magazines that they published -- or the orations given to student literary societies).

If anyone's interested in knowing more about UVA students in the decade before Civil War, Peter Carmichael has a great book on this topic, The Last Generation: Young Virginians in Peace, War, and Reunion (UNC, 2005).

[Kim Krawiec]

Thanks for finding it, Al -- it was a fun read.

[Miriam A. Cherry]

Yes, that made me giggle. And that exam was tough going!!

[Kim Krawiec]

Me too Miriam. Don't know if they were *trying* to be funny or not . . .