He was educated at Whitesboro, New York, became a teacher at Whitesborough and Binghamton, and was for twelve years principal of the Stone School in Hartford, Connecticut, resigning in 1831.

Olney was a practical instructor, and was dissatisfied with the existing textbooks and treatises, which began with an exposition of the science of astronomy, and, making the centre of the Solar System the initial point, developed the scheme until it finally included the Earth.

He began with the scholar's own continent — in fact, in the very city, town, or village in which he or she lived, and made clear by lucid definitions the natural divisions of land and water, illustrating each instance by the use of maps.

His plan was to familiarize the child with the surface of the Earth by going from the near to the distant, and from the concrete to the abstract, and this system at once overthrew theoretic geography, and initiated the modern practical and descriptive science.

He was for many years a member of the legislature, afterward comptroller of the state for two terms, and used largely his legislative and official powers to build up the system of Connecticut common schools.