Consider the times in which Laura Ann Scott Cansler, Knoxville's first African-American schoolteacher, lived.
Born in the western North Carolina hills some 15 years before the Civil War began, Cansler was a free black woman. (Her tombstone and 1926 obituary say Cansler was born in 1846; some accounts say 1844). She grew up an avid reader. She was educated, taught by her parents, teachers and a revered Knoxville minister.
When she was about 6, the Scott family moved to East Tennessee. William and Maria Scott were heading for Oberlin, Ohio, so their children, Laura and her brother, William, could study. But the family found a home in Friendsville. When Confederates controlled East Tennessee during the first part of the Civil War, the Scotts moved to Knoxville. It was for safety, wrote Laura's son Charles Warner Cansler in his 1939 book "Three Generations: The Story of a Colored Family of Eastern Tennessee." Earlier raiding Rebels invaded the family home, taking blankets, quilts and son William. William escaped two nights later.
While in Knoxville the Scott children were among the free blacks taught by the Rev. Thomas Humes. The Episcopal priest was a staunch Unionist who taught in his home.
A few years later Cansler became a teacher. At 17, she'd married wheelwright Hugh Lawson Cansler. By late 1863, Union troops controlled East Tennessee. Cansler asked Union Gen. Ambrose Burnside if she could open a school to teach former slaves. Granted permission, she started "The Burnside School" in 1864 on Detroit Avenue and became Knoxville's first African-American teacher.
By 1866, with her own young family growing, Cansler was teaching former slaves in a night school. It was work she loved. "These older people are so willing and eager to learn," Charles Warner Cansler quoted his mother saying. "Though some of them are seventy years old and more, they crowd in early each night and want to remain even after the hour for closing school. The great ambition of most of them is to learn to read the Bible."
Several of Cansler's children, including Charles, became educators. Built in 1952 Cansler Elementary School was named in her memory. The property is now the Laura Cansler Boy's and Girl's Club.
Charles Warner Cansler dedicated his 1939 family history to his mother. In that dedication, he wrote that Laura Ann Cansler "with simple tools but with large faith, wrought well in her day and generation."
Posted By: Siebra Muhammad
Sunday, December 30th 2012 at 6:25PM
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