Delicacy, Refinement, Propriety

Millersburg Female College marketed itself as a quintessentially Southern institution, Gould largely recruiting students from that part of the country, training them "according to the Southern ideas of delicacy, refinement, womanhood, religion, and propriety." Gould boasted of his Southern birth in advertising the school. It faced competition from numerous other female academies, including a dozen in Kentucky. He accompanied sixty-five of his students on a day trip to the hotel at Blue Licks Springs, the girls singing and laughing with what some thought was too much exuberance. One of them, Texie Head of Missouri, injured herself there when climbing a ravine, and was confined to her bed to convalesce. Gould paid her assiduous visits about which his wife would later complain. Bristow formed a student orchestra and led them and the calisthenics team in performances in neighboring communities. On June 8, 1883, he and Gould would take them on the train for a performance in Versailles.