On  the  26th  of  April,  1843,  it  was  ordered  that
a  colored  school  be  opened  under  the  same  regu-
lations as  the  white  school,  and  George  Shreeve
was  appointed  its  teacher  at  a  salary  of  seventeen
dollars  per  month.  On  May  8th  rooms  in  the
academy  were  fitted  up,  and  in  it  the  first  public
school  in  Camden  was  inaugurated.  This  school
continued  with  varying  success.  In  1845,  the
trustees  met  at  the  Niagara  Fire  Company's  engine-
house,  with  Dr.  Isaac  S.  Mulford  as  president,
Philander  C.  Bfinck  secretary,  and  J.  C.  De  La
Cour  treasurer.
The  trustees  then  went  to  work  in  earnest,  and
this  is  the  point  the  progress  of  the  schools  properly
dates  from.  The  members  of  the  Board  of  Educa-
tion then  were  Franklin  Ferguson,  Joseph  C.  De
La  Cour,  Samuel  H.  Morton,  Philander  C.  Brinck,
Jesse  Smith,  Joseph  Taylor,  David  Brown,  Isaac
S.  Mulford,  and  Thomas  Chapman.  David  Brown
reported  the  census  of  children  of  school  age  in
Camden  to  be  nine  hundred  and  seventy-four
white  and  fifty-nine  colored.  An  examination  of
teachers  was  ordered  to  be  held  on  the  14th  of  the
ensuing  month,  the  president  of  the  board  to  con-
duct the  same,  when  Messrs.  English,  Plotts  and
Hall  and  Miss  Thomas  were  passed  as  candidates.
Following  this  report  came  a  resolution  of  the
board,  which  reads  strangely  in  the  light  of  this
generation  :  "  Resolved,  That  the  circumstance  of
Mr.  English  being  a  foreigner,  we  will  decline  ex-
amining his  papers  or  credentials,"  the  president
alone  dissenting,  when  Mr.  English,  who  passed
first,  was  ignored,  and  Conly  IPlotts  was  elected
principal  of  the  first  grammar  school,  at  a  salary
of  four  hundred  and  fifty  dollars  a  year,  Miss
Thomas  being  chosen  for  the  primary  school.
