EDUCATOR, FOUNDER OF THE BANK STREET
SCHOOL OF EDUCATION

A Different Path.

Lucy Sprague Mitchell, writer, teacher, and social reformer, is remembered primarily for her work in building experimental schools and as a researcher who carefully studied children's language-learning patterns. At a time when many educated women who sought careers spurned the notion of marriage and family, Sprague chose to marry economist Wesley Clair Mitchell and raise four children while pursuing a full career.

Background.

Lucy Sprague, the daughter of a wealthy Chicago family, grew up in an archetypal Victorian household. She viewed her mother as "ardent but suppressed, delightful but tragic" and eagerly embraced the notion of education as a means of escaping a similar fate. She was largely self-educated before college but attended Radcliffe as an undergraduate and graduated magna cum laude with honors in philosophy (the first...