Everand Logo

Welcome to Everand!

  • Discover millions of ebooks, audiobooks, and so much more with a free trial

    Only $11.99/month after trial. Cancel anytime.

    Necessary Rules for Children in Pennsylvania Dutch Country
    Necessary Rules for Children in Pennsylvania Dutch Country
    Necessary Rules for Children in Pennsylvania Dutch Country
    Ebook88 pages30 minutes

    Necessary Rules for Children in Pennsylvania Dutch Country

    By Christopher Dock and Tonya Wilhelm

    ()

    Read preview

    About this ebook

    Mennonite schoolmaster Christopher Dock first published his A Hundred Necessary Rules of Conduct for Children in 1764. It instructed children how to keep their belongings tidy, behave in public and stay awake in church. While even the best-behaved Mennonite boy couldn't resist the allure of a well-placed puddle, the schoolmaster laid out helpful guidelines. Schoolteacher Paul Breon brings the rules into context for today's children and parents in Necessary Rules for Children in Pennsylvania Dutch Country, with charming period photography by Tonya Wilhelm. Rediscover timeless wisdom in the first guide to etiquette published in the American colonies.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherThe History Press
    Release dateJul 13, 2015
    ISBN9781625855879
    Necessary Rules for Children in Pennsylvania Dutch Country
    Author

    Christopher Dock

    Paul Breon is a fifth-grade teacher. He has worked as a waiter, cook, restaurant manager, computer and copier salesman, technological support staff and computer technology instructor. His writing has been published in Seventeen magazine, Chicken Soup for the Single's Soul, the local newspaper, and several other smaller publications.

    Related to Necessary Rules for Children in Pennsylvania Dutch Country

    Related ebooks

    Relationships For You

    View More
    View More

    Related podcast episodes

    Related articles

    • Article

      Durene Jones

      Aug 24, 2021

      Durene Jones
      1 min read

    • Article

      Keslyn’s

      Aug 24, 2021

      Keslyn’s
      1 min read

    • Article

      Jennifer J. Redmond

      Aug 24, 2021

      Jennifer J. Redmond
      1 min read

    • Article

      Giulia Punti Antichi

      Aug 24, 2021

      Giulia Punti Antichi
      1 min read

    • Article

      Witches Bowed Down To Christ

      May 20, 2019

      Witches Bowed Down To Christ
      1 min read

    • Article

      Finder Of Treasure Chest Hidden In Rocky Mountains Reveals His Identity

      Dec 8, 2020

      The grandson of Forrest Fenn, who hid the trove that set off a hunt for buried treasure, confirmed that it was found by a man named Jack Stuef. Stuef says a lawsuit forced him to come forward.

      2 min read

    • Article

      Find Your U.S. Ancestors

      Feb 15, 2022

      Find Your U.S. Ancestors
      1 min read

    • Article

      Food Historian

      May 13, 2021

      Food Historian
      3 min read

    • Article

      Reading Corner

      Dec 1, 2021

      Great books for growing minds KEY: HB HARDBACK H PB PAPERBACK H BB BOARD BOOK www.austinmacauley.com A series of short stories written about minibeasts for young children and self-readers. Age 6 years + We say… This collection of short stories about

      2 min read

    • Article

      A Very Personal Passion

      Apr 28, 2021

      A Very Personal Passion
      2 min read

    • Article

      MY ENGLISH HOME Matthew Fort

      Jan 8, 2020

      MY ENGLISH HOME Matthew Fort
      4 min read

    • Article

      Medieval Manners

      Dec 21, 2023

      Medieval Manners
      1 min read

    • Article

      Deborah Hutton

      Sep 19, 2021

      Deborah Hutton
      3 min read

    • Article

      Q&A with Bonnie

      Apr 21, 2023

      ◗ Elizabeth Zott is a character we would all love to know or even become. Where did such a personality spring from? Fury! I started Lessons in Chemistry about seven years ago. I’d just come out of a meeting, irritated by some garden variety sexism, a

      6 min read

    • Article

      As A Family Line

      May 12, 2023

      As A Family Line
      7 min read

    • Article

      Patrick’s Pages

      Dec 17, 2021

      THE INTERNET has a lot to answer for, but we’ll never know how much unintended damage was done by the Victorian equivalent when our worried ancestors looked for help and advice. Enquire Within Upon Everything – a tome found on the bookshelves of many

