YOUR PROBLEMS 
 AND MINE 
 
 J, K, STABLETON 
 
YOUR PROBLEMS and MINE 
 
 In fke Guidance of You&i 
 
 A CASE BOOK FOR 
 TEACHERS and PARENTS 
 
 By 
 
 J. K. STABLETON, Doctor of Pedagogy 
 
 Author of 
 "Diary of a Western Schoolmaster" 
 
 THE PUBLIC SCHOOL PUBLISHING CO. 
 
 Blooming ton, Illinois 
 
Sg 
 
 Copyright 1922 
 
 by the 
 
 PUBLIC SCHOOL PUBLISHING CO. 
 Bloomington, Illinois 
 
PREFACE 
 
 This book is intended to be helpful to all school offi- 
 cers, and teachers, and to parents, in fact, to all who have 
 anything to do with the teaching and training of youth. 
 The problems presented and discussed are the problems 
 that all who belong to any one of these classes have to 
 meet. 
 
 The book is full of concrete illustrations drawn almost 
 entirely from the writer's own record of cases he has 
 observed and studied. In fact, it is a teacher 's case book. 
 The boys, of whom there are many, the girls, and the 
 teachers, who appear on its pages are not fictitious peo- 
 ple ; but each one is a real character true to life. 
 
 The writer is often asked what he would do with this 
 boy or that boy ; this girl or that girl ; this teacher or 
 that teacher; this school situation or that school situ- 
 ation. An open confession of what he has tried to do in 
 his own school with boys, girls, teachers, and school situ- 
 ations, and the manner of doing revealing the spirit in 
 which he has tried to do his school work, is his answer. 
 
 The closing paragraph or paragraphs in many of the 
 chapters are intended to direct the reader's attention to 
 the lesson or lessons in pedagogy the story is intended to 
 teach, for the purpose of aiding him in understanding 
 similar cases or situations in his own work, and in sug- 
 gesting to him possible solutions. In an appendix a 
 further consideration is given of some cases from each 
 chapter. 
 
 The whole book emphasizes the great importance of 
 child-study to all who have to do with youth. A study 
 not only of some of the instructive books that have been 
 written on this subject, but also a careful, sympathetic 
 observation and study of the boys and girls under their 
 
 in 
 
 86727 
 
IV 
 
 care, in the school, the home, or elsewhere. Books must 
 receive their full share of attention, but these pages place 
 the emphasis on the study of the flesh and blood boys 
 and girls. 
 
 In presenting some of the characteristics of the physi- 
 cal and of the mental life movements of youth as dis- 
 covered and recorded by special students of this subject, 
 the writer has seen these characteristics verified again 
 and again in the many boys and girls whom he has care- 
 fully observed and studied, still he lays no claim to origi- 
 nal discovery of any of them. Even in giving these 
 facts, he lays no claim to the form of the statements. In 
 many instances, he has quoted the language of the spe- 
 cialists ; in others he has held so closely to the form in 
 which specialists have stated these facts, that these parts, 
 too, might almost be included in parentheses. 
 
 It is a knowledge of these facts of the life of youth 
 that he has ever had in mind while working with pupils 
 in the grammar grades and scholars in the high school. 
 In stating these facts, he had drawn largely on the writ- 
 ings of Dr. G. Stanley Hall, Dr. William H. Burnham, 
 Dr. Arthur H. Daniels, and others. 
 
 And lastly the book teaches that the teacher, the par- 
 ent, or anyone who would rightly direct child-life at its 
 emotional flood-tide, must make a careful study of him- 
 self that he may be in the right attitude toward the youth 
 for whose instruction, guidance, or care, he is responsible. 
 
 J. K. STABLETON. 
 
SWEET CLOVER ILLUSTRATION 
 
 Three years ago the Iowa State Agricultural College, 
 from its experimental department, sent out over the 
 United States and Canada, to other agricultural experi- 
 ment stations, and to thousands of private persons inter- 
 ested in agriculture, small packets of annual sweet clover 
 seed that owed its origin to a single plant of an annual 
 character that appeared, as if by accident, in a pot of 
 biennial (two years) sweet clover at the Iowa Agri- 
 cultural experiment station. 
 
 Biennial sweet clover had been known for a number 
 of years as a valuable farm crop. Annual sweet clover, 
 one year sweet clover, was something new. 
 
 The Iowa Agriculture experiment station sent out 
 the packets of this annual sweet clover seed that it might 
 be tested in all parts of this country and Canada where 
 biennial sweet clover grows ; to have it tested under all 
 possible conditions to find out whether or not the newly 
 discovered clover was of value for agricultural purposes. 
 
 Only a short time ago I received a bulletin from the 
 Ohio Agricultural Experiment Station setting forth the 
 results of that station's testing annual sweet clover. The 
 bulletin showed the results of very close observation and 
 study of the plant. Point after point as observed was 
 set down. First, the plant proved to be an annual ; that 
 is, the seed planted in the spring ripened seed the latter 
 part of the summer of the same year, then died. 
 
 The plant on good soil free from weeds, made a 
 growth equal to the growth made by the biennial sweet 
 clover the second year. 
 
 The annual sweet clover plant made less foliage than 
 the biennial sweet clover. 
 
VI 
 
 The annual sweet clover plant had a smaller root sys- 
 tem than the biennial variety. 
 
 In this manner all the results of the observation of 
 the plant were stated. But had the bulletin gone no 
 further than to give these results of observation of the 
 plant, it would not have been the valuable bulletin that 
 it is. The work of observation was very carefully fol- 
 lowed up by a thorough study of the data gathered by 
 observation, and the results of this study were given in 
 the bulletin together with the data of observation. 
 
 The annual plant made a growth the first year equal 
 to the growth made by the biennial sweet clover the sec- 
 ond year, but the annual sweet clover had less foliage 
 on its stems than the biennial sweet clover so was less 
 valuable as a hay crop than the biennial type. But the 
 annual sweet clover makes a heavy crop of hay the first 
 year and while the quality is somewhat inferior, still un- 
 der some conditions this large crop of hay the first year 
 makes annual sweet clover more valuable than the bien- 
 nial in some situations. The results of long and careful 
 study are here given to all farmers. 
 
 But why is so much time, study and expense devoted 
 to this plant? What is the purpose of all this labor? 
 The object in view is to know annual sweet clover in 
 order to determine whether or not it has sufficient value 
 under some conditions to give it a place in agriculture. 
 
 This observation of the plant to see how it responds 
 to this or that condition of soil, to this or that condition 
 of climate, to cultivation, or to no cultivation, and the 
 thoughtful study of all the data secured in this manner, 
 are the means by which the usefulness of a variety of 
 plants may be determined. All the qualities of the plant 
 must be known, otherwise a plant of great agricultural 
 
VII 
 
 value under some conditions, might be cast aside as 
 useless. 
 
 I have dwelt quite at legnth on how the scientist ob- 
 serves and studies a plant in order that he may know 
 the plant. I have so dwelt on this bit of plant observa- 
 tion and study that those who teach and train youth, or 
 have anything to do in directing youth, may see that as 
 the scientist observes and studies plants, so should these 
 guardians of youth observe and study boys and girls that 
 they may know them physically, mentally and emotion- 
 ally during their growing years, and as much as possible 
 in their body and mind birth inheritances; that they 
 may know the physical and mental qualities of the boys 
 and girls as the scientist in the Botanical field knows a 
 plant. 
 
 But how much higher the purpose of knowing on the 
 part of these teachers of youth than on the part of the 
 scientific student of the plant ! As in the case of annual 
 sweet clover, the scientist would know all the qualities 
 of the plant to determine whether or not it is sufficiently 
 useful to make it worth preserving, so the teachers and 
 guardians of youth would know all the qualities of each 
 individual youth not for the purpose of determining 
 whether or not the boy or girl is worth saving; but that 
 they may so adapt their teaching and training to each 
 boy and each girl that the finest qualities of body and 
 soul of each one may be developed in the best possible 
 manner. 
 
IX 
 
 TABLE OF CONTENTS 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Chapter I. Some Sample Cases 1 
 
 Chapter II. Some Comments, A Few Characteristics of Youth 
 
 With Concrete Cases 23 
 
 Chapter III. Characteristics of Youth With Concrete Cases 
 
 (Continued) 36 
 
 Chapter IV. Religious Awakening 54 
 
 Chapter V. Mild Types, Demonstrative Types, Discussed .... 61 
 Chapter VI. Roseate Dreams; Dreams Daubed With Blue; 
 
 The Dreamers 66 
 
 Chapter VII. Are They Worth Being Interested In? 73 
 
 Chapter VIII. Mistrustful of Parents or Home Friends 82 
 
 Chapter IX. Cheating Grammar Grade Pupils, High School 
 
 Scholars 89 
 
 Chapter X. The Taking of the Property of Others 98 
 
 Chapter XI. Wrong Doing Responsibility, Teacher 's? Par- 
 ents'? City Government's? 122 
 
 Chapter XII. Awakened to a Consciousness of Power 133 
 
 Chapter XIII. On the Way to and From School, Gatherings 
 
 Under School Names 150 
 
 Chapter XIV. Attraction of the Opposite Sex 163 
 
 Chapter XV. What Would You Do With Them? 178 
 
 Chapter XVI. Athletics 190 
 
 Chapter XVII. Some Considerations for the Health of Girls 
 
 of Grammar Grades and High School 203 
 
 Chapter XVIII. A Period of Rapid Growth; A Period of 
 Lowered Intellectual Power; A Period of Stimulated 
 Intellectual Power. An Open Way to Those Quick at 
 
 Learning. Gime Time to the Slow Scholar 211 
 
 Chapter XIX. Rural School Contrasts 219 
 
 Chapter XX. Some Outside Conditions That Affect School 
 
 Work 222 
 
 Chapter XXI. Some Comments on Teachers, Pupils, and 
 
 Scholars 232 
 
 Appendix. Observations and Questions that are Suggested in 
 the Study of Individual Cases. 
 
YOUR PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 CHAPTER I 
 SOME SAMPLE CASES 
 
 Ned R. had come up through the last three years of 
 our elementary schools into the high school, and was at 
 the mid-year of his senior year when one morning the 
 high school principal said to me that Ned was becoming 
 a little smart, was anxious to show off ; that he had com- 
 mitted an offense the day before that could not easily 
 be passed over lest something more serious might hap- 
 pen; but that Ned had always before, in his three and 
 one-half years in high school, been above criticism in his 
 conduct, and in scholarship had always ranked with the 
 best in his class. 
 
 "This fine record," said the principal, "makes it 
 hard for me to know just how to meet the case. As you 
 have known him longer than I, and I have often heard 
 you speak of his fine standing in the elementary schools, 
 I would like very much to have you talk with him if you 
 will. The fact that you have known his good record for 
 so much longer time than I, will make it easier for you 
 to touch him in a way to get a happy response. " 
 
 I replied, "I'll do my best." 
 
 In a few minutes, Ned came into my office looking a 
 little ashamed. As he stepped up to my desk, I extended 
 my hand to him. As we clasped hands, I asked : ' ' What 
 about the trouble, Ned?" 
 
 With his fine, clear eye looking straight into mine, he 
 replied: "I did wrong. I'll never do wrong in school 
 again. ' ' 
 
 1 
 
2 Your. PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 I replied: "I take your words at their full value; 
 you never will." And he never did. 
 
 Then I asked : * ' Ned, how many years have you been 
 with me in school, the elementary school and the high 
 school?" 
 
 He replied, "I came here at the beginning of the 
 sixth grade and have been in school here ever since." 
 
 Then I said: "In all these years up to the present 
 time you have never before been spoken to in regard to 
 your conduct, nor has fault ever been found with your 
 class work. The principal did not tell the offense for 
 which you have come to me. He said you would tell me. 
 But you need not. I do not wish to know. You are 
 forgiven. I want you to understand that a good record 
 counts. You will graduate in June, and when you leave 
 us, the principal and I wish you to remember that we 
 tried to appreciate the great good that was in you boys 
 and not to magnify the mistakes." 
 
 Ned gave my hand a firmer grip, big tears stole down 
 from his eyes and stood on his cheeks, his lips quivered 
 as he said: "Thank you," and left the office. 
 
 When I told the principal what I had done, he said, 
 ' * I knew you would settle it that way. It was just what 
 I wished you to do." 
 
 I had spent the afternoon in one of the elementary 
 schools and as was my custom, had stopped in the prin- 
 cipal's office for a conference with her or any teacher 
 who might wish to talk over with me some part of her 
 work, when a teacher of the advanced half of the seventh 
 grade asked for a few minutes of my time. We passed 
 to her room as the private office was occupied. 
 
SOME SAMPLE CASES 3 
 
 She said : ' ' Mr. Stableton, I 'in all discouraged today 
 and want to talk with you about one of the boys in my 
 
 room. You know Marion S , and you know how 
 
 every teacher that has ever had him in her room has 
 thought him about the finest boy in the school. " 
 
 "Yes, I know what they have all thought of him," 
 I replied. 
 
 ' ' Well, today, ' ' she continued, * * I found that instead 
 of his being the fine boy we had thought him, his mind 
 is perfectly filthy, he is unclean as he can be." 
 
 She then gave me a note that he had written, not as 
 site thought an unclean note, but a note that showed that 
 sex inquisitiveness had come to him as it comes to all 
 boys whose development is normal. Then she passed me 
 his dictionary in which he had underscored many of the 
 words referring to sex. This was further evidence to 
 me that not evil-mindedness as she thought, but sex in- 
 quisitiveness, had come to him ; and that while she must 
 guard further outcroppings of this awakening instinct 
 in school, the inquisitiveness was not in itself bad. I said 
 to her that while she could not talk to the boy of himself, 
 she could give him to understand that any further note- 
 writing on his part would be considered no light offense ; 
 that she should require him to erase all marks from his 
 dictionary, and tell him that she would examine it from 
 time to time to see there was no more marking ; that the 
 greatest thing she could do for him was to keep him so 
 busy with his work, by giving him extra work of an 
 attractive kind, that he would have no time to think 
 about himself while in school ; that she ought to explain 
 the situation to his parents in order that they might give 
 him help ; that she must not in any way lose her high 
 regard for him or she would render herself helpless to 
 do him good just when he needed her most. 
 
4 YOUR PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 This teacher was in many ways an exceptionally fine 
 young teacher. She gave herself unreservedly to her 
 school, was scholarly, able in her instruction, and tactful 
 in managing her room. The pupils greatly respected her 
 and admired her. The work of her room on the whole 
 was of a fine character; but in this case she had failed 
 to connect what she had read of the physical and the 
 mental development of youth with the boy in her room 
 who was experiencing the very changes of which she had 
 read. This failing to determine the cause from its 
 effect on the boy, had led her to believe the boy was foul- 
 minded. Then, too, as a result of not properly inter- 
 preting the boy, she said she thought "If he is as filthy 
 minded as he seems to be, what must the others be, and 
 what does our teaching amount to anyway V 
 
 I talked his development over with her. She was 
 just a little chagrined that she had failed to understand 
 the boy; that she had failed to apply to the boy in her 
 own room the information she had gathered from read- 
 ing; that she had failed to discover the cause from the 
 effect it had on the boy. 
 
 After our talk, she was again in her happy, hopeful 
 frame of mind that was so characteristic of her in her 
 work with boys and girls. 
 
 ********* 
 
 Another afternoon at the close of school at another 
 building, I called at an advanced seventh grade room to 
 speak a moment with the teacher. As I looked into the 
 room, I saw she was engaged in talking with a boy. She 
 immediately excused herself and stepped into the hall. 
 She smiled and said, "Alonzo and I have just been 
 having a little talk. Today I found a note that he had 
 written, so asked him to wait a few minutes after school. 
 
SOME SAMPLE CASES 5 
 
 I have just given him to understand that that kind of 
 thing must not occur again, and I know him. well 
 enough to know he will not try it again. It was not a 
 bad note, but a little off color. In two or three years, 
 he will be ashamed he ever wrote such a note. But, 
 Mr. Stableton, he is a splendid boy, and will make a fine 
 man. ' ' 
 
 She pleased me greatly. She knew the boy's 
 physical and mental condition. She knew too what her 
 part was with the boy, and understanding the situation, 
 met it in a good, strong way, all the while keeping a 
 fine, helpful attitude toward the boy. 
 
 ********* 
 
 In a town where I lived for many years, there dwelt 
 from youth to old age, a man, who even when hoary- 
 headed, his face bleared and bloated, a life of sin 
 written in every lineament of his features, was still at- 
 tractive to boys and young men. I often heard it said 
 that that man had led more boys to lives of wrong than 
 any other one influence in that community. He was 
 always surrounded by a crowd of boys, and no boy ever 
 came under his influence who was the same again. 
 
 With that peculiar charm about his personality 
 that wins youth, had he been a noble character, he 
 might have been of untold good to his community in- 
 stead of making himself the source of a great stream of 
 immoral conduct. 
 
 What was the secret of this man's great influence 
 over boys and young men? 
 
