Looking back: George Schoolfield was longtime KSD teacher
Published 7:00 am Wednesday, July 7, 2021
- George T. Schoolfield Jr.
BY BRENDA EDWARDS
Staff writer
(Editor’s note: Research for this article was taken from information in The Advocate, and the photos from https://www.findagrave.com).
A Kentucky School for the Deaf professor for 52 years also was active in the school’s alumni association.
George T. Schoolfield Jr. attended Indiana School from 1853 to 1856; and Kentucky School for the Deaf from 1866-1887.
He began his teaching career six years later at KSD and retired in1918. He was supervisor at KSD from 1866-1887.
Schoolfield continued his interest with the school through the alumni association and was treasurer in 1891. He also was president of the Kentucky Association of the Deaf from 1910-1916. He also farmed.
George T. Schoolfield Jr. with his wife Emma, and two of their four children, Allen and Isabella.
Bracken County native
Schoolfield was born May 4, 1841, in Bracken County and was a son of George T. Schoolfield Sr. (1799-1877) and Mary Maxwell Schoolfield (1819-1901).
He was one of 11 children: Benjamin, Robert, Mary Emma, Virginia, Charles, Arabelle Albert, Anna, Clara, Ida May and Stephen. He had a half brother, Augustus.
Married in 1871
George and Emma Beard were married Sept. 26, 1871. They lived on Third Street with their four children: Stephen Beard (1872-1933) worked for the government; Allen Thomas (1875-1930), who worked for the Chicago railroad; Charles Boyle (1883-1927), an attorney in Frankfort; and Isabella “Belle” (1888-1938), a teacher at KSD.
Schoolfield retired from teaching in 1918 when he was 79 years old. After he retired he lived with his daughter Isabella, in Memphis, Tennessee until his death on Nov. 7, 1920.
His wife, Emma, was born in 1852 and died Jan. 14, 1910. Both are buried in Bellevue Cemetery in Danville.
