The Geyer Act of 1839 was an act of the

Missouri State Legislature The Missouri General Assembly is the state legislature of the U.S. state of Missouri. The bicameral General Assembly is composed of a 34-member Senate and a 163-member House of Representatives. Members of both houses of the General Assembly are ...

which established the

public school Public school may refer to: * State school (known as a public school in many countries), a no-fee school, publicly funded and operated by the government * Public school (United Kingdom), certain elite fee-charging independent schools in England an ...

system of

Missouri Missouri is a U.S. state, state in the Midwestern United States, Midwestern region of the United States. Ranking List of U.S. states and territories by area, 21st in land area, it is bordered by eight states (tied for the most with Tennessee ...

as well as the

University of Missouri The University of Missouri (Mizzou, MU, or Missouri) is a public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in Columbia, Missouri. It is Missouri's largest university and the flagship of the four-campus Universit ...

Columbia, Missouri Columbia is a city in the U.S. state of Missouri. It is the county seat of Boone County and home to the University of Missouri. Founded in 1821, it is the principal city of the five-county Columbia metropolitan area. It is Missouri's fourth ...

. The act was introduced by congressman

James S. Rollins James Sidney Rollins (April 19, 1812 – January 9, 1888) was a nineteenth-century Missouri politician and lawyer. He helped establish the University of Missouri, led the successful effort to get it located in Boone County, and gained funding ...

from Boone County and named after its author, Henry Geyer. Rollins became known as the "Father of the University of Missouri" in part because of his support in the bills passaged. The act was designed after

Thomas Jefferson Thomas Jefferson (April 13, 1743 – July 4, 1826) was an American statesman, diplomat, lawyer, architect, philosopher, and Founding Fathers of the United States, Founding Father who served as the third president of the United States from 18 ...

's plan for public education in

Virginia Virginia, officially the Commonwealth of Virginia, is a state in the Mid-Atlantic and Southeastern regions of the United States, between the Atlantic Coast and the Appalachian Mountains. The geography and climate of the Commonwealth ar ...

. Most of the act was revoked by 1841 out of practicality, but still the foundations of public education in Missouri can be traced to the passage of the Geyer Act.

References

See also