Schaeffer, Nathan C., educator, was born near Kutztown, Berks со., Pa., Feb. 3, 1849, son of David and Esther Ann (Christ, pronounced Krist) Schaeffer, and grandson of Philip and Elizabeth (Fetterolf) Schaeffer. His great-grandfather, George Schaeffer, came to this country from Germany in 1750. One of his four brothers, Rev. William C. Schaeffer, Ph.D., professor of New Testament exegesis in the theological seminary at Lancaster, Pa., is editor of the Sunday-school lessons of the Reformed church in the United States Nathan C. Schaeffer was educated at Franklin and Marshall College, Lancaster, Pa., and at the universities of Berlin, Leipzig and Tubingen, Germany. During 1875-77 he was professor of Latin in the Franklin and Marshall College, and was principal of the Keystone State normal school during 1877-93. He was appointed state superintendent of public instruction of Pennsylvania by Gov. Pattison in 1893, and has served by reappointment to the present time (1909). During his administration Dr. Schaeffer has elevated the standard of the public schools of the state so that they not only compare favorably with the best in the country but are worthy examples for every other state in the Union to follow. Not only has he raised the standard of the schools, but he has improved the conditions of pupils and teachers alike. He has awakened the legislature through his valuable annual reports to a sense of duty, and thus secured increased appropriations for school purposes. Over $90,000,000 of state funds have expended by him for school betterment and he has made the influence of the state educational department so powerful that it now ranks amongst the most important in the administration of the affairs of the state. His cooperation with the heads of colleges and universities has also had strong influence in the promotion of higher education. He has secured a system of township high schools; the passage of minimum salary laws by which the wages of teachers have been doubled in many school districts; large increase in school appropriations and practically free tuition in the slate normal schools for all above seventeen years of age; and he has lengthened the minimum school term to seven months; increased the medical course from two to four years, and added a year to the course of study in the state normal schools. He inaugurated a policy which has kept the schools true to their original purpose, that of banishing illiteracy and making ignorance impossible. Dr. Schaeffer was a member of the commission on industrial education, is secretary of the medical council of Pennsylvania, of the dental council of Pennsylvania, and of the college and university council of Pennsylvania. He is president of a commission of seven, created by the legislature of 1907 to codify and revise the school laws of the state. He was chancellor of the Pennsylvania Chautauqua at Mt. Gretna during 1902-05. He served as president of the National Education Association during 1905-07. He has been editor of the "Pennsylvania School Journal" since 1893, and is the author of "Bible Reading for Schools" (1897); "Thinking and Learning to Think" (1900), and "History of Education in Pennsylvania" (1907). He prepared the introduction to Hinsdale's "Civil Government"; Riddle's "Nicholas Comenius"; and "Life of Henry Harbaugh." He has received the degrees of Ph.D. from the college of St. Thomas of Villanova, D.D. from Waynesburg College, and LL.D. from the Western University of Pennsylvania, Washington and Jefferson College, and Dickinson College. He was married, July 8, 1880, to Annie, daughter of John F. Ahlum of Quakertown, Pa. They have two sons and five daughters; Claribel, Helen Elizabeth, wife of Dr. Wm. H. Huff, John Ahlum, Frederic Christopher, Grace Marguerite, Anna Dorothy, and Mary Matilda.
Source: James Terry White. The National Cyclopaedia of American Biography: Being the History of the United States as Illustrated in the Lives of the Founders, Builders, and Defenders of the Republic, and of the Men and Women Who Are Doing the Work and Moulding the Thought of the Present Time. New York: James T. White & Co., 1910, p. 214.
Contributed by: Nancy.