But thanks to the indefatigable Ebenezer Tucker,
its first principal, the "Nigger School" weathered the storm. The
Institute, however, was founded to educate both races. Its charter
required that no distinction should be made on account of race, color,
rank, or religion. Accordingly, although the student body was from
the beginning of the school partly white, the board of trustees
represented denominations of both races. Accessible statistics do not
show that colored persons ever constituted more than one-third of
the students.[2] It was one of the most durable of the manual labor
schools, having continued after the Civil War, carrying out to some
extent the original designs of its founders. As the plan to continue
it as a private institution proved later to be impracticable the
establishment was changed into a public school.[3]
[Footnote 1: Boone, _The History of Education in Indiana_, p. 77.]
[Footnote 2: According to the _Report of the United States
Commissioner of Education_ in 1893 the colored students then
constituted about one-third of those then registered at this
institution. See p. 1944 of this report.]
[Footnote 3: Records of the United States Bureau of Education.
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