 There was always in him a keen appreciation of boy- 
 life. For forty years, he was ever at the front of his 
 place of business to speak a pleasant word to the passing 
 boy, to cultivate his acquaintance. And in this he was 
 
6 YOUR PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 not evil. This great love of boy-life stands out promi- 
 nently as the one redeeming trait in his character ; and 
 yet, it ever drew the boys to him only to be hurt by his 
 many vices. 
 
 Often as I have thought of this man, the question 
 has come to me, Cannot those who are interested in the 
 good make themselves as attractive to the youth? -Can- 
 not, should not, teachers, too, cultivate that manner that 
 appeals to youth? Can they not have that same sym- 
 pathetic touch with young life that gave this man his 
 wonderful influence over boys? 
 
 ********* 
 
 A few years ago, I happened to hear two gentlemen 
 talking. At that time, they had been friends for several 
 years. One of them said to the other : ' ' Do you know, 
 I liked you from the first time I met you." I am not 
 going into any explanation of what is implied in this 
 statement, but will say that boys measure men and 
 women in much the same way, they "kind o' like them," 
 or they ' ' kind o ' don ? t like them, ' ' when they first meet 
 them. When boys "size us up," rest assured they give 
 us credit for about all there is in us. Sometimes they 
 fail in their first estimate of us, but when they do, it 
 takes time for us to prove to them that they were wrong 
 in their judgment. 
 
 When I go into a strange town, I feel rather lone- 
 some. I miss the boys that at home meet me at every 
 corner ready for a look or word of recognition. I know 
 nothing more delightful than to pass along the street 
 and exchange pleasant words with the boys: here a 
 group is playing, and I stop to see how goes the game, 
 and everyone gives me a pleasant nod as I watch the 
 game with unfeigned pleasure ; or I tip my hat to some 
 
SOME SAMPLE CASES 7 
 
 boy as he rides by in his car, fearful of not being seen 
 in his elevated greatness ; or politely I speak a word of 
 recognition to some boy who is busy at his work in 
 office or store, yet glances up to give and to receive the 
 approving smile that blesses life; I hear someone's 
 shoes going clickety-clack, I turn 'round and see some 
 boy running to catch up with me. I wait and as we 
 walk the next block or two, we pleasantly chat of what 
 is uppermost in Jiis mind. Then with a " Good-bye," 
 he is gone another way. 
 
 Teachers cannot afford to walk along the streets 
 with their minds wholly occupied with solving their 
 problems, but in this pleasant way they may so get hold 
 of the boys that many of their school problems will 
 solve themselves. 
 
 Do we not remember some men whom we greatly 
 admired when we were boys? Were they men who 
 passed us by with never a word or look of recognition? 
 I hardly think so. 
 
 ********* 
 
 Boys are natural hero-worshippers, and cannot ad- 
 mire or respect one who is not able to carry out his 
 plans. They admire that teacher who, if need be, can 
 make them do as they ought, although he may never 
 be compelled to use his coercing power. Still, if some 
 boy leader sets out to contest the leadership with the 
 teacher, the teacher must, if he wishes to sustain his 
 position as head of the school, bring this leader to 
 ignominious defeat; otherwise the boys will array 
 themselves under their own leader against the teacher; 
 but if, on the other hand, the teacher or principal brings 
 this leader into humble submission, the boys will rally 
 to the teacher's standard. 
 
8 YOUR PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 A number of years ago, on taking up my work in 
 Charleston, Illinois, in one of the fifth grades I found 
 a large colored boy, possibly sixteen years of age. 
 Judging from his size alone, he seemed even older. His 
 teacher said to me : ' ' I am afraid of that boy, he is so 
 sullen and is not at all inclined to do what I wish.'' I 
 asked a few questions about the boy, and learned that a 
 gentleman in the town had brought him from Okla- 
 homa, had given him a home, and was trying to educate 
 him; that the boy had been in the fifth grade the year 
 before but had not been promoted, and that his not 
 being promoted was what caused his sullen manner. 
 
 The teacher who had taught the fifth grade the year 
 before was this year principal of the building, and 
 teacher of the sixth grade. She said that while the boy 
 was not strong in his work, she believed that it would 
 be better to give him a place in the sixth grade room ; 
 that she knew he would do his best for her and would 
 learn more, and she was confident that to leave him 
 where he was could only mean trouble. 
 
 I replied that I would arrange to have him placed 
 in the sixth grade, but would try to do it in a way that 
 would have a good effect on him. I made it convenient 
 that day to meet the boys as they were dismissed and 
 apparently accidently, I met Sam, the colored boy, 
 recognized him pleasantly, and then said, "Sam, 
 someone tells me you are from Oklahoma?" He 
 stopped, grinned pleasantly, and said: "Yes, sah, I'se 
 
 from Oklahoma, I came to Charleston with Mr. . 
 
 He found me out there. I live with him." 
 
 I then told him that I was from the West too, that 
 I had lived a number of years in Nebraska, and chatted 
 a few minutes with him about some common char- 
 
SOME SAMPLE CASES 9 
 
 acteristics of that western country. A day or two after 
 this, I was at that building again, and made it a point 
 to get to talk a little while with Sam. I said to him: 
 "Sam, I have been thinking that you might, by work- 
 ing extra hard, try to do the work in the sixth grade. 
 I'm sure you would feel better in the sixth grade than 
 where you are with all those little folks. What do you 
 think about it?" 
 
 A big smile parted his thick lips and spread almost 
 from ear to ear as he replied: "Mr. Stableton, I'd 
 like mighty well to be in that grade, and I'll work 
 mighty hard if you'll try me." 
 
 "All right," said I, "I'll ask the principal to trans- 
 fer you to her grade, and I'm sure you'll not disappoint 
 me." 
 
 Three or four weeks later, I was hurriedly called to 
 this same building. The janitor, very much excited, 
 met me at the door and said: "Dick's on a tare, and 
 has a big piece of iron and swears he'll knock a hole in 
 your head if you go in where he is. I tell you Tie's a 
 terror. The superintendent last year turned him out of 
 school, and after that Dick rocked the superintendent 
 on the street." 
 
 I passed to the principal 's room and found her much 
 excited. Dick had been very unruly and had defied her 
 in the presence of the school. When he knew that she 
 had sent for me, he swore he would do so and so if I 
 came. 
 
 There was an unoccupied room adjoining the prin- 
 cipal's room, into which she had finally got him. I 
 went into the room. He was standing with an iron bar 
 in one hand. He growled something as I entered. I 
 paid no attention to this, but spoke to him when he 
 
10 YOUR PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 growled again that I had better look out. Before he 
 knew that I was going to touch him, I gripped both his 
 hands so quickly that it startled him. I shook the rod 
 of iron out of his hand. He immediately threw him- 
 self down on the floor, locked his legs around mine, and 
 tried to trip me down. I held his hands in a tight grip, 
 and by lifting his feet with my feet, moved across the 
 room to where there were some switches left from the 
 year before. I then whipped him severely. This brought 
 him to his feet. As he rose to his feet, I said, "Be 
 seated," pointing to a chair nearby. He sat down. 
 Just then the door to the principal's room opened and 
 in came my big colored boy, Sam, and stepping up to me 
 he said: "Mr. Stableton, do you need any help?" I 
 thanked him, and replied, "No." He returned to his 
 own room. 
 
 I then talked with Dick. He was out of his passion 
 so he could listen to what I had to say. I told him he 
 was not all bad, but when he allowed himself to get into 
 such an angry passion, he was terrible, and nothing but 
 severe punishment would bring him to his senses; that 
 he must be in school that year ; that I had no thought of 
 turning him out ; but that he would be compelled to do 
 right and be obedient to his teacher. I said further 
 that I had known worse boys than he to make good men, 
 and there was no reason why he could not. He had felt 
 that everybody thought he was wholly bad, and was, so 
 to speak, trying to keep up his reputation. 
 
 My aim was to let him see that I did not consider 
 him a hopeless case, but that I expected something good 
 of him and believed he could make a useful man. 
 
 As he had been so unruly in the presence of the 
 school, and as the pupils could hear the noise we made 
 when I first took hold of him, I felt that the school must 
 
SOME SAMPLE CASES 11 
 
 know how the affair was settled, so I arranged it with 
 him that I should explain to the school. We passed into 
 the room together, and I told the school that I had 
 punished Dick severely for his conduct, and that he 
 was going to try to be a better boy. They saw him come 
 into the room so changed from what they had seen him 
 leave it a short time before, that they understood fully 
 what had been done. I then said that as the matter was 
 settled, it must not be made a subject of conversation 
 anywhere about the school or schoolgrounds ; that I 
 would consider it a very bad offense for any of them to 
 be heard talking about the trouble; that it must be 
 dropped and dropped at once. Tlie affair was not 
 talked about openly. 
 
 The principal said that the colored boy had asked to 
 leave the room and she had excused him but had no 
 thought of his wishing to assist me; it was his own 
 doing. When he went home he told his folks what he 
 had done, and said that he was afraid Dick might be 
 too strong for Mr. Stableton, and so thought he ought 
 to help him, but that he had not needed his help. 
 
 When Dick went home from school, he told his 
 mother what had occurred, but said he didn't care if I 
 had whipped him, he liked me anyway, for I had said 
 that he could make a good man, that I had known worse 
 boys than he to make good men. 
 
 Dick was not always perfect in his conduct, but he 
 was never again as he had been before, and a few words 
 were all that were necessary to set him right. 
 
 This may not be the best way of getting hold of boys. 
 Many may not approve of it. All I can say in its de- 
 fense is that it answered my purpose when I knew no 
 other, and to me it is far preferable to not getting hold 
 
12 YOUE PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 of such boys at all. It is in perfect harmony with the 
 physical and mental laws of the development of youth. 
 
 A teacher in a high school said to me one day that he 
 was greatly annoyed by the boys on the street, not 
 simply high school boys, but grammar grade boys as 
 well, by their dodging behind the corners of buildings 
 and fences and yelling names at him as he passed along 
 the street. "What would you do if you were in my 
 place ? ' ' said he. I replied : "I would cultivate the ac- 
 quaintance of those boys, and instead of trying to keep 
 out of their way, I would make it a point to meet them 
 and to speak to them just as politely as I could/' He 
 tried this, and the trouble disappeared. Those same boys 
 came to know that teacher as a fine man and a worthy 
 friend. He said afterwards in speaking of the affair: 
 "My speaking pleasantly to them and cultivating their 
 acquaintance seemed to take all the wind out of them." 
 He was about right. 
 
 One Tuesday afternoon several years ago, about five 
 o'clock, I sat at my office desk busily engaged with the 
 
 last hour's work of the day when Miss G , one of 
 
 our high school teachers, entered, and said that as the 
 high school principal was not in his office, she thought 
 that possibly she ought to tell me that some of the junior 
 and the senior boys were getting ready to post up about 
 the city, some Rules and Regulations for freshmen and 
 sophomores; that one of the boys, calling him by name, 
 had just been talking to her about it; that they in- 
 tended to have one hundred large posters printed, and 
 to put them up in conspicuous places about the city; 
 
SOME SAMPLE CASES 13 
 
 that they did not intend to make any trouble, "only 
 just have a little fun. ' ' 
 
 I thanked her and she passed from the office. 
 
 In a moment's time, I thought it through. It meant 
 a clash between juniors and seniors on one side, fresh- 
 men and sophomores on the other. I must head off the 
 affair. I had seen the boy whom she mentioned leave 
 the building not five minutes before the teacher gave 
 me the report. 
 
 By this time the high school principal had re- 
 turned to his office. I stated the case to him and re- 
 quested him to find the boy and tell him that I said that 
 he must go no further with the affair, but must call at 
 my office before school in the morning. I said further : 
 "Do not leave the boy until you have his word that he 
 will do nothing more until he sees me. " I knew the boy 
 and that he would do, with the proper insistence 
 on the part of the principal, as I requested. 
 
 The principal then said that he had seen a certain 
 other boy engaged evidently in a very serious con- 
 versation with some other students at the close of 
 school, and that he thought this boy must be interested 
 in the same thing. I immediately called this boy over 
 the telephone while the principal went to look after the 
 first boy. In a few minutes the second boy was in the 
 office. I said to him that I had learned that a number of 
 junior and senior boys were getting out a set of Rules 
 and Regulations for freshmen and sophomores to be 
 posted up about the city ; and that this could not be done 
 without great wrong to our school ; that I believed he was 
 one of the promoters of the scheme, and for this reason 
 had called him in to have a talk with him. I did not 
 bluff him, I was as honest with him as I hoped he would 
 be with me. I don't think it pays to bluff. 
 
14 YOUR PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 He replied that he was one of them, but said that they 
 were not intending to make any trouble, that they had no 
 thought of doing anything that would interfere with the 
 work of the school, but just wanted "to have a little 
 fun" ; that the plan was to put up the posters some night, 
 then catch a few freshmen and sophomores, take them to 
 one of the city parks, where the juniors and seniors would 
 have a wiener roast, read the Rules and Regulations to 
 the captured "freshies" and "sophs" and make them 
 pledge to observe the rules; that no one was to be in- 
 jured in any way, that they were only ' ' going to have a 
 little fun." 
 
 I accepted his statement of their intentions as honest, 
 for this boy had always been loyal to his school and one 
 on whom we could depend as ever standing for the right. 
 I pointed out to him just what would be the result of any 
 such action on their part : that it would mean strife and 
 ill will between juniors and seniors on one side, and 
 sophomores and freshmen on the other; that it would 
 mean the loss practically of at least two weeks and pos- 
 sibly a month of school time, as far as the regular school 
 work was concerned ; that the energies of teachers, prin- 
 cipal and superintendent would be taken from the reg- 
 ular school work to keep the disorder from going beyond 
 bounds, and that the school would win for itself a name 
 as a center of rowdyism. He had not thought the whole 
 thing through. It is not often in these cases that young 
 people do think the whole thing through, and see the end 
 from the beginning. I then asked him his promise that 
 he would have nothing more to do with the affair and said 
 that if he would not give me his word, I would call in 
 his father, that we both knew what his father would do. 
 
 He gave me his word that he would have nothing 
 more to do with carrying on the affair. In fact, would 
 
SOME SAMPLE CASES 15 
 
 try to help stop it, and said: "Mr. Stableton, you had 
 better call in the other fellows and talk with them." 
 
 I thanked him and he left my office. I knew I could 
 trust him. 
 
 A little later I had word from the first boy that 
 nothing would be done that night, and that he would 
 call to see me in the morning. I went home feeling sure 
 that the first steps had been taken that would prevent 
 five hundred pupils being thrown into an excited, riotous 
 state, and that with close, tactful work for a day or two 
 the good name of the school for order and decency would 
 be preserved ; but I knew there was still work ahead. 
 
 Very early the next morning the boy with whom I had 
 talked the evening before called at my office with a copy 
 of the Rules and Regulations for sophomores and fresh- 
 men, saying that he thought I would like to read them. I 
 thanked him. I then knew just what the intended posters 
 contained, and that they had been handed down from 
 some university or college. I was glad to read them, for 
 when a few minutes later the boy whom the teacher had 
 reported the evening before called on me, I was able to 
 talk directly to the point as to the effect the posters would 
 produce. 
 
 This boy 's statement of the case was almost the same 
 as that of the other and I felt they were both honest in 
 what they said. I explained how it appealed to me, and 
 kindly, yet without any possibility of its going on, stated 
 that the whole affair must be called off. I asked him, not 
 in a way to make him feel that I thought he had in- 
 tentionally planned something to disrupt our school, to 
 give me his word that he as one of the leaders or origi- 
 nators would call off the affair and bring the posters 
 to me. 
 
16 YOUR PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 He gave me his word that he would, but asked if they 
 would have to pay for the posters if they gave them to 
 me. I replied that they most certainly would. He then 
 said that the money to pay for them had not been col- 
 lected, and asked if it would be all right for him to go 
 on collecting it. I replied ' ' Yes. ' ' This was Wednesday 
 morning. 
 
 Thursday the same boy came to my office and asked 
 me if I would be willing to talk to all who were interested 
 in the affair, as I had talked to a few of them, saying that 
 it would help him in settling up matters. I told him to 
 get word to all interested to meet me in a specified room. 
 That forenoon the word was carefully gotten to all in- 
 terested that I would meet them in one of the class rooms 
 at a certain hour. When I entered the room to talk to 
 them, I was surprised to see the large number present. I 
 had not supposed so many were taking part in it. I stated 
 the case as it appeared to me, being careful not to im- 
 pute any bad motive to those who had originated it, but 
 to dwell rather on the unfortunate results that would 
 come to our schools; and to make clear the fact that as 
 the head of the school system it was my bounden duty to 
 ward off all things that might bring harm to the school. 
 For an hour I sat with them and counselled with them 
 in the very pleasantest manner. They were free to ask 
 questions and to speak their minds, and I answered them 
 with all frankness. Whether my answers were always 
 the best I know not, but I do know that I won my case. 
 Their questions were well put and right to the point. 
 
