Formally opened in 1879 on the site of an abandoned military base in Pennsylvania, Carlisle was the first nonreservation boarding school established for the U.S. government for the exclusive use of native children. Its first director was Richard Henry Pratt, and army officer who had experience in running an Indian prisoner-of-war camp in St. Augustine, Florida. Pratt convinced government officials and humitarian reformers that education was the solution to the "Indian Problem."
———By objective of Carlisle's curriculum was, in Pratt's words, to "kill the Indian and save the man." The school set out to teach boys skills in mechanical and agricultural arts; girls were trained in sewing, cooking, laundry, and general housework. The English language was considered a strong "civilizing" force at Carlisle, and the use of native languages was strictly forbidden. Further attempts to break tribal ties included placing children with white families for the summer months, dressing students in military uniforms, and encouraging them to find permanent employment away from their home reservations.
———By 1900, Carlisle had over twelve hundred students from seventy-nine tribes. Nevertheless, rising costs, resistance from parents, a preference for institutions closer to Indian populations, and World War I led to the decision to close the school in September 1918. The Indian Office returned the school buildings to the army.

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