The Hampton Normal and Agricultural Institute. Session of 1885-1886

Hampton, Va: Normal School Press Print, 1886. Good.. viii,75pp. Original green printed wrappers. Some chipping to spine and edges of wrappers, a handful of earnest cello tape repairs. Internally rather clean. A rare session catalogue for the Hampton Institute printed at the school during the middle portion of the school's second decade. The work includes a brief history of the school, a list of trustees, courses of study, a report on the school from the principal, Samuel Chapman Armstrong to the trustees that incorporates detailed reports on the various school departments, each written by a department head, and more. A four-page supplement, dated November 1886 is laid in. Though the teaching foundations of this school for freedmen were laid during the Civil War, Hampton didn't open until the end of the decade; a division dedicated to teaching Native American youth began in 1878 and operated until 1923, and the principal's report here contains much on "The Indian School" at Hampton. OCLC only explicitly reports two copies of this particular Hampton Institute catalogue, located at the Clements Library and the Roanoke City Public Library, though there may be additional copies in serial runs of the catalogue at other places.