Bloomfield Academy
aka Bloomfield Seminary
south of Achille, Choctaw Nation, Indian Territory

1914
moved to Ardmore, Carter Co. Oklahoma 

1932 
renamed Carter Seminary

Bloomfield Academy was established in 1852 for the benefit of the Chickasaw children and was located south of Durant near Achille, Choctaw Nation, Indian Territory. [maps]  

When Bloomfield Academy burned in 1914 the school was relocated to Ardmore, Carter County, Oklahoma, in the Hargrove College building. The school was renamed Carter Seminary in 1934 in honor of Charles D. Carter. Today it is a dormitory and serves as home to American Indian students from many different tribes. 

Bloomfield Academy was listed on the National Register of Historic Place, as south of Achille off Oklahoma Highway 78, Site #72001055.

Bloomfield Seminary for Indian Girls is enumerated in Morgan Twp. and Bloomfield Academy is enumerated in Ardmore City, Ward 1, Carter Co., Oklahoma 1930 Federal Census.

In the spring of 1852, The Indian Mission Conference appointed John Harpole Carr to oversee the construction of buildings later known as Bloomfield Academy. He was afterward appointed superintendent of the school. He, with others, selected the site which  was surrounded by prairies of green and with wild flowers of all hues and kinds. There, with his own axe he struck the first blow toward the establishment of the first missionary boarding school for girls among the Chickasaws. The school received its name when Carr, attempting to give directions, mentioned the site was situated in a beautiful field filled with blooming wild flowers - Bloomfield was adopted as the official designation of the school. 

A neighborhood school was opened for boys and girls continuing through the winter and spring until the buildings of Bloomfield were completed. Three names recalled by Mrs. Carr as attending were Simon Kemp, Martin Allen and Levi Colbert. 

The Bloomfield boarding school opened in the fall of 1853 as a boarding school for girls, with twenty-five pupils. Mrs. Carr was matron and Miss S. J. Johnson was teacher. The curriculum included English language and alphabet; spelling, reading, writing and arithmetic, both mental and written. As the students advanced, natural philosophy, grammar, "Watts on the Mind," botany and United States history of the United States were added. The opening morning session was at half past eight and continued with a recess until half past twelve. The older pupils studied from five to six in the afternoon. Before this, in the afternoon they were taught to cut, make and mend their own clothes. They were also taught how to do all the ordinary house work, cooking excepted. The older pupils were taught each Saturday in the pastry department Instruction in all these domestic duties was required by the contract. The division of labor was after the plan adopted at Mt. Holyoke Seminary. In the afternoon they were taught needle, wax, worsted and coral work, also drawing, painting and vocal music. In the Sabbath School, Mrs. Carr taught the advanced class by Bible topics; Mr. Carr preached in the school house Sabbath mornings, and in an arbor near the branch, in the summer time. A vivid description of the school days is described in the Elizabeth Kemp Mead Interview.

The school closed in 1861 with the onset of the Civil War.

During the Civil War a private school was kept three hours during the morning, free to all who chose to attend. In the early part of the war the Chickasaw Battalion had orders to occupy the buildings at Bloomfield in which case the family would have had to move out, but the buildings were not large enough to accommodate all so the main body of soldiers encamped in the prairie only making use of the small building in the yard for the Doctor’s office and the girls’ sitting room for commissary stores. The school house was used for a hospital.

Rev. John H. Carr, the founder, and his family, left Bloomfield, in 1867. While records are incomplete, it is known that the first school session after their departure was conducted by Captain Frederic Young. At that time, the school was conducted as a co-educational institution, boys as well as girls being admitted as pupils. Among the boys thus enrolled, was Douglas H. Johnston, destined, many years later, to serve as superintendent of Bloomfield Seminary and, still later, to serve the people of the Chickasaw Nation as their chief executive or governor.

In 1867, the Chickasaw Nation adopted a new constitution which stated quality education should be provided for their young. A number of educators directed the affairs of Bloomfield. Captain Young was succeeded, in 1868, by Dr. and Mrs. H. F. Murray, who had charge of the school for two years. Mrs. Murray was a native of Mississippi, a member of a prominent Chickasaw family. Following was Professor Robert Cole from 1870 to 1875 who was succeeded by Professor J. E. Wharton.

In 1876, the Chickasaw National Legislature enacted a law providing for a female seminary at Bloomfield Academy and a male school at the Chickasaw Manual Labor Academy. The plan for both schools called for forty-five students between the ages of nine and eighteen who were able to read well in McGuffey's Fifth Readers, spell well, and read in the New Testament, and be of good moral character. Only one child from a family would be received and no pupil would be allowed to remain longer than five years.

Professor Wharton continued until 1880, when he was succeeded by Robert Boyd, of Tishomingo, who was a citizen of the Chickasaw Nation by birth. Two years later, Mr. Boyd resigned and was succeeded by Mr. and Mrs. Douglas H. Johnston, who were to fill out the other three years of the five-year period. Mrs. Johnston died during the last year of this contract term. Mr. Johnston was given a new contract for another five-year period, in 1885. Three years later, he married Miss Betty Harper, one of the teachers in the Seminary and who was also a former pupil. Her mother, Serena Factor, had likewise been educated at Bloomfield and was the first pupil of the institution to become one of its teachers. Mr. and Mrs. Johnston remained in active charge of Bloomfield Seminary for ten years after their marriage. Then, Mr. Johnston was elected as governor of the Chickasaw Nation, thus terminating sixteen years of faithful and efficient service as superintendent.