 Some one said : * ' Mr. Stableton, why is it they permit 
 university and college students to do these things, and 
 do not think it right for high school scholars ? ' ' 
 
 I replied that in most cases it would doubtless be 
 better if university students did not engage in affairs of 
 
SOME SAMPLE CASES 17 
 
 this character, as they often lead to some students ' being 
 excluded from the university ; that the university being 
 a school for more mature students did not hesitate to 
 sever the connection of any who were detrimental to the 
 school ; that ordinarily high school scholars heard only of 
 the "big times" the university students had on such 
 occasions, and that those students whose opportunity for 
 further education was cut short were lost sight of; that 
 with young people in the high school our aim was to give 
 each one the best possible opportunity for a high school 
 education and to keep the school free from everything 
 that might take this opportunity away from any of them. 
 These and many other points were discussed. 
 
 One asked: "Mr. Stableton, if we pay for these 
 posters and promise not to use them as we planned, can- 
 not each of us who helps pay for them, have one to hang 
 up in his room at home?" 
 
 This looked fair to them, but I had to say "No." I 
 stated that as soon as it would be known, and it would 
 be known, that these posters were hanging in the rooms 
 of Bloomington seniors and juniors, even in their homes, 
 there would be trouble, and as it would affect the school 
 I must insist upon their being given into my hands. 
 
 At the close of the conference they were unanimous to 
 do as I requested. Then with good feeling and in a happy 
 frame of mind, all passed back to their studies. 
 
 Thus far the school had not been excited by the affair, 
 but the principal and I knew that as soon as the sopho- 
 mores and freshmen should hear what had been planned, 
 and we knew they would hear it, they would begin to 
 plan. The following morning the leaders in these two 
 classes were privately called in and told what had been 
 planned and that it had all been called off, that there 
 
18 YOUE PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 was nothing for them to consider, that the whole matter 
 was a thing of the past. In this way any counter plan 
 was forestalled. 
 
 A day or two later the one hundred large posters 
 bearing "rules and regulations for sophomores and 
 freshmen" were delivered to me at my office. And so 
 the affair passed out of the minds of the scholars. 
 
 All this time I had been wondering who was re- 
 sponsible for the thing's taking shape in the mind of the 
 leading boy. I thought possibly a letter from a boy 
 friend in some college or university had given him the 
 cue. Two weeks later the teacher who first gave me 
 notice came into my office and said : ' ' Mr. Stableton, I 
 think I owe you an apology. I fear I was responsible for 
 that Rules and Regulations affair. It was this way the 
 boy who was the leader had spent an evening at my home 
 a short time before and while entertaining him, I told him 
 of my university life and showed him a card with those 
 rules and regulations on it, a card that I had hanging in 
 my room. And that put the idea into his head. ' ' 
 
 Then the whole situation flashed over me. Here was 
 a teacher whom the scholars were taught to respect and 
 whom they did respect, telling one of the boys of the 
 most glorious time of her college life and reading with 
 him the card that she kept as a prized memento of the 
 occasion. Suggestion had done the rest. Why should 
 not they have a "glorious time?" Their teacher had 
 had. And why not? 
 
 I said to her: "You are a good woman; you mean 
 well ; but your lack of judgment came near engaging this 
 body of five hundred scholars in a strife that would have 
 degraded and disgraced us in the eyes of the public, and 
 would have robbed us of much valuable time. To pre- 
 
SOME SAMPLE CASES 19 
 
 vent this the high school principal and myself gave two 
 or three days of the most nerve-straining work that ever 
 comes to those in authority/' 
 
 I was glad that I had accepted the intent as the boys 
 had stated it, and that I had so felt that what they stated 
 was true that I could talk with them with no other 
 thought than that of helping them to see the situation 
 as I saw it; and that as a duty to them and to the 
 school it was my part to prevent anything that would 
 hurt the school. 
 
 Only those who deal with young people know the 
 tension under which one labors when handling a body of 
 several hundred high school scholars at such a time, in a 
 way to hold their confidence so that he can shape their 
 action, even when he is shaping it against that on which 
 their hearts are set, and when, as in this case, they have 
 a precedent that in their eyes could scarcely be ques- 
 tioned. 
 
 ********* 
 
 It was just before the opening of the morning session 
 of school, Thursday of the third week of school, one 
 September, that the principal of the high school stepped 
 into my office and said: ''Mr. Stableton, will you talk 
 with the foot-ball boys? They are all stirred up this 
 morning. ' ' 
 
 I replied, ' * Yes. What 's the trouble ? ' ' 
 
 He then told me that Jack S had entered school 
 
 that morning and that as Jack had been the finest foot- 
 ball player in the school the year before, the boys were 
 wild to have him on the team ; that the boys had asked 
 him if Jack would be permitted to play, and that he had 
 replied that the State High School Athletic Association 
 Rules said that no one could play who entered school 
 
20 YOUR PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 later than the beginning of the third week of the semester. 
 
 The boys, boy-like, had jumped at the conclusion that 
 the principal was, as they put it, " making too fine a 
 ruling" and so were in an excited mood. 
 
 As soon as I understood the situation, I asked the 
 principal to send the captain to me. In a moment he 
 came. He was a splendid, big fellow, and manly through 
 and through, but impulsive, and only a boy. 
 
 "What's the trouble, Henry?" asked I. 
 
 "Oh, Jack S has entered school this morning 
 
 and we fellows want him on our team. He's the best 
 football man in the school, and WE NEED HIM. The prin- 
 cipal says he don't think Jack can play under the State 
 H. S. A. A. rules, and we think that is shading a little 
 too fine." 
 
 I took a sheet of paper, drew five spaces, and marked 
 them Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday. 
 I held up the paper and asked: "Where is the middle 
 of the week, Henry?" 
 
 Henry smiled and replied: "Wednesday noon, of 
 course. ' ' 
 
 Then I asked: "Did you ever hear of the beginning 
 of the week's coming after the middle of the week?" 
 
 He smiled again, and said: "Nobody ever heard of 
 the beginning coming after the middle." 
 
 Placing my hand on his shoulder, I asked : "Do you 
 wish me as your superintendent to sign my name to a 
 certificate stating that Jack entered school the beginning 
 of the third week, in order that he may play on your 
 team? Would you respect me as your superintendent 
 if I should do this ? " I waited a moment, then Henry, 
 looking me full in the face, said: "Don't you do it. I'll 
 not ask you to sign it. Don't do it. 
 
 j ) 
 
SOME SAMPLE CASES 21 
 
 "Will you take this stand with the boys?" I asked. 
 
 1 ' Yes, I will, ' ' replied Henry. I patted him on the 
 shoulder and he passed out of my office. I knew I could 
 trust him. 
 
 Next I called for Jack S . He was a boy who 
 
 was greatly liked by all, both students and faculty. He 
 came into my office, happy-faced, shaking his head, and 
 saying, "Please don't ask me any questions, Mr. Stable- 
 ton, I want to play.'' 1 
 
 I took my sheet of paper with the spaces for days 
 and put the same questions to Jack that I had to Henry. 
 At first he said: "Please don't ask me," but when I 
 placed my hand on his shoulder in a kindly way and 
 waited a moment he said: "Mr. Stableton, I'll not ask 
 you to sign such a paper, you must not do it." 
 
 I said, "Jack, will you say the same thing to the 
 boys?" 
 
 He replied: "Yes, sir. I will." 
 
 I patted him on the back and he went out smiling. 
 
 I then asked the principal to get word to all the 
 football boys and other athletic boys to meet me at once 
 in a certain classroom. The room was soon filled. I 
 stepped to the blackboard, marked off five spaces and 
 named them as I had done on the sheet of paper. Again 
 I asked where the middle of the week would be found. 
 
 "Wednesday noon," came the answer. I then put 
 the same questions to the crowd that I had to each of 
 the two boys, adding : ' ' Your captain says he would not 
 ask me to sign a certificate that Jack entered the begin- 
 ning of the third week, and Jack says he would not ask 
 me to sign it. Now what do you boys wish me to do?" 
 Immediately a loud chorus of voices said, "We don't 
 want you to sign it. Don't do it." Only one boy asked, 
 ' ' But, Mr. Stableton, couldn 't you get around it ? Busi- 
 
22 YOUR PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 ness men get around things." The other boys said: 
 "No, no y we don't want you to get around it." 
 
 I thanked them and passed them on to their school 
 work. All happy, no discontent anywhere. 
 
 Jack did not play; but the one game of all games of 
 the season that the team and school wished most to win, 
 they won. They were happy, but they were not more 
 happy than I. 
 
CHAPTER II 
 
 SOME COMMENTS, A FEW CHARACTERISTICS 
 OF YOUTH WITH CONCRETE CASES 
 
 While some teachers who have little or no knowledge 
 of the physical and the mental characteristics that 
 should mark pupils of the grammar grades, and scholars 
 of the Junior and the Senior high schools, make excel- 
 lent teachers in these schools, still it is only the few and 
 not the many who are blessed with an intuition that 
 enables them to do this. Yet even these might do far 
 superior work if they understood the physical and the 
 mental life movements of these boys and girls as revealed 
 by special students of this subject. 
 
 My acquaintance with high school teachers and gram- 
 mar grade teachers leads me to believe that the rank and 
 file of them are not to any great extent conversant with 
 the literature that has been given us by special students 
 of this subject during the past comparatively few years. 
 
 I have been led to inquire why teachers whose work 
 should be in perfect harmony with these recorded facts, 
 have so little interest in knowing them. Again and 
 again I have asked these teachers why they did not 
 familiarize themselves with the literature treating of 
 the physical and the mental characteristics of youth. 
 Almost every one of them has said: "I don't enjoy that 
 kind of reading, and so do not read it. ' ' One high school 
 teacher, one of the ablest young high school teachers I 
 have ever known, when asked, replied: "Mr. Stableton, 
 I'll tell you why I don't read that kind of literature; 
 it makes me feel creepy, and I think most other young 
 men teachers are affected just as I am, and so don't 
 read it." 
 
 23 
 
24 YOUR PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 I suspect this young man gave me the correct an- 
 swer; and I can see why in many cases it would be so. 
 Many, very many, of our high school teachers and gram- 
 mar grade teachers are not beyond the later period of 
 youth themselves, and so are much given to introspec- 
 tion, and as a result, when in their reading they come 
 upon some of the distressingly abnormal cases, they 
 study themselves and imagine they see the beginnings 
 of these abnormalities within themselves, and so are 
 frightened, or "feel creepy." This results from the 
 fact that all abnormalities, both physical and mental, we 
 are told, are but normal conditions carried to extremes. 
 The very state of the youth's mind makes it impossible 
 for him to consider the abnormal without more or less 
 introspection that may, for the reason given, be so un- 
 pleasant as not to be helpful, if not, indeed, harmful. I 
 hope, however, I may be able so to present some of the 
 leading facts relating to this subject that they will be 
 attractive to teachers of these grades. It is also true, 
 as someone has said, that these characteristics of youth 
 have so much to do with the element of sex concerning 
 which there has been so little healthful teaching, that 
 many teachers hesitate to read for fear of happening on 
 something that might offend what is called good taste. 
 
 But many things concerning sex that teachers of 
 youth should know not the things the teachers should 
 teach the boys and girls concerning sex, but the things 
 teachers should know that they may be in the right atti- 
 tude toward youth these things it should be possible 
 to state in language offensive to none, but helpful to 
 many. 
 
 I have nothing to say in this book of what should be 
 taught boys and girls of their own development. That 
 is a problem for others. 
 
CHARACTERISTICS OF YOUTH 25 
 
 While for many years I have been a student of the 
 physical and the mental life movements of boys and 
 girls from twelve years to twenty, still I lay no claim 
 to originality in the discovery of the facts I am about 
 to state, though I have seen them verified over and 
 over, again and again, in the great number of boys and 
 girls whom I have carefully observed and studied. These 
 facts are what specialists have discovered and recorded. 
 Today they are common knowledge of all who read care- 
 fully along this line. While I lay no claim to the orig- 
 inal discovery of any of these facts, neither do I lay 
 claim to originality in the statement of them. In many 
 instances I have quoted extensively the words of other 
 writers, and have so indicated. In other cases, I have 
 kept so closely to the wording of other writers that these 
 parts too might almost be included in quotation marks. 
 
 These facts are the facts that have given me a basis 
 for my dealings with boys and girls of these grades of 
 school ; that have helped me to interpret youth. I give 
 them to the readers of this book that they may have in 
 mind the facts that I ever had in mind while working 
 with young people of these grades in school. 
 
 As I have already said in the preface, the book is, to 
 a very great extent, concrete. The boys of whom there 
 are many, the girls, and the teachers who appear on its 
 pages are not fictitious people; but each one is true to 
 life. The concrete cases of my dealings with them are 
 given in answer to the questions so often asked: ''What 
 would you do with this boy or that boy ; with this girl 
 or that girl ; with this teacher or that teacher ; with this 
 situation or that situation?" An open confession of 
 what I have tried to do and the manner of doing it re- 
 vealing the spirit in which I have tried to do it, is my 
 answer. 
 
26 YOUR PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 In the upper grammar grades and the high schools, 
 most of the scholars come between eleven years of age 
 and twenty. In the lower grammar grades, the fifth and 
 sixth grades, we find the greater number under twelve 
 years ; while in the senior high school, w r e now and then 
 meet with a few older than twenty. 
 
 Pubescence is the term applied to the physical 
 changes looking to reproduction, that ordinarily occur 
 in boys from the thirteenth year to the sixteenth, and in 
 girls a year or two earlier. Adolescence is the term some- 
 times considered as including all the changes, both 
 physical and mental, that take place in youth from the 
 state of puberty, or pubescence, to fully developed man- 
 hood or womanhood. However, a slightly different use 
 of the term adolescence considers it as applied to all 
 changes both physical and mental beginning about the 
 twelfth year with the approach of pubescence and ex- 
 tending into the twenties, to fully developed manhood 
 or womanhood. This latter use of the term makes pu- 
 bescence but an early phase of adolescence. In this 
 sense, the terms will be used whenever they occur on 
 these pages. 
 
 Sometimes these changes that usually take place be- 
 tween the thirteenth year and the sixteenth in boys and 
 earlier in girls are delayed even into the twenties. Again 
 we find them occurring earlier than the twelfth year, 
 even with pupils in our own schools. But the delayed 
 development and the precocious, are the exceptions, not 
 the rule. 
 
 Those who have made careful investigations tell us 
 that among primitive peoples and in warmer climes, 
 these changes come at a much earlier age than among 
 civilized peoples in temperate climes. A friend of mine 
 who was for a number of years a physician in the Philip- 
 
CHARACTERISTICS OF YOUTH 27 
 
 pines, said that the youngest mother he saw while there 
 was but twelve years of age, and that she was the 
 mother of two children, not twins. 
 
 Says one writer : "As the boy or girl enters the stage 
 of pubescence, the parts of the body looking to repro- 
 duction are rapidly developed. The bones make rapid 
 growth; the muscular system is rounded out; a full- 
 ness comes to the chest ; the vocal chords are elongated ; 
 the chin lengthens; the nose gives up its flabby char- 
 acter and takes on stronger outlines ; and the eye flashes 
 with a brilliancy never before known. New brain cen- 
 ters are becoming active, and the heart is pumping the 
 blood through the body with an energy that causes every 
 part of the body to throb with renewed life. ' ' One writer 
 calls this the second birth. 
 
 It is easy thus to state these changes and in a few 
 words to sum them up ; but the processes of nature in 
 working them out are far from uniform. Sometimes 
 like Jonah's gourd, a night-time is sufficient for the 
 marvelous change, while in other cases years are neces- 
 sary for its accomplishment. Sometimes the life of 
 childhood seems to glide with perfect ease into the life 
 of youth, and youth into early manhood or womanhood ; 
 while again these changes are accomplished with appar- 
 ently great effort. 
 
 Says one: "At this time pug noses and soft flabby 
 noses of all kinds are shaped to their final form by the 
 cartilage and bones that push up and give them outline. 
 The jaw shapes weak or strong. The peculiar racial 
 characteristics of mould of face are apt to become promi- 
 nent. " 
 
 Robert T. was a beautiful boy, ordinarily bright, his 
 face of somewhat regular mould, no parts unduly promi- 
 nent, until about his fourteenth year, when the carti- 
 
28 YOUE PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 lages and bones of his face began to make rapid growth. 
 At the end of eighteen months the boy that had been 
 was scarcely recognizable in the youth that was. Just 
 as the volcanic forces of the earth will sometimes sud- 
 denly push up a great volcanic mount, changing the 
 appearance of the whole country round about, so within 
 the space of a few months the growing forces of his 
 body pushed up, a great Roman nose so out of propor- 
 tion to other parts of his face as to disfigure it forever 
 after. No ordinary person would have dreamed that his 
 slightly arched nose of childhood was the beginning of 
 the great disfigurement he was doomed to carry through 
 life. 
 
 But while such cases as Robert's may be somewhat 
 rare, it often happens that the beautiful face of a child 
 is only very commonplace after the changes of this period 
 of life have taken place ; and it is just as often that the 
 commonplace face of childhood is transformed into one 
 of great beauty. Character, weak or strong, now stands 
 out prominent in many a newly-moulded face. 
 
