Education majors know he had something to do with creating modern public education. Ed.D.s probably know more about Horace Mann‘s actual life, actions and philosophy. Local school boards know enough to name a school after him from time to time.
But has anyone actually kept count? How many schools in the U.S. — or anywhere else — are named after Horace Mann? Is there a registry somewhere? We know of a few:
Antioch College continues to operate in accordance with the egalitarian and humanitarian values of Horace Mann. A monument including his statue stands in lands belonging to the college in Yellow Springs, Ohio with his quote and college motto “Be Ashamed to Die Until You Have Won Some Victory for Humanity.”
There are a number of schools in the U.S. named for Mann, including ones in Arkansas, Washington, D.C., Boston, Charleston, West Virginia, Marstons Mills, Massachusetts, Salem, Massachusetts, Redmond, Washington, Fargo, North Dakota, St. Louis, Missouri, Chicago, North Bergen, New Jersey and the Horace Mann School in Riverdale, New York. The University of Northern Colorado named the gates to their campus in his dedication, a gift of the Class of 1910.[9]
If you know of a Horace Mann school, would you comment? Tell us about it, where it is, and how long it’s been there.
And if you know of a list of the schools, let us know.
Millard Fillmore's Bathtub 
My husband and I have lived in near the Horace Mann Elementary School in Fargo ND for over 30 years. Established in 1915, it is one of the oldest schools in Fargo and, according to a former neighbor of ours who attended Horace Mann and lived in the neighborhood for over 80 years, it’s the BEST!!
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Its pronounced “BYE-wah-bick” I think.
Its from the Ojibwe word for iron: Biwabiko-nabik-wan
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Biwabik? That’s not a well-known place!
How does one pronounce it?
(And thanks for letting us know.)
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I know in past years, there were even more Horace Mann Schools. My dad’s hometown of Biwabik, MN had Horace Mann High School, which I believe burned in the late 1960s.
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[…] In an earlier post, in comments, we found a page at the National Center for Education Statistics listing schools by name — 55 Horace Mann schools listed there as of May 4, 2013 […]
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There is a Horace Mann Laboratory school located in the middle of my college campus which is Northwest Missouri State University in Maryville, MO. It was established around the same time as the college and it is used for our education majors. It has pre-k and then K-6.
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Mike, it rather looks like they replaced Horace Mann with Gilson Brown, in Alton, Illinois. Tough to tell from the district website:
http://www.altonschools.org/schools/gilsonb/index.html
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I went to Horace Mann High School in Gary, IN. The worst school ever! Teachers were all focused on incorporating black history into every subject, or they were focused presenting a “them” (middle-upper class whites) vs. “us” (lower income minorities) view of the world. It was a bad place for anybody. Teenage pregnancy, underage sex, drug use and violence was looked at with complacency.
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I go to a Horace Mann School. This one is a private school and in the post that Daniel Cornwall he listed 4 different Horace Mann private schools but the bottom ones, 2-4 are one school. One is the lower grade school… one is a pre-k and the other is a nature laboratory which is basically a couple of cabins some obstacle courses. and towers we climb and zip line off of. We call it Dorr. The John Dorr Nature Laboratory is incorporated in to all of the curriculum’s from 2nd to 8th grade. After that its not mandatory.
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My nephew is in Alton — I’ll ask him!
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I went to Horace Mann Elementary in Alton Illinois. Not sure if it is still there though.
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I went to Horace Mann in San Diego, CA.
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The Horace Mann School in the Bronx (Riverdale is just a neighborhood, though some residents prefer to use the neighborhood name. Wonder what they have against the Bronx?).
It is also, ironically, private. At the high school level, the closest local options are John F Kennedy and Dewitt Clinton, the Bronx High School of Science, and a handful of smaller schools.
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There’s a Horace Mann Elementary School at the corner of Albemarle and Watertown Streets here in West Newton, Mass, just outside of Boston. Horace Mann started the country’s first co-ed, racially mixed “state normal school” at The Allen House, including gymnastics and a pure kindergarten, also educational firsts. From the Newton History Museum’s site:
Under the leadership of Horace Mann, the State Normal School (the first of its kind in the world), relocated to West Newton in 1844 and four years later established a Model School in conjunction with the West Newton School district. Nathaniel Allen became the principal of the Model School at age twenty-five, and lived in the Mann’s West Newton home where he met Elizabeth Peabody, Catherine Beecher and other prominent educators.
My husband and I have lived around the corner from the Allen House (in another house the Allen family owned) for 35 years. I’m guessing that Horace Mann himself visited this house once or twice – and I attended Antioch College my very self (Class of ’70).
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Thank you!
Only 57? Does that seem a little bit low?
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According to the US Department of Education’s Public School Locater at http://nces.ed.gov/ccd/schoolsearch/, there are 57 public schools named for Horace Mann. This site also allows you to download an Excel file of the data. The Dept of Ed records don’t have the date each school was named, but does have contact information for each school.
There is also a US Dept of Ed Private school locater at
http://nces.ed.gov/surveys/pss/privateschoolsearch/ and it lists four private K-12 schools named for Horace Mann:
HORACE MANN LABORATORY SCHOOL
800 University Drive, Maryville, MO (660) 562-1234 Nodaway 135 K-6
2. HORACE MANN SCHOOL
231 W 246th Street, Riverdale, NY (718) 432-4100 Bronx 1,757 PK-12
3. HORACE MANN SCHOOL
4440 Tibbett Avenue, Bronx, NY (718) 432-3300 Bronx 440 K-5
4. HORACE MANN SCHOOL JOHN DORR NATURE LABO
Po Box 290, Washington Depot, CT (860) 868-2230 Litchfield 1,760
Finally there is a locater that includes colleges at http://nces.ed.gov/globallocator/, but it indicates no colleges named Horace Mann.
Hope this helps.
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