The Heathen School Summary

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In The Heathen School, John Demos follows the story of a school for indigenous youth in Cornwall, Connecticut that was at danger of being lost in time as just “a piece of local history” (265). The story is entwined in the history of early America, a time when prejudice against non-whites was prevalent. The school and the youth that were brought to America from all over the world faced many challenges, which some faced well, but others did not. The story follows the school from its creation to its eventual closure, as well as some of the students’ lives after leaving the school. The story is intermixed with historical background and stories of the author’s journey as he conducted his research for the book. The story begins with the history …show more content…

Enrollment slowly grew, along with funding and approval of the school from the local community, and it appeared to be doing well. That was until they encountered problems with their students fraternizing with local white girls. Interracial dating and marriage were highly stigmatized in that time, as white Americans thought of any “colored” race, including blacks and Indians, as inferior. However, the students continue and two end up marrying white girls. This starts the decline of the schools success that eventual leads to its closure. The rest of the book is dedicated to the students after the school closed. Sadly, many of them failed to be effective missionaries in their homeland, like the school had hoped. Two of the scholars, however, were successful and surprisingly, they were the two that had married the white girls. Although the school had ultimately failed, the success of the two students The story of the heathen school is a little known, but fascinating story. It’s clear the amount of research and work Demos put into the book. The interludes that tell his story as he gathers information about the school show his dedication to the book. Demos shows a passion for history and telling the untold stories. His passion spills over into the reader as they see the injustice the “heathens” faced. I think he accomplishes the goal of leaving the reader with a feeling …show more content…

The history and personal stories might be relevant to the main story, but I feel like some of them went on too long and distracted from the main story. Chapter five, for example, dives into the history of interracial marriage and the prejudice against the Indians. The chapter never mentions any of the main characters of the story and is long enough to distract from the story. While the information might be relevant, inserting that much of it in the middle takes away from the flow of the story. In addition, some chapters were reasonable, but others were much longer and filled with extensive detail. The longer chapters seemed to cover the same amount of the story as the shorter ones, but were stretched out with long winded descriptions that I feel bog down the reader. The story stops for him to give extensive detail and doesn’t pick up again until he

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