Oakland Institute
The 1850 census of District 9, Dekalb County, Tennessee has a listing of a large group living in one dwelling with the following explanation in the occupations column, which I quote here, the items in [ ] being my addition:
"From the 20th line on this [page] to the 6th line on the next [page] ware Students at Oakland Institute Study
being their 1st June 1850. Said Scholl was taught in 14th District but the teachers (viz) W C Ghormley and R C
Saunders- the former of which is the head of the family with whom numberd had removed to the 9th District before
the information was obtained hence they are numbered in the 9th District"
Surely the census taker could have improved his spelling if he had stopped to attend a few classes there. In 1850
the 9th civil district where the teacher and students were living was on the west side of the Caney Fork River,
and the school was in the 14th district in Sligo on the other side of the River. It would seem most reasonable
that the dwelling and the school were very close to each other, having not much more than the Sligo bridge, or
its equivalent, between them.
The following is a listing of that household listing the teachers and their families along with all the school's
students living there:
| Name | age | sex | occupation | where born | attended school? |
| 1045/1045 | |||||
| W C Ghormley | 26 | M | school teacher | AL | |
| Elizabeth J " | 22 | F | TN | ||
| Owen D P " | 8/12 | M | TN | ||
| E J Oldfield | 16 | F | TN | student | |
| Margaret S " [Oldfield] | 15 | F | TN | student | |
| S S Tinsley | 18 | M | TN | student | |
| B A Cameron | 18 | M | TN | student | |
| Henry Cameron | 16 | M | TN | student | |
| W D F Barnett | 22 | M | TN | student | |
| R F Barnett | 21 | M | TN | student | |
| E C Rhea | 22 | M | TN | student | |
| W T Rhea | 20 | M | TN | student | |
| J L Boyd | 25 | M | TN | student | |
| Samuel Stone | 18 | M | TN | student | |
| Richard [Stone] | 10 | M | TN | student | |
| A S Holmes | 22 | M | TN | student | |
| F N Allen | 15 | M | TN | student | |
| Bird Elison | 10 | M | TN | student | |
| James Brown | 18 | M | TN | student | |
| James Martin | 10 | M | TN | student | |
| John Buch | 20 | M | TN | student | |
| Isaac Adcock | 20 | M | TN | student | |
| Joseph Bibie | 20 | M | TN | student | |
| J P Tittsworth | 21 | M | TN | student | |
| Amanda J Webb | 27 | F | TN | student | |
| Martha A Adcock | 16 | F | TN | student | |
| Corder Bounds | 18 | M | TN | student | |
| W M Perkins | 18 | M | TN | student | |
| John Linder | 30 | M | TN | student | |
| Isaac Pollard | 20 | M | TN | student | |
| Curtis Mills | 28 | M | TN | student | |
| John K Bayn | 23 | M | TN | student | |
| R C Saunders | 24 | M | teacher | TN |