 At this time, too, we see the tall, awkward, gawky 
 boy. "The boy whose body and limbs have lengthened 
 out of all proportion, until he is tall, slim, very often 
 slightly stooped, and awkward in every movement. Phys- 
 ically, he looks ready to fall in a heap, and physically 
 that is about his condition; for with all this growth of 
 bones there is as yet no growth of muscles to hold this 
 long, bony framework erect. The muscles that held the 
 shorter body erect and alert are not equal to the task, 
 and must themselves take on renewed growth and vigor 
 to meet the new demands. " 
 
 "Sometimes the bony framework at this time makes 
 only a moderate growth in length, and so gives us the 
 man or woman of ordinary height ; or as again happens, 
 
CHARACTERISTICS OF YOUTH 29 
 
 there is little or no growth in height, but a broadening 
 out, a massive growth of bones; or in other cases, only 
 a comparatively slight lengthening and strengthening of 
 the bony structure fitting it for its work in the life of 
 the coming man or woman ; but whatever the changes 
 may be, this is primarily a period of bone growth. " 
 
 During childhood the bones and the muscles have 
 grown with a fair balance of adjustment, thus giving the 
 free, graceful, swift-moving play of childhood, the ease 
 and certainty of which add beauty to all child-life. But 
 with the oncoming of pubescence all this balance of ad- 
 justment between bones and muscles ordinarily disap- 
 pears, and the awkwardness and the uncertainty of 
 youth take its place. This is especially true where there 
 is a great growth in the length of the bones with for a 
 time, no corresponding growth of muscles. 
 
 Once in a while there is a great growth of muscles 
 before the bones take on growth. This results in an un- 
 balanced condition that gives the same uncertainty and 
 awkwardness. 
 
 Even after the bones and muscles have made their 
 growth, time is required for them to become accustomed 
 to working together before awkwardness and uncertainty 
 entirely disappear. 
 
 The following is one of the most pronounced cases of 
 uncertainty and awkwardness I have ever observed: 
 Theodore as a boy had a small body, quick and certain 
 of movement and full of nervous energy. He grew to 
 more than six feet in height, and he made this growth 
 in so short a time that the adjustments of muscles and 
 bones were greatly unbalanced. The latter part of his 
 first year in high school he began to change rapidly, 
 and when he reentered school the following September, 
 he was so completely changed that some of the younger 
 
30 YOUE PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 teachers began to ask : ' ' What is the matter with Theo- 
 dore, he hardly knows which way he's moving, and he 
 looks awful." But all his teachers said that he was 
 keeping his class work to the front, except that his 
 written papers were mere scrawls and scratches that 
 taxed their skill to interpret. His forehead had become 
 massive, bulging out over his eyes, his hands and feet 
 looked so very large and appeared too heavy for use. 
 As the boys put it: "Theodore, what's the matter with 
 your feet handles, can't they move your feet? Better 
 get you some new ones. ' ' It did not occur to them that 
 that was just what he was doing, and that for him, it 
 was a serious business. 
 
 At the opening of the second semester of this year, 
 his second in high school, he came into my office to ask 
 advice in selecting his elective work for the semester. 
 He was uncouth looking, and so awkward that he could 
 hardly sit down on a chair, and when he did, it was to 
 sit down, lean forward, and double up almost like a 
 closing blade of a pocket-knife. But when he laid his 
 plans before me, there was no uncertainty as to what 
 he wished to do. He had selected the course he intended 
 to take in the university. That for the time being, at 
 least, was settled; but of the elective work in the high 
 school he wished to know which I thought would give 
 the best foundation for his intended course in the uni- 
 versity. He wished to get the best preparation the high 
 school could give him for his university work. He was 
 uncertainty itself and painfully awkward in every 
 movement of his body, but his thinking was clear-cut 
 and unusual for a boy at his stage in physical develop- 
 ment. Later on he came into his own physically, and 
 was a fine-appearing young man when two years later he 
 graduated from the high school. He entered the uni- 
 
CHARACTERISTICS OF YOUTH 31 
 
 versity following the course he had selected his second 
 year in the high school, and after dropping out at his 
 country's call to fight in France, where he was made an 
 officer, reentered the university and graduated. 
 
 But awkwardness does not always mark the boy who 
 grows tall and slim at this time. Nature is so capricious 
 that none may forecast with absolute certainty what 
 may happen to the youth at this stage of his develop- 
 ment. In general, we may forecast, but nature is sure 
 to give the exception. However, the exception only 
 makes more evident what is generally true. 
 
 Harry G. was under my supervision from the time 
 of his entering the first primary to his graduation from 
 the high school. He was always as erect as grace and 
 beauty of movement would demand. When he came to 
 the period of rapid growth at the beginning of youth 
 he stretched up to more than six feet in height, slight 
 and graceful, with never a stoop of the shoulders, nor 
 an awkward movement of any part of his body. He 
 towered head and shoulders above most of his class- 
 mates, but seemed unconscious of the fact that he stood 
 physically above them. He had always been a good 
 student, he was still a good student. If wild visions 
 passed before his mind, there was nothing in his con- 
 duct that gave evidence of them. If the opposite sex 
 had any unusual attraction for him, no one knew it. He 
 was always courteous and polite toward the girls, but 
 never seemed to have favorites. 
 
 The year before he graduated, teachers would often 
 say : ' ' What a handsome young man Harry is, what a 
 gentleman and scholar. Why can't there be more like 
 him?" No one ever answered the question, for no one 
 knew. To all appearances he had been spared the pangs 
 of bashfulness and awkwardness that torment many. 
 
32 YOUR PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 Exacting or trying to exact good written form of 
 scholars while they are in a wholly unsettled state of 
 levers and muscles is just about as sensible as trying to 
 draw red blood out of a turnip. The teacher who at- 
 tempts this becomes a nagger, and often ruins a 
 scholar's year in school or drives him out of school 
 altogether. So often boys who were fine penmen in the 
 fifth and the sixth grades show a letting down for a 
 time in some higher grade, a letting down in the written 
 form, due not to any lack of trying on their part, not to 
 any unwillingness on their part, but to a lack of ad- 
 justment between their bones and their muscles! for 
 which they are not at all responsible. 
 
 Take the case of Theodore A., a most painfully awk- 
 ward boy at this period of his life. Had his teachers 
 been exacting and nagging in trying to secure from him 
 a better form in his written work than he was able to 
 give, they could have easily driven him from school; 
 but with good sense on their part, they recognized his 
 condition, appreciated his fine work even though his 
 written form was almost unintelligibly scrawly; and 
 looked forward to the time when his written form would 
 again show muscular control. 
 
 A teacher lacking in good judgment and the power 
 of discrimination, or what is more probable, lacking the 
 information concerning the characteristics of youth 
 that would enable her to form a good judgment, to dis- 
 criminate, will often select some unusual boy like Harry 
 G-. whose case I have given you, a boy with no visible 
 unsettling, either physical or mental, from childhood to 
 early manhood, as her ideal of what all boys should be 
 at this time in life, and as a result, utterly fail as a 
 teacher. 
 
CHARACTERISTICS OF YOUTH 33 
 
 It is a fact that at this period of life, while many 
 boys cannot do the fine little things in form work, and 
 sometimes in other things they will omit many of the 
 minor points in a subject, points that a mere memory 
 reciter would give with great exactness, still they seize 
 upon the really important things and present them in a 
 way that shows a wonderful mastery of the subject. 
 Boys of this type can be held to little things until they 
 almost lose their power to do big things. They seem to 
 have the power to take in ''great chunks " of informa- 
 tion in the rough and get out all that is in them. If 
 given too finely broken up information with unnecessary 
 explanation, intellectual dyspepsia results. 
 
 Don't destroy all their ruggedness of thinking and 
 speech. 
 
 In singing, and in oral reading and oral recitation 
 work, at this time, the teacher needs to exercise great 
 care. The boy who was a beautiful singer before his 
 vocal chords began to lengthen, now for a time has but 
 little or no control of his voice. He cannot sing ; he does 
 not know why; and often the teacher does not know 
 why, so when the boy fiatly refuses because he knows he 
 cannot hold his voice from squeaking, the teacher at- 
 tributes it to stubbornness on the boy's part, and then 
 the trouble begins. But when the teacher is on the 
 lookout for changing voices, she easily controls the sit- 
 uation. She does not hesitate to say to this boy or that 
 boy: "Your voice is changing. You need not try to 
 sing for a while. Your voice will be all right later. ' ' 
 
 But, says one teacher: "It always makes trouble 
 in my school if I excuse one boy from singing, so many 
 others want to be excused." 
 
 All I can say in reply is that this teacher lacks the 
 proper control of her school. It is tier shortage, not the 
 
34 YOUR PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 boys ' faulty that she cannot so conduct the work in her 
 school as to be able to deal justly in all these cases. A 
 really able teacher soon creates a school atmosphere in 
 her room that enables her to do right by any scholar and 
 not a shadow of criticism come from the school. 
 
 Oral reading in the advanced grammar grades and 
 in the first two years of the high school often fails in 
 comparison with that done by these same scholars when 
 in the sixth grade and the first half of the seventh, be- 
 cause of the lack of voice control due to lengthening and 
 thickening vocal chords. Oral recitations are sometimes 
 mere stumbling attempts for the same reason, and also 
 from the fact that the scholar is often so self-conscious, 
 so bashful, as he stands up in the presence of the class 
 that he loses all power to think. 
 
 I have again and again heard some young high school 
 teacher say: "I have some boys in my classes in Eng- 
 lish who can scarcely read so as to be understood when 
 they stand up before the class. I wonder what their 
 teachers in the elementary schools were doing that they 
 never taught them to read?" 
 
 The fact is this teacher knew Jier English but had 
 no knowledge of adolescent boy life. She was directing 
 her critical questioning toward the very able teachers 
 of these boys in the grammar grades, teachers who in 
 their power to teach were so far above her that their 
 work could not be compared. 
 
 But do not misunderstand me. I would not un- 
 justly criticize this young high school teacher. She was 
 not wholly at fault. The university had prepared her 
 to be a high school teacher but had taught her nothing 
 of the boys and the girls she was expected to teach. 
 
 Out of just such material as this principals and 
 superintendents in the past have been compelled to 
 
CHARACTERISTICS OF YOUTH 35 
 
 make teachers. I remember one young man who taught 
 his first year of school in our high school. He was 
 finely equipped in the subject-matter he was to teach, 
 yet had heard nothing of the problems he was to meet 
 in the boys and girls. But he was teachable. His prin- 
 cipal and superintendent gave him every possible at- 
 tention and watched with pleasure his growth in power 
 as a teacher. 
 
 At the close of the school year just as he was start- 
 ing home for his summer vacation, he called at the sup- 
 erintendent's office to thank the superintendent and the 
 principal for their very great help to him, adding that 
 if his professors in the university had been half so care- 
 ful to teach him as his superintendent and principal had 
 been the past year, he would not have been so foolish as 
 he was when he began his teaching. "I have learned 
 more this year," said he, "than in any year I was in the 
 university. ' ' 
 
 Today colleges and universities that prepare young 
 men and women for teachers in our high schools are 
 giving courses in school management and teaching that 
 throw much light on the phases of the work that have 
 been so long neglected. I am glad this change in the 
 preparation of teachers for high schools has come. 
 
CHAPTER III 
 
 CHARACTERISTICS OF YOUTH, WITH CON- 
 CRETE CASES (Continued) 
 
 Pubescence means hairy. This is not only the period 
 for bone and muscle growth, but it is also the time when 
 the upper lip of the boy begins to darken ; or it may be 
 the hairy growth creeps down in front of his ears, or 
 straggling patches sprout out on his chin, giving a dirty, 
 unkempt look until the sharpness of the razor is called 
 upon to remove the appearance of dirt that will not 
 wash off. 
 
 But all these visible physical changes are but the 
 accompanying physical changes of a still more funda- 
 mental physical change that is preparing the body for 
 the great work of reproduction. "Any retardation, 
 whatever its cause, in the perfecting of the parts of the 
 body looking specially to the work of reproduction, 
 manifests itself somewhere in the accompanying physical 
 changes. ' ' 
 
 We school men know very little of the physical 
 causes that may result in the retardation of the body in 
 its development for reproduction. We see the effects of, 
 to us, some unknown causes and often are helpless to 
 render assistance. We are not much better than blind 
 leaders of the blind in our efforts in school in behalf of 
 some of these retarded cases. 
 
 The following is a type of cases where the teachers 
 see the result but know not the causes. I question 
 whether or not, the school did anything very helpful 
 for the boy. In the light of wider experience, I am con- 
 fident that it would have been far better for him had he 
 been out of school for a year or two when he first began 
 
 36 
 
CHARACTERISTICS OF YOUTH 37 
 
 to manifest arrested development, providing he could 
 have had interesting occupation of some kind under 
 good environment. 
 
 This boy did good school work through the eight 
 grades, and at fourteen and one-half years of age en- 
 tered the high school. He was then physically as much 
 a boy as at twelve; and for the three years following 
 his entrance into the high school, made no further de- 
 velopment physically, and seemed to lose, rather than 
 gain, mentally. The first year in high school, he 
 worked by "fits and starts," but his efforts showed less 
 and less vigor. He failed to pass in a large part of his 
 year's work. The next fall his parents asked me what I 
 thought they ought to do with the boy, keep him in 
 school or let him remain out. They finally decided to 
 keep him in school, for it was a question of the school 
 or the street. They said he was in good health, although 
 he had ceased to grow, and that they felt that as long as 
 he was well, he was better off in school, even though he 
 failed to do a full year 's work. They could not account 
 for his condition, nor could their family physician. He 
 was kept in school the entire year and made but little 
 progress in his school work. 
 
 A few weeks before the close of the year, one of the 
 teachers said to me that she thought he ought to be put 
 out of school, that she had no use for a boy who could 
 do good work and would not do it. I asked her if he 
 was disorderly or disturbed her. She replied that he 
 was not disorderly and did not disturb her, but that she 
 was tired of working with a boy who ought to do good 
 work and did not. I then asked her where she would 
 have him go; she did not know just so he was out of her 
 way. I then asked her if she had thought of his age 
 and physical condition ; she had not ; if she had thought 
 
38 YOUE PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 of these things in connection with other members of his 
 home; she had not. I then called her attention to the 
 fact that he was a boy in his seventeenth year with the 
 body of a boy of twelve; that his sister, two years 
 younger, was even more diminutive and undeveloped 
 physically, but was, intellectually, one of the strongest 
 in the school; that his two older sisters had developed 
 young, physically and mentally, and were strong, both 
 in mind and in body ; and that one of them at that time 
 weighed more than two hundred pounds. She had not 
 thought of these things. To me they were an interesting 
 study. 
 
 I could not call the boy a boy of poor mentality, but 
 he was a boy long after the ordinary time for his passing 
 to youth and early manhood. Why, I do not know; 
 neither do I know why his sister, two years younger, 
 should cease to grow physically and yet take on un- 
 usual mental power. 
 
 This boy continued in high school the third year, 
 doing but little better in his work. The third year closed 
 his school life. He was, at this time, not so strong 
 physically as he had been, so went to live on a western 
 cattle ranch, hoping the outdoor life would benefit him. 
 After a year on the ranch, I met him again. He was so 
 changed that I did not recognize him 'till his father 
 said, "Mr. Stableton, this is our boy." He was a vig- 
 orous, independent young man. The year had brought 
 him greater changes than the previous three years. 
 
 As I said at the beginning of this sketch, I think the 
 boy would have been better off had he been given out- 
 door life for a year or two, under good environments, at 
 the time when he first ceased to grow and to do school 
 work ; but in these cases no one knows what is best and, 
 as with this boy, parents are often not able to provide 
 
CHARACTERISTICS OF YOUTH 39 
 
 anything that gives an environment that they are will- 
 ing to trust as they do the school, so hold the boy, or it 
 may be the girl, in school. They do this, feeling that 
 there is, to some extent, good in the carefully guarded 
 environment of the school. 
 
 It is no doubt true that the school is a safer place for 
 the boy than the street, but the school, to some extent, 
 suffers from his being there. The teacher of whom I 
 have spoken in relation to this boy was not a careless in- 
 different teacher, but the very opposite. She was en- 
 thusiastic and earnest, and she felt that he only in- 
 creased the inertia of the class she would move. She 
 was right in this, for he did add to her load. No one of 
 this type can be in a class without adding to the burden 
 of the conscientious teacher. At the Yale commence- 
 ment, June, 1909, President Hadley discussed Honor 
 Courses. In his address, he said that the honor students 
 suffer from the presence of the pass students, or in other, 
 plainer words, I may express what he meant by saying 
 that the honor students, those inspired by a desire for 
 the highest scholarship, are prevented from accomplish- 
 ing all that they might, by the requirements that are 
 necessary on account of the presence of the pass 
 students, those who are not working for scholarship, but 
 only attempting to make the minimum requirements for 
 a pass; that thus far the university had not been able 
 to so organize its student body as to free the honor men 
 from the hindrance offered by the presence of the pass 
 men. 
 
