l 04 The Writing Centerjournal
centers. Though some centers may have fit Wallace's model, his rendering the more we suspect antecedent,; beyond those we have discovered. Using
ofthe past, rather than an informed attempt nt history.1 becomes a straw man
against which he can sec his agenda for current writing centers-a rhetorical
srracegy that enables his essay to present a vision of p rogress.
Like \Y/a!lace, Andrea.Lundsford uses a progressive model to account fur
writing center history, constructing centers in her now weHMlmown schema
11
of"storchouses" based in cunem-traditional pedagogy) garreo/' subscribing
to a student-centered expressionism, or «Burkean parlors" where tutorials are
seen as instances ofthe social conscrucrlon ofmeaning. Here the early center
is portrayed as a "storehouse" of grammar drills lacking the theoretical
sophistication of che "Burkean parloru Lunsford advocates.
Similarly, Christina N{urphy, in tracing a p rogressive movement of
writing centers toward <!current educational theory» {p art ofher essay's tide),
posits a deficient past in relation to her picture ofa, more enlightened model
of present centers: "In the 1940s and 50s, writing centers were established
to address the instructional problems of weaker students by strengthening
their writing and critical thinkin g skills , . ." (276). To be fair to Murphy,
she also rccognize,i; a liberal mission in early centers-<ldeveloping students1
potentials and facilitating their intellectual growth"--hut implies that this
agenda was subsumed by the conservative demand for "the highest number
of meas1m1b!e tesnk� for the largest number o-f students in the shortest rime
frame" (277) .
These constructions, all by notable commentators on writing centers 1
reflect an evolutionary history of centers often accepred uncritically by the
writing center community. I do not mean to say chat centers have not
"progressed," Nor do I daim fur centers of the past the theoretical
sophisticarion thar com mentators such as Wallace, Lunsford, and Murphy
*
find. lacking. Rather, I believe that although we can, to some degree, trace an
� history of wrirh,g centers, this history is not a neat march of
progress from currcnr�rradicional gradgrindianism to theoreticall
· y sophisri-
� n11rturc. Earl centers, as we can reconstruct t historical texts,
were a much more vad ate an com Jex hen. �en
rcpres te i[w;1tin center discourse. ms, in tht':{ essay I will attemp t to
fi �
trace t e evo utton o writmg centers to demonstrate how early ceriters
conducted practice in ways which both deviate from and foreshadow writing
center practice and theory roday, I will begin wirhadiru:hroniclookatcenters
as an evolving phenomenon before dosing with a synchronk perspective
comparing centers of the past and present on three issues; clientele,. staffing,
and institutional identity.
EVOLUTION: CONNECTIONS AND GAPS
Finding the first writing centeri in some form that we would reco gnize
in terms ofcenrers today1 .is like any quest for origins: the .further back we go1
Early Writing Centers: Toward n Histoey l 05
documents published in early issues of English Jourmd and other places,
however, we can gain some sense ofhow centers began to evolve early in this
century, though we may not discover the first impulse engendering them.
Classroom Origins: The Laboratory Method
As Thomas Hemmeter and David Healy have demonstrated,, writfrtg
centers today often .like to de.fine rhe.rnselves as an alternative or even an
opposition to the classroom. Neverthdess i it is likely that centers evolved
from a da.ssroom format known as the laboratoty method. This format
enablea imervention lri the srudent1s writing process through individual help
from the instmcror and peer editing groups, two methods shared l,y writing
centef,S and classrooms today.
As early as 1904, Philo Buck, • §,. Louis high school teacher, described
such a classroom. Long before the birth ofKennethBruffee and decades prior
to the Dartmouth Conference, Buck's students wrote together on topics of
their own choosing while he himselfspent time with each individually before
havin g them read and critique one another's papers. Buck may have even
coined the term laboratory method/ for the opening ofhis essayjustifies the
ii
method by dtawing analogies with already esrablished laboratorywork in d,e
sdences1 a move that subsequent commentators in the early part of the
century itoitated. Though Buck's method used dass tlme, evidently he
aware of the value of one�to�one instruction and peer criti que. techniques ar
was]
the heart ofwriting center methodology today.
By the 1 9 l Os, it isj'Vident that others were subscribing to the laboratoty
method. Defulclln g cokposition instruction against those who were calling
fuL: its abolition, an editorial in the fustJ�G pf f.pgiifiJ. lqurnelcires rl,e
efficacy of the laboraro metho<l. The method continued to flo urish, as is
ev, e r nc · r's 191'i'. art' le describing a classroom at
New Trier High School similar ro u t · two da s er aside
for labgratory wp(.k. A s1m1 ar article by �nk W. Cady pf Micl,lkbu.ny
�p;e two years earlier indicates tlut the aboratory method had been
adopted in post-secondary instruction as well. It is difficult to tell how
widespread the method was in either college or high schools, but evidently
it was eo on enou b the end ofthe 1920, to become the subjecr ofan
em pirical study or a aster s I""' y · est Virginia high school teacher
Warren Horner. Elomer found that studen,:s in the experimental group
made small gains in rhe>orical and grrunmatlcal p roficiency but did so in half
the instruction time dedicated to a control group of students m.ughr in a
redtational format.
A Place of Its Own
By name. and method we can see connections between the laboratory