      5 min read

    • Article

      A Starter Kit For Writing Memoir

      Jun 20, 2020

      Sorry, are you writing an autobiography? If so, you’re right – you should tell us all about your childhood, your middle-grade years, your high school experience, etc. But unless you’re famous – and we mean really famous – your odds of selling an auto

      9 min read

    • Article

      Panayoti Kelaidis

      Aug 25, 2022

      PANAYOTI KELAIDIS is a lifelong Colorado gardener who has worked at Denver Botanic Gardens for more than 40 years. Known for his expertise in rock gardening and alpine plants, he is a longtime member of the North American Rock Garden Society. This in

      11 min read

    • Article

      Recollections Of The Crooked House

      Nov 14, 2023

      Email wdytyaeditorial@ourmedia.co.uk Write to WDYTYA? Magazine, Eagle House, Bristol BS1 4ST STAR LETTER WIN an AncestryDNA test kit from ancestry.co.uk WORTH £79 The writer of our star letter wins an AncestryDNA test worth £79 – so drop us a line an

      7 min read

    • Article

      The 1950s Irish Convent Guide To Green Living

      Oct 20, 2021

      What with the energy crisis and the COP26 Climate Change event, I expect we’re all facing an austere winter. But I do feel I’ve had good training for this – at my convent boarding school in 1950s Dublin. The rules then were exceptionally green. Heati

      3 min read

    • Article

      Travelling & Time Travelling

      Aug 13, 2021

      I hope that your summer is going well, even really well, perhaps with the chance to get out and about and explore. I hope you’ve managed to feed ‘body’ with cream teas from National Trust tea shops and ‘soul’ with visits to archives and historic prop

      1 min read

    Related categories

    Reviews for Necessary Rules for Children in Pennsylvania Dutch Country

    0 ratings

    0 ratings0 reviews

    What did you think?

    Tap to rate

    Review must be at least 10 words

      Book preview

      Necessary Rules for Children in Pennsylvania Dutch Country - Christopher Dock

      www.wilhelm-photography.com.

      Introduction

      The story of how this book came to be in your hands is the story of two men.

      Christopher Dock emigrated from Germany to the Pennsylvania colony in 1714. A man of Mennonite faith, he opened a school for children along Skippack Creek, north of Philadelphia. He lived a humble existence, sometimes farming but mostly teaching. His influence was small, limited to the children he ministered to through providing them an education. Even though not all the students could afford to pay, they were treated fairly, and Dock was noted for being one of the few early schoolmasters who held his students in high regard. Respect—mutual respect—was the order of the day.

      Encouraged by friends to share his wisdom, he was reluctant for years, but in 1764, he crafted an article that detailed his standards of behavior. A Hundred Necessary Rules of Conduct for Children, published anonymously in the German Geistliches magazine, is notable for being our first known original document on the subject of etiquette in the colonies.

      The rules were certainly read by and to children in the time following publication, but the magazine’s readership was limited to German-speaking pre-Revolutionary colonists, and the Rules may have at this point been lost to history.

      Over one hundred years later, Samuel Pennypacker, governor of Pennsylvania and president of its historical society, was determined to preserve his state’s history. A lover of antique books and documents, he would often spend the day with a friend walking through old shops and knocking on doors, hoping a historic volume would find its way to him.

      One day, his travels took him up north of Philadelphia, along the Skippack, and he came among the Mennonite farms. His own grandfather had lived there, and many of the descendants of those first settlers still resided in colonial-era homes. Pennypacker knocked on the door of an older gentleman, presenting him with his quest to locate antique writings, were there any to be found there. The man offered him a fragile document even then over one hundred years old—a copy of the fortieth issue of Geistliches magazine, which contained Dock’s Rules. Pennypacker, intrigued with Dock’s philosophies, and intending to honor this early colonial teacher, published a short biography and a translation of the Rules in his 1883 Historical and Biographical Sketches.

      And so the Rules were preserved for history yet again, and many read Pennypacker’s book in its day. Now, over one hundred years later, his work joins many thousands of other volumes that languish unread by many, with few having the opportunity to appreciate the wisdom and history in their pages.

      In republishing Dock’s work, using Pennypacker’s 1883 translation, we intend to once again bring the Rules to the attention of the public. The Rules are too instructive, and too charming, to miss. We have included illustrative photographs, telling the story of a young boy and his two sisters as they do their best to obey. (Rules are one thing when read and another in the midst of life.)

      Christopher Dock left little of substance behind when he died in 1771. His influence on the lives he touched cannot be measured. With our republication of his work, we hope to encourage that influence to

      Enjoying the preview?
      Page 1 of 1