 So in grammar grades and in our secondary, or 
 public high schools, the teachers often find their work 
 heavier from the presence of those for whom the public 
 makes no other provision, and whom the school author- 
 ities have neither legal nor moral right to exclude from 
 
40 YOUR PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 the school. The boy of whom I have just been speaking, 
 represents only one class of those whose right to be in 
 the high school teachers sometimes question because of 
 the seemingly little they accomplish. But, on the other 
 hand, who knows what high school student receives the 
 greatest good from the high school? 
 
 I must say one word more about this teacher and 
 the boy before leaving them. You have sometimes seen 
 little boys playing when one would accidentally hurt 
 another, and then, with tears in his eyes, the injured 
 boy would say, ' ' It don 't hurt very bad ; he didn 't mean 
 to do it." The fact that his friend "didn't mean to do 
 it" takes away all bitterness and calls up the courageous 
 spirit. Had this teacher fully appreciated that the boy 
 was not responsible for his lack of power in the prep- 
 aration of his lessons, she would have had a different 
 feeling toward the boy and, as a result, would have been 
 much happier. The nervous energy spent in worrying 
 over what could not be helped, would have been saved 
 for pushing forward the work of the class, and the boy, 
 as well as the other members of the class, would have 
 been better taught. 
 
 A short time ago I called the attention of one of our 
 leading physicians to a girl in one of our third grades. 
 She was not an imbecije, but while only twelve years of 
 age, with the intellect of a child, she had the body of a 
 girl of fifteen or sixteen years of age, and weighed about 
 one hundred sixty pounds. 
 
 After seeing the girl, he said : ' ' There is something 
 wrong with her thyroid gland. There is too great 
 physical growth. Doubtless with proper treatment, she 
 could be greatly helped." 
 
 We are told that help could be given many of these 
 arrested and abnormal cases by proper medical treat- 
 
CHARACTERISTICS OF YOUTH 41 
 
 ment, but that all the causes that bring arrested de- 
 velopment or other abnormalities are not fully under- 
 stood, even by the best posted of the medical fraternity ; 
 that the functions of certain glands in the economy of 
 the body are known only to a limited extent ; that at the 
 present time much study is being given to the work of 
 these glands that may throw a flood of light on many 
 of the problems of physical and mental development. 
 As the medical fraternity's field of knowledge is ex- 
 tended, greater help will come to the teachers, for the 
 work of the teacher is very largely dependent upon the 
 condition of the physical body of the child or youth. 
 The teacher must look to the skilled physician for in- 
 formation concerning the youth's physical condition. 
 
 I have no doubt that many of the hindrances that 
 the teacher meets in his work are deep-seated in the 
 physical body. 
 
 I have spoken of a more fundamental physical change 
 at this time, a change on which all other changes seem 
 to be attendant. "This is the great change that takes 
 place in certain centers of the nervous system and in 
 certain glands at this period of life. Brain centers that 
 until now have had a very little part to play in life, for 
 a time become very active. The sex element in the 
 scholar's life up to now has been largely a sealed book 
 to him. I say largely, speaking cautiously, for long be- 
 fore this the dawn of the awakening of the sex instinct 
 has come to many. But now Nature is opening wide the 
 book within the walls of his own being." The scholar 
 does not always understand the reading. But I'm not 
 speaking of what of themselves should be taught schol- 
 ars. That is another subject. 
 
 The wonderfully constructed nervous system is 
 uniquely responsive to the sex instinct, and at this period 
 
42 YOUR PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 the development of the nervous system seems peculiarly 
 affected by this instinct. ' ' The perfecting of the nervous 
 system in its relation to the organs of reproduction is the 
 greatest accomplishment of the physical body at this 
 period of life." 
 
 As the nervous system is also the seat of the emotions, 
 and of thought, we can see how closely the thought and 
 the emotions of youth would center around the sex idea. 
 One noted writer says that for a time at this period of 
 life, two-thirds of the thinking is centered on the sub- 
 ject of sex. 
 
 The mental life of scholars of this age, including 
 both the intellectual and the emotional life, is a story of 
 marvelous interest. "We stand in admiration in the 
 presence of the young man who has just come into full 
 possession of a physically perfect manhood, whose 
 physical strength and beauty words fail to describe ; the 
 charm of whose being holds us spellbound; yet, the 
 changes a few years have wrought in his physical body 
 at this period are not greater than his mental and 
 spiritual transformation of the same years ; and the re- 
 sulting mental and spiritual strength and beauty often 
 tower transcendent ally over the physical, or as some- 
 times happens, all mental and spiritual strength and 
 beauty seem to be lost or buried under a flood of gross 
 and sensual thoughts. ' ' 
 
 Quoting again: "It is a time when the very 
 fountains of the emotions seem to be let loose and the 
 newly-awakened passions often sweep like a whirlwind 
 over the boy, almost breaking him from his moorings of 
 mental sanity. Reason in many cases has not yet 
 asserted her sway; she is often tardy in coming to the 
 
CHARACTERISTICS OP YOUTH 43 
 
 "Today and tomorrow no longer occupy all his 
 thoughts. Life begins to open up with a new meaning. 
 He feels and sees himself as a part of society, destined 
 to take his place in the great active, thronging field of 
 life. Cause and effect begin to link themselves together 
 and everything appears to him with a question as to 
 their relation to everything else." 
 
 Still again: "This opening up to him of great 
 vistas, this looking for the first time into the future, his 
 future with no experience in the past that enables him 
 to see how to meet it, produces in many a boy feelings 
 of uncertainty and self -mistrust ; while at the same time 
 his rapidly lengthening limbs and swelling muscles are 
 not perfectly under control, his hands and arms are in 
 his way, and the muscles of his legs are unable to handle 
 his feet with ease. Do you wonder that a feeling of un- 
 certainty is seen in all that he does? He is ill at ease 
 with himself and so self-conscious that he is ill at ease 
 with others. He hesitates to meet strangers and when 
 compelled to meet them is painfully bashful. Some- 
 times this is just reversed, the boy instead of being self- 
 conscious and bashful, is anxious to show off, to be 
 smart even to an offensive degree. Whichever it may be, 
 the type is but the result of the physical and the ac- 
 companying mental changes incident to adolescence. 
 
 Ben M. completed his eighth grade and entered the 
 high school when thirteen years of age. He was a 
 boy of good mental parts, not brilliant, but had the gift 
 of persistent work so that he always ranked high in his 
 studies. He was merely a boy in his friendships and in 
 his play up to the beginning of his second year in the 
 high school when a change came over him and he sought 
 older boys for his friends: he became self-conscious 
 and giggly, so giggly that he was annoying to one of his 
 
44 YOUE PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 teachers whose nerves were quite on edge. He had 
 never been a boy to interrupt or disturb school in any 
 way, nor did he now wish to be annoying, but his 
 nervously disturbed condition caused him to blush and 
 giggle wherever he might be. One day his teacher in 
 English said to me that Ben's written English was ex- 
 cellent, but that his monthly report was low in English 
 because he had failed to recite orally before the class 
 and that he never more than began his oral themes. 
 
 Shortly after talking with his teacher, I was passing 
 by the manual training shop where Ben happened to be 
 working. I asked permission of the shop teacher to speak 
 with Ben. Ben stepped into the corridor to see me. I 
 greeted him pleasantly so as to put him at ease. We 
 were close friends. Then I asked about his English 
 saying: "What is the trouble with your oral English, 
 Ben? You have always stood high in English." He 
 blushed and hesitatingly said: "I'm too bashful, I 
 can't stand up before the class and talk." And then 
 he giggled. 
 
 I replied : "All right, Ben, do your best, you'll soon 
 get over your bashf ulness, " and left him to his work 
 in the shop. 
 
 In the same class with him was a boy of the smart 
 type, anxious to show off. He did brilliant work in his 
 English, especially his oral English. It gave him an op- 
 portunity to "shine" and he thoroughly enjoyed it. 
 
 But I remember one occasion, not in English, when 
 his smartness brought confusion. On this occasion at 
 the noon intermission he called at the principal's office 
 and asked the principal to excuse him that afternoon at 
 2 :30 as he had to have some work done on a tooth and 
 the dentist had set the time at 2 :30 p. m. saying he could 
 not give him a later hour. Such things sometimes hap- 
 
CHARACTERISTICS OF YOUTH 45 
 
 pened, but it was the principal's habit always to call up 
 the dentist to see if a later hour could not be arranged. 
 So when this boy made his request, the principal very 
 naturally asked : ' ' Who is your dentist ? ' ' The boy re- 
 plied: "Dr. Me ." 
 
 "What?" said the principal. "Dr. Me has 
 
 been in France with the army for the past six months. 
 Don't you ever again ask me to excuse you. Pass to 
 your work. ' ' He passed. 
 
 ********* 
 
 Daniel was under my supervision from his entering 
 the first primary to the close of his Junior year in the 
 high school. There was never a time in his school life 
 when he did not rank at the very front in scholarship ; 
 and in conduct always made the heart of a teacher glad. 
 
 At the middle of the seventh grade he became ex- 
 ceedingly nervous. He was then in his thirteenth year. 
 He was so nervous that any attempt at oral work caused 
 him to break down in a flood of tears. As soon as the 
 situation was understood by the teacher, he was excused 
 from all oral work. Written work either on paper or 
 before the school on the blackboard he did with no em- 
 barrassment. 
 
 Before the seventh grade year closed, on the advice 
 of the family physician, he was taken out of school that 
 he might live outdoors. This seemed to do him great 
 good so that at the opening of school the following Sep- 
 tember he was able to take his place in school and, 
 having made up what he had missed of the seventh 
 grade work, was passed into the eighth grade. 
 
 For a time all went well, then the nervousness began 
 to annoy him again. He was excused again from all 
 oral work. This prolonged his stay in school but finally 
 
46 YOUR PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 his physician said that he must have outdoor freedom. 
 He remained out of school all the latter part of the 
 eighth grade year but at the close of the year, he was 
 well up with all the eighth grade work and so was pro- 
 moted to the high school. These two years he had grown 
 in height quite rapidly but otherwise showed little evi- 
 dence of the changes of puberty. The first two years in 
 the high school were but a continuation of his condition 
 in the seventh and the eighth grades. His scholarship 
 was fine, but at times he was so nervous that he was ex- 
 cused from all oral work, and was given the privilege of 
 being out of school whenever his physician so advised. 
 
 At the opening of his third year in high school, the 
 changes of pubescence were pretty fully accomplished. 
 His body was tall and erect, his muscles finely rounded 
 out; his voice had taken on a heavier quality, he was 
 deeply interested in all the social activities of his class ; 
 and welcomed appointments on committees that he might 
 help direct affairs. His timidity was now largely a thing 
 of the past. He could recite orally with the best and 
 was regular in school to the close of the year. He was 
 now quite strong physically as well as mentally and of 
 unusually fine appearance. 
 
 All the way through these five years his parents 
 were in close touch with the school. They were at times 
 very deeply concerned for fear all might not be well in 
 the end, but his physician said that while the changes 
 came slowly and with an extremely nervous condition, 
 still with patience and care, he would arrive at early 
 manhood in a good state both physically and mentally. 
 In his case, five years were taken for the accomplishment 
 of changes that often require but a few months. 
 
 "The activity of the organs which connect the in- 
 dividual with the race is accompanied by powers and 
 
CHARACTERISTICS OP YOUTH 47 
 
 instincts which affect his mental life in all its various 
 aspects and mark the beginning of a new life, intellec- 
 tually, emotionally, and morally. At puberty the dif- 
 ferences between the individuals as well as the differ- 
 ences between the two sexes become marked and char- 
 acteristic. Plays and pastimes of childhood lose their 
 attractiveness. With the child, life is all play and fairy- 
 tales, and learning the external properties of things; 
 with youth it is bodily exercises, exercises of a more 
 systematic sort, novels of the real world, boon fellow- 
 ship and song, friendship and love, nature and travel 
 and adventure, science and philosophy." 
 
 ' * There is at puberty a great increase in vitality and 
 energy. This is manifest in the increased power to re- 
 sist disease, by great mental activity and the like. The 
 great evolution of energy and the corresponding influx 
 of emotional vitality may objectify itself in many dif- 
 ferent ways. With some it may result in merely 
 greater physical activity; with others, it gives an im- 
 pulse to intellectual work; with still others it leads to 
 social and altruistic activity: A love affair, poetry, re- 
 ligion, political fanaticism, bizarre actions, general per- 
 versity and insanity, are all possible outlets. The whole 
 subject is most complicated. It involves the most pro- 
 found questions of life and heredity. What the phe- 
 nomena in any particular case may be depends largely 
 upon one's health, education, inherited tendencies, tem- 
 perament and the like." 
 
 At the close of pubescence, or shortly before, the 
 philosophy of all things makes tremendous appeal to 
 youth. The mind is occupied with the why and where- 
 fore of all things as never before. Great mental power 
 seems to be let loose and to occupy itself with the very 
 fundamentals of life. 
 
48 YOUR PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 One writer who has made extensive investigations 
 tells us that a good part of the world's work along phil- 
 osophical lines has been done by men scarcely beyond 
 the later adolescent years. 
 
 The unsettled state of the world since the beginning 
 of the Great World War has greatly stimulated the 
 study of the economic and the social problems of the 
 world by high school scholars of certain groups among 
 the more mature scholars. Books, magazines and news- 
 papers are watched from day to day and everything 
 bearing on the economic and the social questions of the 
 day is read with avidity. 
 
 Most of the thinking of these scholars of high school 
 age aroused by this extensive reading on these subjects, 
 seems to have a wholesome trend ; but in a few instances 
 the streams of thought seem to be polluted by the read- 
 ing of books of a radical character, books and articles 
 against all existing forms of government. Only by 
 being near the thought of these scholars can one realize 
 how now and then some bright, erratic scholar for a 
 time, at least, is carried away by reading the writings 
 of radicals. 
 
 Generally where scholars seem to be sympathizing 
 with the anarchistic doctrines of these radical writers, 
 it is only the outcropping in these boys of the adolescent 
 desire to be conspicuous, to attract attention by advo- 
 cating the things that astound their associates and 
 friends. 
 
 As the adolescent craving for notoriety fades out the 
 scholar of this type usually comes back to sane feeling 
 and thinking on all the disturbing problems of the day, 
 and to unbounded loyalty to his own government and 
 country. 
 
CHARACTERISTICS OF YOUTH 49 
 
 Warren N. was a beautiful boy in the grammar 
 grades, with an expressive face that would attract at- 
 tention in any school. All his teachers spoke in high 
 praise of him, although in the eighth grade, I can see 
 the teacher smile as she said it, " Warren is a dear boy, 
 so bright and so attractive, but just now he likes to 
 show off to attract attention. ' ' 
 
 In the high school the first two years he did fairly 
 good work, but never stood in the highest rank. One 
 teacher to whom he looked for guidance and real friend- 
 ship more than to any other, became very greatly in- 
 terested in him. One day in talking with me of him she 
 said that he could make a high record in his work if he 
 would, but that he had said he did not care to make high 
 grades ; that all he cared for was to have good grades in 
 school and plenty of time for outside reading. This 
 was his aim at that time, a fair record in his school 
 studies and plenty of time for reading. Another day 
 this same teacher said to me that she did not think 
 Warren was reading the kind of literature he should 
 read. "Why," said she, "he is reading and filling his 
 mind full of the worst of radical and anarchistic doc- 
 trines and persists in trying to thrust them on one when 
 one engages him in conversation. You know how bright, 
 happy-spirited and interesting he has always been, but 
 now he is losing all that and is sour, and critical of 
 everything in this country that we hold good." 
 
 One evening a short time after this conversation, 
 Warren called at my home to talk over some school 
 affair in which he was to have a part. He needed assist- 
 ance in some way. I gave it. 
 
 He visited with me for quite a little while ; told me 
 what he had been reading and what he thought of it. 
 He had read so carefully that he could almost repeat 
 
50 YOUR PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 the words of the writers ; I could see, too, that when he 
 spoke of the theories he was reading, he was committing 
 himself to the better things set forth by the writer. 
 
 I studied him carefully while he talked, believing 
 that it was only another case of an adolescent seeking 
 the unusual, the unpopular, for the sake of attracting 
 attention; that his state of mind would not be lasting. 
 
 I entered into no discussion with him, but seemingly 
 paid no attention to what he was saying of his reading, 
 and his thinking. I did not wish to cause him to feel 
 that I was at all concerned about what he was reading. 
 
 When the United States entered the World War and 
 our body of high school scholars was aflame with patriot- 
 ism, Warren came near bringing the ill-will of the 
 whole school on himself by making some remarks that 
 were considered unpatriotic. The principal of the high 
 school very frankly told him that his words and con- 
 versation must be above criticism from the patriotic 
 standpoint or the consequences would be bad for him. 
 Nothing more was heard from him. 
 
 A year later he offered his services to his county to 
 fight in France. The last I heard from him everything 
 indicated that he had given up his wild, anarchistic 
 views. 
 
 But there is always danger at the time the scholar's 
 thinking is dominated by these anarchistic thoughts and 
 feelings, that some unfortunate happening or influence 
 may so fasten their hold on him as to place him forever 
 after with the anarchistically inclined. 
 