Governor Johnston was succeeded by Professor Elihu B. Hinshaw, who had been actively associated with him as the principal of the Seminary, for eleven years. During those years, a modern frame building was erected, superceding the original log school building. Both the original building and the new one were destroyed by fire, however, and a third building was erected. While Governor Johnston was superintendent, he was greatly interested in popularizing education among the Chickasaw people, especially those of full Indian blood. As the result of his efforts, the Chickasaw Legislature was induced to make a grant of ten dollars per month for the maintenance of each pupil, whether living at home or boarding at the Seminary. This action was the cause of many families moving and settling in the immediate vicinity of Bloomfield.

Professor Hinshaw worked out a course of study for Bloomfield Seminary which was submitted to the Chickasaw Legislature for approval. The Legislature not only approved the course of study but issued a charter to the Seminary, authorizing it to confer diplomas on those of its students who had completed the course for graduation. The Seminary was the only school in the Chickasaw Nation which was thus honored. Professor Hinshaw also developed a summer school of normal training for teachers prior to statehood. It is said that practically every child of school age in the Chickasaw Nation could read, write and speak English when the time came to organize the public school system under the state government.

In 1899, the Federal Government assumed control of all tribal schools in the Indian Territory. Professor Hinshaw was continued as superintendent of Bloomfield Seminary for seven years longer. In 1906, he was succeeded by Mr. J. R. Hendricks, who, in turn was succeeded by Mrs. Annie Ream Addington, a member of the well known Guy family of the Chickasaw Nation. She remained in charge until the school buildings were again destroyed by fire, January 24th, 1914. The school was not rebuilt but moved to Ardmore, where the old Hargrove College property was purchased and where school has since been conducted.

John Harpole Carr son of Thomas and Mary Carr born in Lebanon, Wilson county, Tennessee on April 16, 1812. Licensed to preach in the Methodist Episcopal Church in 1835. In 1836 he married Miss Harriet Newell Nail who died in 1847 at her sisters home in Arkansas. In 1845 he became a member of the Indian Mission Conference. In 1852 he married Miss Angelina Hosmer, of Bedford, Massachusetts who died in September 1864 and was buried in the cemetery north of the school house. Two little daughters are also buried there. In August 1865, he married Miss S. J. Johnson. John Carr died December 29, 1876 in Paris, Texas.

Sources

Bryce, J. Y.  Some Notes of Interest Concerning Early Day Operations In Indian Territory By Methodist Church South.  The OSU Library Electronic Publishing Center, Digital Collections, Chronicles of Oklahoma, Volume 4, No. 3, September, 1926: 233-241. Jun 2002 http://digital.library.okstate.edu/  

Carr, S. J. (Mrs.). Bloomfield Academy and Its Founder.  The OSU Library Electronic Publishing Center, Digital Collections, Chronicles of Oklahoma, Volume 2, No. 4, December, 1924: 379. Jun 2002 http://digital.library.okstate.edu/  

Carter Seminary  July 2002 http://www.chickasaw.net/programs/education/CARTER.htm 

The Chickasaw Nation Press, September 8 2000. Calling Bloomfield Academy Graduates.   Jul 2002 http://www.chickasaw.net/news/press/archive2000/pesept11.htm 

The Chickasaw Nation Press, May 18, 2001. Carter Seminary Reunion Scheduled.   Jul 2002 http://www.chickasaw.net/news/press/archive2000/pesept11.htm 

Foreman, Carolyn Thomas. Chickasaw Manual Labor Academy, Chronicles of Oklahoma, Vol. XXIII, No. 4, Winter 1945-46.

Mitchell, Irene B. and Ida Belle Renken. The Golden Age of Bloomfield Academy In the Chickasaw Nation, Chronicles of Oklahoma, Vol. XLIX, No. 4, Winter 1971-72.

National Register of Historic Places, Oklahoma, Bryan County, Site #72001055, south of Achille (Bryan Co.) off Highway 78. Jul 2002 http://www.nationalregisterofhistoricplaces.com/OK/Bryan/state.html

The Spur of Phoenix, the Newsletter of Clan Johnston/e in America, Vol. IV, June 1980, #2, Governor Douglas Hancock Cooper Johnston Of The Oklahoma Indian Territory.   Jul 2002  http://vidas.rootsweb.com/s004.html 

Steacy, Stephen. The Chickasaw Nation on the Eve of the Civil War. Chronicles of Oklahoma, Vol. XLIX, No. 1, Spring 1971, p. 56

Other sources which may contain information on this subject:

Cobb, Amanda J. Listening to Our Grandmothers' Stories: The Bloomfield Academy for Chickasaw Females, 1852-1949. Nebraska: University of Nebraska Press, 2000, ISBN: 0803215096.