Education of Elizabeth Studebaker Gates

An Amazing Phone Call about an Even More Amazing Lady

I received one of the most amazing phone calls on the morning of July 13, 2000, from the Kansas School for the Deaf. The person calling on behalf of the school was trying to locate descendants of prominent alums. She had found Dad’s name with his contact information on the internet.  This school official knew my grandfather’s name was Edmund Gates. So acting on a hunch that the two were related, she had called at my father's home. She was planning the 140^th anniversary of the founding of the school. I knew my great-grandmother was born deaf but was astonished to learn she was the first student of the school.

Elizabeth Studebaker was born to Daniel and Elizabeth Jacobs Studebaker on May 16, 1851, in South Bend, Indiana. She was the first daughter born following the birth of three sons. She would have two sisters born later. Little Elizabeth was born deaf. At the age of six, she and her family moved west to Kansas in a covered wagon.


First Building to House the Kansas School for the Deaf

Elizabeth Studebaker Gates 

Above is a photo of the original building at Baldwin, Kansas, that housed the Kansas School for the Deaf. Records show Elizabeth Studebaker, whose portrait is above, studied there for six years following her enrollment as the first student on December 9, 1861. Her father would have taken her the approximate thirty miles between their closest town of Clinton to Baldwin, the only place Elizabeth could learn sign language. American Sign Language was a relatively new language at that time having been taught for less than fifty years. The school’s photograph, as well as the information below, is available on the school’s present website in its history section.

 Elizabeth Studebaker from Clinton arrived with her father, along with some ham, butter and eggs. These items, along with the following week's arrival of a wagon load of corn, served as the barter for the school costs of roughly $2.50 per week.

I am greatly indebted to Great-aunt Ella Gates-Meyer for information she wrote for the school about her mother, Elizabeth Studebaker. Her article about her mother indicated that Elizabeth did housework for one dollar per week to pay for her room and board. Great-aunt Ella stated that the only way her mother could attend the Kansas School for the Deaf was the school’s willingness to accept produce from Daniel Studebaker’s farm near Fort Scott, Kansas, in lieu of tuition fees. The forward-thinking Dunkard* minister, Daniel Studebaker purposefully and sacrificially sought out education for his deaf daughter in a time when many felt girls needed no education and one with a disability was considered “inferior.”

Tombstone of Daniel Studebaker, father of
Elizabeth Studebaker Gates. He is buried in
Colyer Cemetery in Douglas County in Kansas.
He was born on September 11, 1820 in Ohio.
He died on May 8, 1894 in Kansas.

*The Dunkards were a branch off the Church of the Brethren, a group that began in Germany in the early 1700s. The present day Dunkards strictly adhere to the New Testament. They practice “triple” immersion baptism once in the name of the Father, once in the name of the Son, and once in the name of the Holy Spirit. This ceremony was performed after an individual professed faith in Jesus as his/her Savior and Lord. Some categorize their doctrine as “Baptistic.” Incidently, Daniel Studebaker’s other six brothers were also Dunkard ministers according to Aunt Ella Gates-Meyer. A Dunkard congregation still exists in Kansas.