 As many specialists tell us and my own observations 
 confirm it, there is a great increase in emotional and in- 
 tellectual power at the close of puberty, a power that 
 continues to grow for a number of years or until full 
 
CHARACTERISTICS or YOUTH 51 
 
 maturity. Still even here, Nature holds true to her 
 liking for variety by giving us youth who experience no 
 intellectual awakening at this period of life nor ever 
 after. Many boys and girls strong in the memory work 
 and the elementary thinking of the elementary schools 
 or lower grades, fail to develop power to do the more 
 scientific work or thinking called for in the high school. 
 
 Here are two families of children who were under 
 my supervision in the elementary school and in the high 
 school. Both families were of the best class of people in 
 the community. 
 
 The children from one home, as they came up through 
 the elementary grades, one by one, were of the class that 
 the ordinary teacher calls perfect in their work. In all 
 the mechanics of the elementary grades, perfect, and in 
 the comparatively simple thinking of these grades, ex- 
 cellent; but when these same scholars entered the high 
 school, they began to show a lack of intellectual grip on 
 the subjects. Not that they failed to apply themselves, 
 for there was no shortage of effort, sustained effort, 
 even to the close of the senior year in the high school. 
 Each year in the high school their work was weaker and 
 weaker, their senior year being their poorest, not much 
 above passing. They were fine young people, but with 
 no intellectual grasp of high school subjects. 
 
 The children from the other family were just as 
 industrious school-workers, but at the start, they seemed 
 actually dull. As they moved along through the lower 
 grades they were the slowest of plodders, painfully 
 heavy, and slow of comprehension. But at the close of 
 each year, they had gathered something. The teachers 
 always debated whether or not to promote them but 
 finally said: "Possibly they know enough to do the 
 next grade as well as they have done this, and they 
 
52 YOUR PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 might be discouraged and do nothing if we hold them, 
 so we will pass them 'by grace,' " whatever that may 
 mean. But after entering the high school, we were all 
 surprised at them. Even their classmates in an amazed 
 way gave them attention. They were so evidently grow- 
 ing in intellectual power that no one could fail to see it. 
 Year by year they showed increased power ; their senior 
 year was the best of all. 
 
 When they graduated, they had the high school 
 foundation and the intellectual power to do good uni- 
 versity work. 
 
 The youth from the one family failed to respond to 
 the awakening intellectual impulse of puberty, while 
 the youth from the other home seemed to receive en- 
 dowment of intellectual power. 
 
 "Up to the change of puberty, all life is objective, 
 now it becomes largely subjective and when this is ex- 
 treme, melancholia sometimes darkens the mind. The 
 boy is often given to musing, wishes to be alone, holds 
 himself aloof from friends except those of his own 
 choosing, and usually of his own age. It is the period 
 of life when inherited tendencies crop out and the un- 
 expected often comes to the surface, the time when many 
 wild schemes pass and re-pass before the mind, and if 
 not fixed, then leave it to return no more." Says one 
 writer: "The greatest danger is that the sexual ele- 
 ment of body and soul will be developed disproportion- 
 ately. Indeed early physical maturity is in this re- 
 spect in itself bad. If it occurs before other compensat- 
 ing and controlling powers are unfolded, it is then more 
 likely to be uninstructed and to suck up all that is vile 
 in the environment." 
 
 ' * The advent of puberty when normally reached, has 
 generally something of the mysterious and unknown for 
 
CHARACTERISTICS or YOUTH 53 
 
 the individual; and the newly-awakened sensations put 
 to test the balance and self-control of the healthiest and 
 best-instructed natures; but sexual maturity when 
 hastened by reading bad literature, a perverted imagi- 
 nation, bad companionship, or by whatever causes, may 
 have disastrous results which can hardly be estimated." 
 Specialists tell us that it is the first really dangerous 
 period in the life of both sexes as regards insanity, 
 though not so dangerous as a few years later. 
 
CHAPTER IV 
 
 RELIGIOUS AWAKENING 
 
 Says one writer: "In Christian nations, youth is 
 the age when the greatest number of conversions occur ; 
 it is the time in life when in the Roman Catholic and the 
 Lutheran Churches, the children are confirmed; and 
 there is a psychological reason for these things. The 
 mind newly awakened to a broader and deeper life 
 reaches out after that which it hopes will satisfy this 
 craving, restless sense, or state of being. It is brought 
 face to face with the problem of life and death at a time 
 when it looks at it as never before." 
 
 "At no other time in life is there the same possi- 
 bility of pressing home religious truths. The very un- 
 settled state of the youth's mental and physical natures 
 makes him meditate on the deep problems of life, God 
 and eternity. It is the period when questionings come, 
 come unbidden, and active Christian work is recom- 
 mended as the surest help to tide over this uncertain 
 period. But the questioning, even to the very founda- 
 tions of his belief still goes on, and is, if rightly directed, 
 but one means of growth, of widening and strengthen- 
 ing his faith. Up to this time, his has been the faith of 
 a child in the words of home friends whom he trusted ; 
 now it is a faith based in a firm conviction that the evi- 
 dences of the Divine are sufficient to justify it. Some- 
 times the questioning leads to a loss of all faith, to a 
 doubter, a skeptic. " 
 
 One writer says that the flood of emotional life often 
 finds its outlet in singing with fervor religious songs and 
 in putting life and interest into the religious work or- 
 dinarily given over to young peoples ' societies in Protest- 
 
 54 
 
RELIGIOUS AWAKENING 55 
 
 ant churches. How true this statement is all of us 
 know. Nor do the churches overestimate the religious 
 character-shaping value of this work. Those who have 
 most carefully studied the religious training of youth 
 tell us that active Christian work at this time of life is 
 the surest way of tiding over this period of religious 
 questioning ; and that the religious impressions made at 
 this time of life are more likely to be lasting than those 
 made at any other time. Not only in young peoples' so- 
 cieties do many of the Protestant churches provide for 
 the religious training at this, the young peoples' period 
 of deepest religious awakening and thought, but in 
 almost all the services of the churches provision is made 
 to give them a part that habits of right religious think- 
 ing and of religious work may be formed. All of us who 
 teach know how when the revival services are in progress 
 in our communities, the various churches call on their 
 young people to help with the singing, to be on hand to 
 help the interest with their presence. Take the young 
 people out of these meetings, the singing, the life, the 
 religious feeling in the community, all suffer. It is the 
 doing right religious thinking and work at this period 
 of youth that fixes religious habits that in the end mean 
 religious character. 
 
 I have an elderly friend, some eighty years of age, 
 cultured and keen of intellect, a man who by honorable 
 means has amassed wealth, a man full of good qualities, 
 but not a happy man. His years are growing few and 
 he knows it. Not long ago, he said to me that nothing 
 religious appealed to him ; that while he tried to attend 
 some church service regularly and for years had made 
 it a part of his life to attend each church in the com- 
 munity, a part of the time, still nothing in any of the 
 services appealed to him and that he had no faith in any 
 
56 YOUR PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 religion. And after standing thoughtful for a few 
 minutes, with his eyes cast down, he looked up, and full 
 of feeling said: "Somewhere in my early life, I was 
 turned wrong in my religious thinking, and I have 
 never been able to get turned about. " I wonder if away 
 back when life was young and the questions came at the 
 unfolding of youth, if someone, or some influence, did 
 not give a wrong trend to his thinking that has made him 
 unhappy to the end ? 
 
 In the Catholic church, great care is given to the re- 
 ligious education and training of the youth. As one 
 writer whom I have quoted says, it is the time in the 
 Catholic churches when the children are confirmed. 
 This church recognizes the vital importance of proper 
 care of the religious interests of her young people at 
 this character-forming time of life, and makes much 
 of it. 
 
 The following bit of personal experience, given me by 
 a former boy among my school friends who is now a man, 
 is in perfect keeping with the statements just made : As 
 a boy, he grew up in a Christian home, with Christian 
 parents, and at the age of thirteen, united with the 
 church of his parents. He was happy and contented in 
 his Christian life until about his sixteenth year when 
 one night at a revival service, the preacher spoke at 
 length of infidels and skeptics, those who do not believe 
 the Word of God, who call the Bible a book of cunningly- 
 devised fables. All at once, the boy was deeply dis- 
 turbed by questions as to the possibility of the infidels' 
 being right. It frightened him; he had taken his par- 
 ents ' word for it that the Bible is God 's Word ; could it 
 be that they were mistaken; could it be that they had 
 been deceived ? How could he know for a certainty that 
 the Bible is God's Word to man? Who could tell him, 
 
RELIGIOUS AWAKENING 57 
 
 how could he discover the truth? These questions came 
 to him with great force he was distressed, and yet he 
 felt afraid to say anything to anyone or to ask questions. 
 He attended church regularly, and listened eagerly to 
 all the preacher said; but there was all the time the 
 question, "Is what he says true?" presenting itself to 
 him and giving him no peace of mind. He read every 
 religious book he could get hold of to see if it presented 
 convincing arguments; but for the greater part of a 
 year, he was religiously in a disturbed state of mind. 
 Finally, one evening at a religious meeting, an elderly 
 man, in whose knowledge and wisdom the boy had 
 great confidence, in speaking said that he had that day 
 been talking with a young woman who was passing 
 through a season of questioning and doubt, and who was, 
 as a result, in a very unhappy frame of mind; that he 
 had told her, in trying to help her, that almost all young 
 people who become strong in their religious convictions, 
 pass through somewhat similar experiences; that it is a 
 process of growth in religious life ; and that the earnest 
 inquiry for a wider knowledge of the evidences that the 
 Bible is God's revealed Word, would bring a broader 
 faith and would lead to a stronger Christian character ; 
 that he, in his life-time, had known many young people 
 to pass through the same period of doubting and ques- 
 tioning ; and that he thought all who became established 
 in a religious faith, other than the simple faith of child- 
 hood, based wholly on the words of loving friends, had 
 had, to some extent, a period of honest questioning and 
 doubt. The boy had oi'ten heard of infidels and skeptics, 
 but never until his sixteenth year did his hearing that 
 men did not believe the Bible suggest to him to doubt 
 the Bible. After he heard this old man's talk, the boy's 
 load dropped from off him. If others had so questioned 
 
58 YOUR PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 the grounds of their religious belief and had become 
 stronger thereby; if to others, probably to most all 
 others, this questioning had come as a means of growth 
 to cause them to study and know why they believed, so 
 it would be to him. He would hold on to his faith and 
 learn more and more of the grounds for it. He read ex- 
 tensively of religious writings for a boy of his age, and 
 learned many of the reasons for belief in the Bible as 
 God's Word. He is today strong in his Christian faith 
 and religious thought, and looks back to his awakening 
 at sixteen as the time when he first formed a taste for 
 this line of investigation. The old gentleman who so 
 wisely gave trend to the boy's thinking was not a psy- 
 chologist, but he had been a close observer and student 
 of the growth of religious faith in young people. His 
 statements are in perfect accord with; the words of 
 special students of this subject today. 
 
 One other illustration: A number of years ago we 
 had in our high school where I was then superintendent, 
 a handsome lad of sixteen years, an excellent student, 
 and so honest and upright in everything that he held 
 the perfect confidence of all of his teachers. One day, 
 very much to the surprise of his teacher in Biology, he 
 asked if it would be possible for him to drop the subject 
 of Zoology, saying that he thought it would be necessary 
 for him to give up the study. The teacher asked him 
 not to think of giving it up as he was doing good work 
 and making a fine standing in the subject ; but referred 
 him to the high school principal for a decision. Before 
 the principal had been called upon to consider the ad- 
 visability of the boy's dropping Zoology, I happened to 
 meet the father of the boy on the street, a very in- 
 telligent man and a most devoted and interested father. 
 He explained, as the boy could not, why the boy wished 
 
RELIGIOUS AWAKENING 59 
 
 to drop his Zoology. The father said that the boy was 
 passing through a very trying religious experience and 
 was deeply disturbed; that in his school work, he had 
 come to the theory of evolution for the first time, and 
 that he was greatly worried as he was unable to reconcile 
 it with his way of interpreting the Bible; and he (the 
 boy) was sure if he continued to study Zoology as pre- 
 sented by the book from the evolution point of view, 
 he would lose "his religion"; that the boy had reached 
 the point where it disturbed him to the extent that he 
 could not sleep ; that his parents were greatly concerned 
 for the boy's welfare. 
 
 In order that I might first see how serious a matter 
 it was to the boy, the father gave me a little history of 
 the boy's religious life for the several months just pre- 
 ceding our interview a history known only to the boy, 
 his mother in whom he confided, and the father. The 
 boy was a member of the church of his parents in which 
 he had been reared; but a few months before he had 
 become concerned about the doctrines presented by his 
 church and had become convinced, as he thought, that 
 there might be some other church, whose doctrines 
 would better meet his views. He had read up the church 
 doctrines of every church in the community, and from 
 time to time thought that this church or that church was 
 the one where he would be most in accord. His parents 
 had not interfered but had kept close in their sympathy 
 with him. They were very anxious that he pass through 
 this phase of religious experience without a wrong bias 
 from any source. 
 
 The parents had no fault to find with the teacher in 
 the high school or his teachings, but felt that it was un- 
 wise for the boy, in his state of mind, to continue a sub- 
 ject that was causing him so much unrest. 
 
60 YOUR PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 As soon as the father had explained the boy's con- 
 dition, I gladly granted the boy the privilege of drop- 
 ping out of the class. I granted him the privilege of 
 dropping Zoology and taking up another subject in its 
 place, believing it unwise, in fact, poor pedagogy, to at- 
 tempt to force the subject on the boy in his religiously 
 unsettled state of mind, knowing full well that a little 
 later, when he had come to a more settled feeling in 
 regard to his religious life, to a more mature judgment 
 concerning things religious, he would, in all probability, 
 be able to study the subject from the evolutionist 's point 
 of view and see in it only God's plan of creation. As 
 the father said, the boy could not give his teacher a 
 reason for not continuing the study, for he did not wish 
 his teacher to know how he was feeling. I immediately 
 spoke to the principal and as soon as he heard, he under- 
 stood, and permitted the boy to take another subject in 
 place of Zoology. 
 
 The boy finally became settled in his religious con- 
 victions and is today one of the finest of men, a strong 
 Christian character. 
 
 I wish to add one word to what I have said of the 
 boy that no one may think the teacher at fault. The 
 teacher was a fine teacher and a devout Christian and 
 presented evolution as a possible plan of creation; as 
 God's way of bringing these things into existence. 
 
CHAPTER V 
 
 MILD TYPES, DEMONSTRATIVE TYPES, 
 DISCUSSED 
 
 As I said in the case of Harry G given in 
 
 Chapter II, we have the milder types as well as the more 
 demonstrative ones, the types that seem to glide un- 
 consciously from childhood into youth and from youth 
 into early manhood or womanhood. In them, emotional 
 life swells like a gently-rising stream that keeps well 
 within its banks as it rises and rises until it is channel- 
 wide, and channel-deep, carrying its vast volumei of 
 water, with safety to its bordering country, on to its 
 destination. 
 
 In the extremely impulsive, demonstrative boys and 
 girls, the new emotional life often comes in successive 
 flood- waves of impulses that know no bounds. Just as 
 in the rising water of some streams, one torrential flood- 
 wave after another rolls down, flooding the banks, break- 
 ing across fields, and if not carefully guarded, causing 
 ruin and destruction everywhere. 
 
 But shall we call the quiet boy more normal in his 
 development than the boy of a more impulsive, dem- 
 onstrative type ? * * The boy who is easily swayed by his 
 emotions or by every passing wave of influence?" He 
 has one wild scheme today and a dozen new ones to- 
 morrow. He is for a time unstable in all he does. With 
 many boys of this type, their friends are greatly con- 
 cerned ; and well they may be, for sometimes wrong in- 
 fluences brought to bear on a boy at this time turn the 
 current of his life to an evil end; while right ideals 
 strongly implanted are a mighty force in the accomplish- 
 ment of a noble life. 
 
 61 
 
62 YOUR PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 A mother of two of our schoolboys, a year 's difference 
 in their ages, once said to me that she feared greatly for 
 her impulsive, emotional, easily-influenced boy, while 
 for her steady boy, moving with the regularity of clock- 
 work, she had no fears. Personally, for this emotional, 
 impulsive boy, I had but little concern, for while for 
 two years he had been passing through the most critical 
 period of his life, all the time, he had kept before him- 
 self certain high ideals to which we could appeal, ideals 
 that held him with a grip. While from time to time he 
 had been swayed a little by some passing craze, his 
 ideals soon lined him up again. 
 
 Most of us, especially teachers, are inclined to con- 
 sider the milder, more quiet types the more normal ; but 
 I doubt it. Sometimes the great flood of emotional life 
 finds its outlet in doing wild, strikingly daring things 
 to attract attention, and the boys often for a time are 
 unreliable in every relation; but where there has been 
 good early training and good boyhood habits have been 
 established, if no strong, shaping influence moves them 
 too far from the right, as the later, not the latest, years 
 of adolescence come, for this happens usually during 
 high school life, the lines of good conduct of the earlier 
 years begin again to take the lead, the objectionable 
 characteristics fade out, and a good life follows. 
 
