Mary Caroline McClelland

Notes:

SOURCE Historic MSD: The Story of the Missouuri School for the Deaf, Richard d. Reed, 2000, Fulton, Missouri

NOTED EDUCATOR OF THE DEAF

Mary Caroline McClelland Tate was born in Fulton, Missouri around 1858 but was raised in Kentucky. It is thought her father was killed in the Battle of Vicksburg. Her mother, a nurse, died about the same time, near the same place. She became a ward of Thomas Nesbit. Mary attended Sayer Institute in Lexington, KY and Fulton Female Seminary.

She became a teacher at the Missouri School for the Deaf in 1871 and was assigned to the newly created position of articulation teacher. In October, 1872 Mary traveled with Supt. William Dabney Kerr to the Illinois School at Jacksonville. There she received instruction from Miss Cornelia Trask, an unusually skilled speech teacher who was expert in the use Alexander Melville Bell's Visible Speech symbols. (Mr. Bell was the father of Alexander Graham Bell.) She returned to MSD and organized rotating classes in articulation. She taught speech and lipreading exclusively. Mary worked with selected pupils who came to her from their regular classes at scheduled times. Back in their classrooms, her pupils continued to receive instruction through sign language. This field was so new that it was necessary for her position to be approved by the Legislature.

On August 15, 1878 she married James Nolley Tate who succeeded William Dabney Kerr as superintendent of MSD. The Tates left Fulton in 1896 for the Minnesota School for the Deaf in Faribault.



Buried:
Grave location and biography:
http://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=gr&GRid=88600010

Mary married Dr. James Nolley TATE. James (son of Col. Isaac TATE and Jane Wright Henderson) was born 14 Oct 1851, Callaway Co. MO; died 27 Sep 1923, Rice Co. MN; was buried , Maple Lawn Cemetery, Faribault, Rice Co. MN. [Group Sheet]

Notes:

BIOGRAPHY

From Find A Grave:

Isaac Nesbit Tate was the son of two distinguished educators of the deaf. His paternal grandparents Isaac Tate and Jane Wright Henderson Tate were very early settlers of the northeastern prairies of Callaway county, Missouri. They had been raised within the Boone & Bryan settlement parties and had lived in Kentucky at the time of the indians raids when settlers held up in stations. This tradition is still strong in the Tate family of today.

Until he was nine, Isaac lived on the campus of the Missouri School for the Deaf in Fulton, Missouri where his father was superintendent and his mother was a pioneer in the teaching of speech and lip reading. When he was 8, a catasptophic fire swept the school one February night, leaving only one major building standing. He was part of a brigade of children that distributed blankets to the pupils who'd been routed from their home. The blankets had been obtained from the Insane Asylum adjacent to the school. This family moved to Faribault in 1896.

The Missouri School is located in Callaway County. Each year, an event called the Kingdom Supper is held there. An individual who was born and raised in the county and has left it to achieve great success is honored. The person must be one who has made an unusual effort to serve others in meaningful ways. In 1936 this award was given to Isaac Nesbit Tate who was, at that time, an officer of the Weyerhauser Corp. in Minnesota.

He had one sister, Elizabeth Tate Monroe.

Buried:
Grave location and biography:
http://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=gr&GRid=88600009