San
Joaquin County
Biographies
LODI ACADEMY
(ELMER E. FARNSWORTH & FREDERIC T. OAKES)
Few institutions of learning in
California have done more to help shape the destiny of the younger and
fast-growing communities than has the Lodi Academy, whose excellent standing is
due in part to the scholarly, thorough work of its principal and his
associates. The Lodi Academy is a
Christian institution operated by the Pacific Union Conference for the training
of Christian workers, and Christian principles have first place in determining
its policies. It was started in 1908 as
a Normal institution, but several changes have been made in its organization in
later years; however, there has been but one aim before the school from its
founding, that young men and women should pass out of its doors fully equipped
to do their part in carrying the Gospel to the world. The Academy is the joint property of the
Northern California and Central California Conferences of Seventh Day
Adventists, and from these conferences and the state of Nevada students are solicited. The Academy offers the full work of the
academic grades as well as training in musical, commercial and normal lines,
and has a department covering the first eight grades of studies. The Academy property is situated south of
Lodi, and the school property comprises forty acres, about half of which is
planted to Tokay grapes. Several acres
are occupied by the buildings, consisting of a girls’ dormitory, a boys’
dormitory and the main school building, which contains the assembly hall and
chapel; the remainder of the land is used for general garden purposes and the
Academy is supplied with water for domestic purposes and for irrigating from
its own wells. From the fifteen-acre
full-bearing vineyard is received a reasonable income each season, thus enabling
the school to be partially self-supporting.
The average enrollment of the school is about 420 students.
Elmer E. Farnsworth, principal of
Lodi Academy, was born in Washington, New Hampshire, June 2, 1865 and received
his education in Lancaster Junior College, Lancaster, Massachusetts, and in
1908 was ordained to the gospel ministry and the most of the past fifteen years
has been spent as instructor in Union College, Collegeview,
Nebraska; Southwestern Junior College, Keene, Texas; and principal of Campion
Academy at Loveland, Colorado; and of Mt. Ellis Academy, Bozeman, Montana. In the month of September, 1922 he came to
Lodi as principal of the Academy and was re-elected for the following year.
Frederic T. Oakes, the present
business manager of the Academy, as well as the head of the commercial
department, was born in Oakland, California, and attended the Oakland grammar
schools and later the Healdsburg and Lodi Adventist schools; he also attended
the Heald’s Business College at San Francisco.
After his graduation from the Lodi Academy he became instructor and
assistant business manager and for the last four years he has been the business
head of the school. His teaching
connection with the school has covered a period of thirteen years.
Transcribed by V. Gerald Iaquinta.
Source: Tinkham, George
H., History of San Joaquin County, California , Page
1616. Los Angeles, Calif.: Historic
Record Co., 1923.
© 2012 V. Gerald Iaquinta.
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