 Once in a while it happens that some quiet boy, a 
 boy of the milder type, is seized by a sudden impulse to 
 do something striking that he may be the recipient of a 
 little hero-worship; that he may stand in the "lime 
 light." 
 
 One day a number of years ago the high school prin- 
 cipal and I were accidentally given word that some boy 
 or boys would enter the high school that night to do 
 
TYPES DISCUSSED 63 
 
 some ' ' lime light work. ' ' We accordingly placed a night 
 watchman in the building. 
 
 A word about the building will help to understand 
 what follows. After entering the front door at the 
 high school there were twelve or fourteen steps up to the 
 first floor. On reaching the top of the stairs, the rail- 
 ing turns directly to the left, extending twelve feet, to 
 the principal's office door. 
 
 The night watchman seated himself on a chair at the 
 head of the stairs just at the turn to the left toward the 
 principal's office door. The night was extremely dark, 
 without, and Egyptian darkness reigned within. As he 
 looked at the glass in the door, it being more densely 
 dark within than without, he could see anyone coming in 
 at the door while no one coming in looking toward the 
 dead darkness of the building could see him. 
 
 It was about ten o'clock p. m., everything deathly 
 still, when two boys came to the front door, unlocked it, 
 and opened it. One boy stood outside the door, the other 
 very stealthily crept up the stairs and turning toward 
 the principal's door, feeling his way, placed his hands 
 on the shoulders of the night watchman. With never a 
 word on his part, silently, suddenly, the night watch- 
 man rose to his feet. The boy jumped straight up into 
 the air, and as his feet came down to the floor, he gave 
 forth a succession of unearthly, frightened yells, and 
 with one leap, cleared the stairs, bolted out the front 
 door, down the street, yelling at the top of his voice. At 
 the first yell from the boy inside, the boy outside gave a 
 piercing yell of horror, and started down\ street at 
 breakneck speed. 
 
 The night watchman said that when the boy jumped 
 into the air and came down giving forth such unearthly 
 
64 YOUR PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 yells, he himself was so startled that he could feel his 
 hair stand straight out from his head. 
 
 The boy, in his leap down the stairs, lost his hat, 
 which was picked up the next morning. By means of the 
 hat we identified the boy, a boy who had always been 
 of the milder type. The principal and I decided that 
 his punishment had been sufficient, almost more than 
 he was able to stand. We kept his hat at the office for 
 many weeks, but he never called for it. And we kept 
 his secret, too, not even mentioning it. 
 
 James Henry S - stood head and shoulders in 
 scholarship above all others of his class in the seventh 
 and the eighth grades, and during these two years in 
 his deportment, he was without fault. His teachers and 
 his classmates had for him the highest respect, and his 
 principal would often remark that James Henry would 
 be a star scholar in the high school and a leader in 
 everything that stood for what was best in the school. 
 
 He entered the high school at thirteen and one-half 
 years of age, and while healthy and strong, physically, 
 still the changes of puberty were only beginning to 
 manifest themselves, and he was taking on a timidity or 
 self-consciousness that made him wholly unlike the boy 
 he had been in the eighth grade. A leader in every 
 school affair in the eighth grade, in the high school he 
 was too self-conscious to wish to be noticed. However, 
 the first two years, he held his scholarship record high, 
 but the third year his scholarship fell very low, in some 
 studies he even failed to pass. Teachers and home 
 friends alike were greatly concerned, fearing he might 
 lose out entirely, so they left nothing undone that could 
 possibly be done to keep him from failing. With them, 
 it was a question of helping him to hold on to his school 
 work until he should come to himself again when they 
 
TYPES DISCUSSED 65 
 
 felt he would be as deeply interested as he had ever 
 been. 
 
 One day, when his home folks were talking with him, 
 they asked him why he would not at least try to make a 
 good standing in his studies. 
 
 He replied: "I don't intend to make any more 
 high grades, and I'll tell you why. I made almost per- 
 fect grades and was such a model in deportment for so 
 long a time that everybody thinks I 'm a sissy. I 'm none 
 of your sissy boys, and you '11 know it, too. ' ' 
 
 His senior year was just as unsatisfactory as his 
 junior year had been, and it was only by a small margin 
 that he passed for graduation. 
 
 After graduating from high school, he entered col- 
 lege, and here came to himself again, and was counted 
 a brilliant student in all his college work, a man of fine 
 mind. 
 
 Possibly I should add that in conduct during his 
 high school junior and senior years, he never failed to 
 be an agreeable gentleman, just as agreeable when 
 leaving his work undone, as though he were doing his 
 teacher a great favor. 
 
CHAPTER VI 
 
 ROSEATE DREAMS, DREAMS DAUBED WITH 
 BLUE THE DREAMERS 
 
 "We are told that many of these characteristics of 
 youth, intellectual and emotional, are of fleeting char- 
 acter if not fixed by some unfortunate influence; that 
 this is the time in life when inherited tendencies crop 
 out and for a time seem to control the whole life; that 
 many of these tendencies too are of fleeting character 
 if not fixed by strong influences at this time. 
 
 This is the time when the boy dreams dreams and has 
 visions. Visions of leadership, of great success in the 
 business-world, of wonderful things he can so easily 
 accomplish; visions that make him exuberantly happy, 
 or as sometimes happens, visions of possible failure that 
 depress to a state of despondency where he needs the 
 touch of an assuring friend. 
 
 This is the time when dreams of unbounded business 
 success cause many a boy to drop out of school. I'm 
 not sure which is the worse for the boy, the vision of a 
 business life painted in too roseate hues, or the one that 
 is more or less daubed over with splotches of blue. 
 
 David R was from a home of culture and re- 
 finement, but not of wealth. He was a bright and un- 
 usually attractive boy, and a fair student. At the 
 close of his second year in the high school, he made 
 known his plans to leave high school and take a place as 
 an office boy with one of our leading business firms. "We 
 teachers were all surprised. "We had never thought of 
 his not completing a high school course. 
 
 He came into my office to tell me of his plans, and 
 when he talked with me, I saw that he had been dream- 
 
 66 
 
DREAMS AND THE DREAMERS 67 
 
 ing dreams and having visions and that his visions 
 were all lighted up with roseate hues. One of his 
 friends in the firm had told him that the last two years 
 of the high school meant nothing to him, that the thing 
 for him to do was to get into business. 
 
 I put forth the arguments that stand clear-cut in 
 favor of a well-rounded, general education for business 
 men; but he had seen a vision and it beckoned him on. 
 I finally said: " David, some day your advancement in 
 life may be blocked by your lack of the two years of 
 high school education you are casting aside." David 
 entered business life. 
 
 After he had been out of school four years, we had 
 another business talk. Almost the first thing he said 
 was: "Mr. Stableton, your fears were well founded. 
 An offer of a position has come to me that I would like 
 very much to accept, but I cannot. The one who accepts 
 this position must hold a high school certificate of grad- 
 uation. I made a great mistake. 
 
 ***. 
 
 George M made an ordinary record in his 
 
 elementary school work, and entered the high school at 
 about 14 years of age. During the first two years he 
 developed rapidly, both physically and mentally. In 
 shorthand, typing, and bookkeeping, he made excellent 
 progress. The first half of his third year, he began to 
 make excuses for staying out of school. Day after day 
 he was absent on some trivial excuse until finally his 
 teacher in typing had a heart-to-heart talk with him 
 about himself and his work. He was the ablest student 
 in typing and shorthand in the high school at this time. 
 
 Miss N was confident he would be able to fill one 
 
 of the best openings in the city if we could only hold 
 him to complete his high school course. But his third 
 
68 YOUR PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 year she was deeply concerned about him. After her 
 heart-to-heart tails with him, she came to me to report 
 what she had learned, and to counsel with me as to how 
 we could help him. 
 
 She said to me : ' ' Mr. Stableton, I can tell you what 
 
 ails George N , he's having the blues. My, but 
 
 he's downhearted! Why, he says no one cares for him, 
 so he doesn't care whether he goes on with his school 
 work or not ; that he doesn 't believe the future has much 
 for him anyway." "Now, Mr. Stableton," she said, 
 we've got to do something for him, we must. It won't 
 do to lose him. Can't you suggest something? You will 
 help. I know you will." 
 
 "Yes, I will "kelp," I replied, "and we'll save the 
 boy or it will not be our fault if he is lost. ' ' 
 
 It was always a pleasure to see this teacher in her 
 personal work holding students up to the best that was 
 in them. She was uncompromising and almost severe 
 in demanding the best in class work, but back of this 
 w r as a personal devotion to the best interest of each one, 
 a devotion that knew no limit to the sacrifices she would 
 make that she might be helpful. The students knew 
 this, and gave her the heartfelt respect always accorded 
 a really great teacher. 
 
 After talking the matter over, we decided to ask a 
 number of the teachers especially given to personal 
 work, to take notice of George; to make a point of ac- 
 cidentally engaging him in conversation whenever op- 
 portunity offered, or rather when they could make op- 
 portunity. I promised to do my part. 
 
 The fact was, that George had always been a little 
 retiring in his manner, always prepared in his work, 
 and so consistent in his deportment that I really think 
 all of us had unconsciously come to consider him as one 
 
DREAMS AND THE DREAMERS 69 
 
 always right and so had failed to realize that he needed 
 attention. 
 
 Our plan succeeded. A number of the teachers and 
 students helped us and we took away the very root of 
 his blues. Of course, we helped, but his own develop- 
 ment, after a time, did much to bring him to a less de- 
 pressed state of mind, to a more hopeful look-a-head. 
 
 George graduated from the high school and has 
 since made an unusual success as a young business man. 
 
 But I never think of him without thinking of that 
 talented and ever- watchful teacher who helped to keep 
 up the courage not only of George, but of other scholars, 
 when the seasons of depression came. 
 
 ********* 
 
 Herman L graduated from the eighth grade, 
 
 entered the high school, and at the close of his second 
 year in high school, dropped out of school as he said, 
 "to earn money." All was done that could be done to 
 hold him in school. His home people, his teachers, his 
 superintendent, all tried in every way possible to pre- 
 vail on him to continue in school, but he would go to 
 work. 
 
 Herman was from a home of high standing; his 
 home training was of the best. He was possessed of 
 good mental ability, and was a handsome lad, fifteen 
 years of age when he left us. 
 
 At first, he worked at odd jobs, but finally drifted 
 into the draughting-room of a prominent architect. 
 Here he became, for a time, at least, a fixture. He "fell 
 in love" with draughting work. This led him to do 
 some good thinking about himself and for himself. 
 
 One day three years after his leaving school, he asked 
 me over the 'phone if he might call at my home that 
 
70 YOUE PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 evening for a little talk with me. The favor was granted. 
 
 When he called on me that evening, he unbosomed 
 himself to me, telling me all his plans. First of all, he 
 told me how greatly he enjoyed the draughting work and 
 everything connected with the work of an architect; 
 that he had decided to be an architect, and that to be the 
 kind of an architect he hoped to be, he must graduate 
 from the course in architecture at our State University ; 
 that for a year he had been carrying on a correspondence 
 course in architecture by giving his evenings to the 
 work ; but that the time had come when he must plan to 
 make up his shortage in high school work to be able to 
 enter the University ; that my interest in him made him 
 feel he could come to me to direct him; that he must 
 make up the work and that nothing should prevent his 
 doing it. 
 
 After listening with deep interest to his recital con- 
 cerning himself I said: ''That's splendid, Herman, of 
 course I '11 help you. I know how you can do it. ' ' 
 
 Herman replied, "It's not half so splendid as it 
 would have been if I had listened to you three years ago 
 and had gone on with my high school work. ' ' 
 
 However, we lost no time in lamenting over what 
 might have been. Everything was right now and we 
 must make the most of the time by planning his work so 
 he could do it. So I asked him if he would object to re- 
 citing in high school classes with the younger scholars, 
 saying that he could come into school for the recitation 
 hour only, and return to his office work at the close, if 
 he could be away from his office long enough each day 
 to do this. But he replied that all his study and recita- 
 tion work must be done after working hours, as he was 
 on a good salary now, and must put in full time, as the 
 office was pushed with work. 
 
DREAMS AND THE DREAMERS 71 
 
 I then arranged for him to see one of our high school 
 teachers of history, and one of mathematics, to take 
 private lessons in General History with the teacher of 
 history, and Algebra with the teacher of mathematics. 
 He was to pay them the regular prices for such work. 
 A word of explanation is in place here. Ordinarily, 
 high school teachers were not supposed to give private 
 lessons except by arrangement with the high school 
 principal or superintendent. When lessons were so 
 arranged and the scholar had been a high school scholar, 
 the teacher's grade for the work was accepted on the 
 high school credit or grade record. 
 
 For two years, he carried on his work under the in- 
 struction of high school teachers whom the high school 
 principal or the superintendent selected, and did good 
 work. The third year, he gave up his office work to de- 
 vote himself wholly to his lessons. On my advice, he en- 
 tered the Illinois Wesleyan University, taking work that 
 would be accredited in his Freshman year at the Illinois 
 State University, while under a private teacher he 
 cleared up his last study for entrance at the University 
 of Illinois. He finally graduated from the course in 
 architecture at the U. of I. and is today a young man of 
 ability in his chosen line of work. 
 
 I'm not able to say whether or not he lost by drop- 
 ping out of school when he did. Possibly he fell into 
 better hands for him than we teachers proved to be at 
 that time in his life. The difficult thing for him and for 
 many who drop out of school before appreciating what 
 an education means, is how to get back into school work 
 again when the hour of appreciation comes. 
 
 *##**#### 
 
 Allison G left school at the close of the seventh 
 
 grade and was given work in one of the dry goods stores 
 
72 YOUE PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 of the city. After he had been in the employ of this 
 firm for two years, I received a letter from the head of 
 the firm stating that he had a boy working in the store 
 who should have more education, and asking me if I 
 could do anything for him. I called at the store the 
 following morning to offer any help that was in my 
 power. I asked the proprietor if it would be possible 
 for the boy to come to the high school for recitation 
 hours only, the remainder of his time to be given to 
 work in the store, his lessons to be prepared of evenings ? 
 
 He replied that he would be glad to give him the 
 recitation hours on the plan suggested, but said : ' ' You 
 understand that the boy has not had the work of the 
 eighth grade." 
 
 "Yes, I understand that," I replied, "but I'm 
 thinking the two years of excellent training he has had 
 with you, and the valuable service he has rendered you, 
 indicate mental power to do high school work and, too, 
 there will be inspiration to him in high school associa- 
 tion that would not be found for him in eighth grade 
 work." 
 
 Allison followed this plan two years, and made a 
 good record in his work. He then accepted a position in 
 Washington, D. C. After being there for a short time, 
 he took work in Washington University, finally gradu- 
 ating from that institution. Later on, he received his 
 doctor's degree from the University of Illinois, and is 
 today a professor of Biology in one of our greatest 
 municipal universities. 
 
CHAPTER VII 
 ARE THEY WORTH OUR INTEREST? 
 
 My second year of teaching was as principal of the 
 schools of Central City, Nebraska. One member of the 
 Board of Education there, Dr. 0. L. Barton, enlarged 
 my horizon of the duty of a schoolman. Many an eve- 
 ning after school hours, and of Saturdays, I rode with 
 him behind his broncho team, a grey and a black, as he 
 made his calls at the homes in the surrounding rural 
 district. As we would approach the house where we 
 were to call for him to minister to the sick, he would 
 say: "At this home there is a young man who should 
 be in our school this year or next," as the case might 
 be ; at another home, ' ' a young woman, ' ' and sometimes 
 more than one young person. Then when we entered 
 the home, he introduced me as the principal of "our" 
 school, and explained what a wonderful opportunity 
 the school, the high school, was offering to the young 
 men and women of all that rural district, as well as to 
 those of the town. He was so enthusiastic about the 
 school, and so truly interested, that these people in the 
 rural district should understand that the school meant 
 great opportunities for their boys and girls, that he 
 never failed to awaken an interest. While he healed the 
 sick, he inspired parents with a burning desire to ed- 
 ucate their boys and girls in the high school that was in 
 process of being organized and developed. 
 
 Then as we rode along, the hoof-beat of the never- 
 tiring ponies keeping time, he talked of what we could 
 do in our school for these our young people. He had no 
 selfish end in view. He was planning for the people, 
 his people, because he was wiser in educational things 
 
 73 
 
74 YOUE PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 than they; planning how he could make our school one 
 of the very best of its kind, and how we could draw all 
 the young people into its classes. 
 
 I had thought schools, high schools, were for those 
 who wished to take advantage of them, and that our 
 duty extended only to those of the town and that those 
 who lived beyond the limits of the town were of no con- 
 cern to us. Of course, if any of them happened to come 
 to our school, they would be treated as our own were 
 treated ; but never a thought had I that otherwise I owed 
 them any consideration. 
 
 But here was a man so zealous in spreading the 
 gospel of educational opportunity among all people that 
 he never lost an opportunity to speak forth the good 
 word. He made me think of ''going into the by-ways 
 and hedges and compelling them to come in," and he 
 cared not whether they had on the ' ' wedding garments, ' ' 
 just so they came. He had a wider conception of the 
 work of a school than had ever come to me. He be- 
 lieved the school should be an educational center, up- 
 lifting to the whole community, both the town and the 
 surrounding rural district, drawing into its classes all 
 possible young people that it might put into their lives 
 something better than they had known, ideals that 
 would shape them to nobler manhood and womanhood. 
 I learned my lesson. It has stayed with me through all 
 the years of my school teaching. 
 
