James Wilmour Lindsay was a New Jersey educator who assumed the office of Superintendent on August 1, 1935. Lindsay was chosen from among 75 applicants. He held an undergraduate degree from the Univeristy of Colorado and a doctorate from New York's Columbia University.
One of Lindsay's first acts was to undertake a complete review of Bloomington's educational programs. He would advocate the use of standardized tests, expansion of adult learning opportunities, as well as changes to the curriculum, which would include training in "contributing citizenship, parenthood, money management, the pre-school child" and retraining of workers who had lost their jobs. All of these ideas required money not available in the strict budgets cuts of the time.
Generally, the Superintendent's contract was renewed each April. Lindsay was not rehired in April, 1937 and, in fact, not until July 26, 1937 was he "re-elected," with the provision that either party could terminate the contract at the end of the first semester. This Lindsay did, submitting his resignation to the Board on December 15, 1937 to be effective January 21, 1938.
