John B. Eberly
John B. Eberly, son of Peter and Sarah Eberly, yet living in the vicinity of Smithville, was born in Cumberland county, Pa., February 5, 1837. With his father he removed to Wayne county in 1840, and remained with him until the age of 19, when he resolved, come what would, to devote himself to the first ambition of his life - to be a scholar and a teacher. For three years he attended the Fredericksburg school, under Prof. B. C. Smith. In 1862 he entered Mt. Union College, remaining there three more years, from which, in June 1865, he graduated with honor in the classical course. In August of the same year he organized the Smithville High School, since which over 4,000 students have attended it.
Mr. Eberly was married October 28, 1869, to Miss Isiphine Moore, of Applecreek, Miss Ise E. Eberly being their only child.
The Smithville High School is a creation of Prof. Eberly, although it may be said to have sprung from the wants of the community; hence there was correspondence in the popular demand and his comprehension of it. Its very life and its boldest features are original with him, and the powerful and stimulating effect it has had upon the young men and women who have patronized it has largely shaped the educational character of the entire community.
Professor Eberly is opposed to an education that crams with theories, languages and words, and does not unfold faculties or develop forces. The ancient languages are to be perused rather as a means than an end; either for the knowledge that is locked up on them, or the discipline which their study affords the mind, or for the entire mastery which the acquisition of a foreign language compels us to obtain of the whole compass of our own. For these purposes he yields to no man in his esteem for the ancient languages. His advice to the students is that of Horace to the Pisos:
"Let classic authors be your chief delight,
Read them by day - read them again by night."
He recognizes the central and seminal fact, that the county asks for scholars, not scholastics; practical men, not perambulating abstractions; men whose minds have been strengthened, not overwhelmed by learning. He was an agile, quick, mechanical mind; loves order because he was born to love it, and out of the harmonious play of his faculties springs the government of the schoolroom. His mind is intuitive, grasping, productive, re-productive; he sees an idea, comprehends it, then pounces on it like a falcon, when he forever holds it. He has, morever, the capacity of not simply understanding things, but of making others understand them. He is a thinker and worker. There is no emotion or gush about him. His mind moves in a region of realities, facts, figures and objects. In conversation he is fluent, elastic and sarcastic. As a public speaker he ascends to the regions of thought, divesting himself of all badinage and the gallantry of declamation. He is one of the foremost educators of Wayne county.
From History of Wayne County, Ohio, From the Days of the Pioneers and First Settlers to the Present Time, by Robert Douglass, 1878