Clara Barton, best known as a Civil War nurse and founder of the American Red Cross, also played a significant role in New Jersey history by beginning the state's first free public school. After taking a teaching position in Hightstown in 1851 at the urging of her friend Mary Norton, Barton visited nearby Bordentown and was disturbed by the number of children in the streets whose families could not afford private school. She met with the local school committee and persuaded them to let her try educating such children, starting with six male students in a free school in a red brick building on Crosswicks Street. The effort proved so successful that attendance grew to 600 pupils by the end of the year. Town officials then built a new public school but replaced Barton as principal with a man. Hurt and resentful, she left New Jersey for Washington, D.C., where she founded the American Red Cross in 1881.