 Some years ago, in visiting with a teacher in a class- 
 ical school in an eastern city, he said: "We have no 
 poor students in this school, all rank high in scholarship. 
 We sometimes get in some poor ones, but we drive them 
 out by piling on the work till they are glad to get out. ' ' 
 Was he a teacher? 
 
WORTH OUR INTEREST 75 
 
 Not long ago in conversation with a teacher from one 
 of the large high schools of a city in the Central West, 
 he said: "I like my work in the large city school. The 
 scholars come into my room for recitations ; if they are 
 are prepared, all right; if not, I flunk them. At the 
 hour for closing in the afternoon, I lock my door and go, 
 home, I don't have to know a single one of them nor care 
 anything about them except their lessons in the recita- 
 tion. Oh yes, I like the large city work, I would not 
 go back to a high school in a small city for anything. 
 I'm so perfectly free here." 
 
 And I thought to myself: "You are another Nich- 
 odemus 'Ye must be born again' before you are a 
 teacher. ' ' 
 
 Another young man teaching in a large high school 
 in the same great city as the last, said in answer to my 
 question, "Do you like teaching in the large city high 
 school?" replied: "Mr. Stableton, I like it for one 
 reason, and one reason only, that is, I get better pay 
 than I ever received in a smaller city; but I do not do 
 so good work as I did in the smaller city because of the 
 conditions in schools in a large city. I feel it a great loss 
 that I have so little opportunity to know the scholars 
 outside of the classroom, and none at all, I might say, 
 outside of the school. Then too, I spend so much time 
 on the street-cars going to and from school, time that 
 in the town and in the small city, I gave to the scholars 
 and so was helpful to them. I miss greatly the oppor- 
 tunity to know them and to know their home life, that 
 I had in the smaller places." 
 
 I need not say that this man had the spirit of a 
 teacher. Ever since my second year in school work, I 
 have felt it a duty, a duty rising to the height of a 
 privilege, to look up and bring into school every pos- 
 
76 YOUR PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 sible boy or girl physically and mentally fit to do some 
 kind of school work. 
 
 Dan Pruit finished the eighth grade and entered the 
 high school at fifteen years of age. He was a boy with 
 good physical development for his age, and graded with 
 the better half of his class in scholarship. By the middle 
 of his second year in the high school he had made an 
 unusual record in the manual training shop. He was a 
 most skillful workman and turned out pieces of work 
 that were a wonder to the others in the shop. Naturally 
 the manual training teacher took: great pride in him, so 
 was somewhat disturbed one morning, the second year 
 Dan was in the high school, when word came to him 
 that Dan and another boy had run away from home, and 
 had told some of the other boys that they were going to 
 New Orleans and get work there. Dan had drawn his 
 own money from the bank, so he had money for the 
 trip. There was no trouble of any kind at home. They 
 just wanted to take a trip. The two boys had been 
 dreaming dreams and having visions of the time they 
 would have in New Orleans. 
 
 But they had only been there a few days when they 
 learned that dreams of New Orleans are one thing, the 
 city itself quite a different thing. Dan had money for 
 his return trip ; but his companion had not, so he wired 
 his father for money for the home trip. 
 
 In due time, the two boys were home again, wiser 
 and more sober than when they started southward. They 
 returned to school, but were not able to make up all they 
 had missed before the close of the semester. This left 
 them each two studies short in the semester's work. 
 
 The following year, Dan did a good year's work in 
 school. Soon after the close of this year, he entered the 
 U. S. service and sailed for France. After two years in 
 
WORTH OUR INTEREST 77 
 
 the service of his country, at the close of the war, he 
 came home. Soon after coming home, he called to see 
 me. He now knew what he wished to follow as his life 
 work, and to be able to do this, must either complete his 
 high school course or take up the same work in some 
 other kind of a school. 
 
 I proposed to him that he come back to us. I gave 
 him a most cordial invitation to return to us. "We 
 talked the situation over and finally left it for him to 
 consider for a few days before deciding. After due con- 
 sideration he called at my office to tell me he would 
 come back to high school to finish his course, and that 
 he was coming back, notwithstanding he was older than 
 the other scholars, because he felt we would be pleased 
 to have him with us again. 
 
 When it came to arranging his studies, without 
 thinking of what he had lost by his trip to New Orleans, 
 I was selecting regular Junior work, but when we looked 
 up his record, I found him short two- studies, and 
 asked : ' ' How did that happen ? ' ' 
 
 He replied : ' ' Don 't you remember ? They are what 
 I lost by taking my trip to New Orleans." I remem- 
 bered, and we both laughed. 
 
 He did splendid work for two years, and graduated 
 one of the best scholars in his class. 
 
 Twice he was brought back into school through per- 
 sonal interest in him, first after his return from New 
 Orleans, and again at the close of the war. He is a 
 young man of real worth today. 
 
 ********* 
 
 One day in the opening week of school in September 
 several years ago, a mother and her boy called at my 
 office to get a labor permit for the boy. The mother 
 
78 YOUR PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 was a Polish woman and could not speak English. 
 While I was filling out the permit the mother and the 
 boy carried on a conversation quite animated, of ques- 
 tions and answers. I could not understand a word but 
 I could see that she was asking the boy to get informa- 
 tion from me, so I finally asked him what it was that 
 she wished to know. 
 
 He replied: "She wants to know how much it 
 would cost for me to come to this school." 
 
 I replied: "Cost you to come to this school? It 
 would not cost you anything but your books. Can't 
 you come? We'd like to have you." 
 
 The boy held an eighth grade diploma from some 
 parochial school so was eligible to enter high school. 
 
 He talked again with his mother and then said: 
 "She wants to know if I could learn to be a clerk if I 
 came to this school." 
 
 I explained to him that we could give him the op- 
 portunity to educate himself so he would be qualified to 
 be a clerk, providing he would do the work given in the 
 school. There was a manner about the boy that was 
 very pleasing. I asked him if it would not be possible 
 for him to come, saying I wished very much to have him 
 in our school. 
 
 Another conversation between the boy and the 
 mother, then he said: "We must talk with my father 
 before I can tell you whether or not I can come to this 
 school. I would like to come." 
 
 1 ' Why can 't your father come talk with me ? I 'd be 
 pleased to talk with him," I saiH, "and I'm sure I 
 could help him to see that you ought to come. ' ' 
 
 "My father is a coal-miner and works in the mine 
 every forenoon but could see you some afternoon," he 
 replied. 
 
WORTH OUR INTEREST 79 
 
 Two days later the father and the boy came to see 
 me. After talking with the father explaining the school 
 to him, I took him to the shorthand teacher and to the 
 teacher of typing, to meet them. Each of these teachers 
 explained the work to the father and answered his ques- 
 tions and made him feel that she would like to have his 
 boy in class. Then we called on a teacher of English. 
 She too made him feel that his boy was worth while. 
 
 After we returned to the office he said : ' * Jacob will 
 enter your school Monday. He has promised to do some 
 
 work for Mr. this week, but he will be here 
 
 Monday. " 
 
 The father spoke good English, and was a very in- 
 telligent man. 
 
 Monday morning Jacob was in his place with the in- 
 tention of remaining in school two years taking for the 
 greater part work in the commercial department. 
 
 He had been in school but a few months when two of 
 his teachers said to me that Jacob was too fine a student 
 to be permitted to drop out of school at the end of two 
 years, that we must hold him for the full four years, and 
 must begin at once to help him to see what it would 
 mean to him to have the four years in school instead of 
 two. 
 
 I knew that if any teachers in the school could in- 
 spire a boy to look forward to a full four-year course, 
 to graduation from the high school, instead of two 
 years of selected commercial work, these two teachers 
 could do it. They were teachers of commercial branches, 
 and knew the value of a four-year high school course to 
 scholars looking forward to business or commercial life ; 
 they knew, too, how to put the value of the four-year 
 course before their scholars in a way that made a strong 
 appeal ; and they saved many. 
 
80 YOUR PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 The fact that a number entered our high school each 
 year to take selected work for two years mostly from the 
 commercial courses, enabled these teachers to know as 
 other teachers could not, who were entering for two 
 years only. All the commercial teachers made it a part 
 of their business to help, as much as possible, these two- 
 year scholars to an appreciation of a better education 
 than two years could give them. 
 
 Jacob, before the first year was passed, was planning 
 his work on the basis of a four-year course. He was ex- 
 cellent everywhere. The last year he was in school he 
 acted as helper to the librarian for which he received a 
 small remuneration. A month before the close of that 
 year, he was offered a trial position in the freight office 
 of one of the railroads if he could have a certain number 
 of hours off from school each day to do the work. The 
 trial month would pay him sixty-five dollars. If he 
 made good, his salary the next month would be over 
 eighty dollars. We arranged his school work so he 
 could have time for the office work. Perhaps someone 
 will say : "I wish you would tell us how you arranged 
 his work. ' ' With this possible question in mind, I '11 tell 
 you. Jacob was one of those marked excellent in the 
 senior class. The time he must have off would take from 
 his hours for practice in typing only. He was to do an 
 even greater amount of typing in the railroad office. We 
 simply accepted the hours of business typing as an 
 equivalent for his hours in practice typing. 
 
 Jacob made good, and stepped into a regular position 
 that by the following September was paying him one 
 hundred four dollars a month. 
 
 The day after he graduated, he came to me and 
 said : "My parents want me to thank you school people 
 for what you have done for me. ' ' 
 
WORTH OUR INTEREST 81 
 
 I wish I could help all teachers who read these little 
 personal histories to appreciate the importance of the 
 personal element in school work. Mass work may arouse ; 
 personal work saves. It was the personal touch of the 
 two teachers mentioned that more than anything else 
 inspired Jacob to complete a four-year course. 
 
CHAPTER VIII 
 
 MISTRUSTFUL OF PARENTS AND HOME 
 FRIENDS 
 
 Often boys of this age become mistrustful of their 
 parents and family friends, and seek some other adult 
 person or persons as confidential friend or friends in 
 whom they place implicit faith; and to whom they re- 
 veal their hopes and their plans, as well as all their 
 failures and disappointments. These friends whom they 
 so fully trust have a wonderful opportunity to touch 
 for good, to inspire ; to fix ideals that may have much to 
 do in shaping for good or evil the lives of these boys. 
 
 Mark Jones was a boy of good intellect, and with a 
 well-developed body for a boy of fourteen, when he en- 
 tered the high school. He soon became deeply interested 
 in high school athletics, and was always present when 
 teams were practicing. His regularity at the practice 
 work attracted the attention of the coach. The coach 
 asked me about him saying he believed he would try 
 him out to see if he could make one of the teams. ' ' There 
 is just one thing that does not look very favorable, that 
 is, he has taken up with one or two of our most worth- 
 less high school boys," said the coach. "But," con- 
 tinued he, "possibly if I put him on one of the teams 
 where he will be closely associated with the team boys 
 he will make them his intimate friends and thus come 
 from under the influence of the other boys. The team 
 boys are surely a great bunch of boys this year." 
 
 Mark had been a fine boy in the elementary school, 
 but I had noticed, as the coach said, that he had fallen 
 in with a group of high school boys whose influence 
 might be harmful to him. I had also noticed that out 
 
 82 
 
MISTRUSTFUL OF PARENTS 83 
 
 of school he was often to be seen in the company of two 
 or three boys who were not in school, boys whose in- 
 fluence could be none other than harmful. 
 
 I was greatly pleased to have the coach state the sit- 
 uation as he had done, for I knew that the coach had a 
 wonderful influence over the boys in his teams and that 
 he would leave nothing undone on his part to save the 
 boy. 
 
 Mark proved out in good shape and was given a 
 prominent place on the first football team. He made a 
 great athletic record throughout the four years of his 
 high school life, and in his scholarship always stood 
 well. He unconsciously dropped out his associates that 
 were not of the right type and in the same way became 
 one in sympathy and spirit with the team boys. This 
 coach was always alert to the possibility for good and 
 had unusual power in making his teams not only win- 
 ning teams, but teams whose influence on the school life 
 was wholesome and uplifting. 
 
 But during Mark's high school life, he never made 
 his father a confident in anything. In fact, he never 
 talked with his father of his school work and school in- 
 terests ; nor of his plans or wishes for education beyond 
 the high school. The father mourned the fact that he 
 had no part in his boy's life at that time. What he 
 knew of Mark, he learned from school teachers and 
 principal, or superintendent, never from Mark. There 
 was no trouble between them, nor for a time was there 
 anything else between them. Mark would drop into my 
 office sometimes and tell me what he hoped to do after 
 completing his high school course ; but never a word of 
 this did he tell his father. He had great admiration for 
 the athletic coach and made him a confident in every- 
 thing. 
 
84 YOUR PROBLEMS AND MINK 
 
 I could give other cases where the boys, who for a 
 year or two, closed themselves up tight as closed clams, 
 to their fathers, but were free to talk with some other 
 friends, friends of their own choosing. I remember, in 
 particular, one father, a father who gave his son every 
 opportunity that could come to a boy of his age, but who 
 suffered greatly for two or three years because the boy 
 held himself completely aloof from him. The boy im- 
 proved every opportunity made possible by the father, 
 but during this time manifested no appreciation of what 
 the father was doing for him, and held his lips closed in 
 his father's presence. But a few years later, the father 
 and son were close companions, and the son was, indeed, 
 a son to his father. 
 
 How careful must be the teacher whom the boy 
 chooses for his trusted friend, that he may ever keep the 
 right ideals before the boy. 
 
 Here is another boy whose case is very different from 
 the two given. The father of this boy was largely at 
 fault, as you will plainly see. 
 
 Alexander Grey came from a home of not what you 
 would call wealth, but a home of " great plenty" ; if you 
 will pardon the use of the term. He was one of the best- 
 dressed boys in the high school, and knew how to dress 
 most Becomingly. He was a handsome lad, one whose 
 first appearance would attract attention. But while he 
 was a boy of good mental ability, he did a low grade of 
 school work. His social life of evenings so exhausted 
 his nerve force that he had but little energy left for 
 school studies. 
 
 One day the high school principal came into my 
 office to talk with me about Alex, as we called him. 
 After considering his case very carefully, I requested 
 the principal to write his father, telling him that Alex 
 
MISTRUSTFUL OF PARENTS 85 
 
 was utterly failing in his work and asking the father's 
 help in trying to bring the boy to a better grade of 
 work. This was Friday afternoon. The principal sent 
 the letter that day. 
 
 Monday morning before school, Alex came in to see 
 me, looking as if he had lost his last friend. I asked him 
 what I could do for him. 
 
 Scarcely waiting for me to finish my question, he 
 began saying: "The principal has done it now, he's 
 done it now, and he had no right to do it." 
 
 "Done what?" I asked. 
 
 He replied : "He wrote dad that I was not doing my- 
 work here at school, and when dad read the letter yes- 
 terday he got mad and said I'd got to leave home this 
 morning, get a job of work and make my own way. He's 
 canned me out, so I've got to get a job and go to work. 
 The principal had no right to write father how I was 
 doing here." 
 
 I replied : "It was at my request that the principal 
 wrote your father, and the principal did just the right 
 thing, for your father has a right to know how you are 
 doing here ; and you know as well as I do that you are 
 not doing what you should do. Don't be angry with the 
 principal, but blame me; but Alex, remember it is not 
 only my right, but my duty, to let your father know how 
 you are doing. It's my duty to you as well as to your 
 father." 
 
 Alex then said : ' ' Oh, Mr. Stableton, you don't know 
 my dad, you don't know him." 
 
 "But I know this, Alex, he is very much concerned 
 to have you do your best here, and you are not doing it." 
 
 After a few more words, I advised Alex to go to his 
 father, promise his father that he would try his best to 
 bring up his school work if he would receive him back 
 
86 YOUR PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 home, and let him return to school. But Alex said it 
 would do no good, that his "dad had canned him out" 
 so he must hunt a job. 
 
 As I could not talk longer with him at that time, I 
 told him to come back at the noon hour and report what 
 he had done. At noon, he came looking more discon- 
 solate than ever. He had tried all forenoon to find a job 
 and had found none. He was really distressed, for he 
 had been provided for in a lavish manner, and now he 
 had been sent out from home with nothing to do, no 
 place to go. I said again to him: "Go, put yourself 
 right with your father, then things will improve. ' ' 
 
 But he replied: "Mr. Stableton, you don't know 
 what kind of a man my dad is, he always says to me 
 'You're going to Hell, you are going to Hell, and I'm 
 not going with you, you're going to Hell.' My, but he 
 gets mad. ' ' 
 
 Finally, I said: "You go to your father intending 
 to do the right thing about your school work. You 
 know you have been wasting your time, doing almost 
 nothing. Get right about that and let your father see 
 that you mean what you say. You do this, then report 
 to me at four o'clock this afternoon, and no difference 
 what report you bring me, I'll go and talk with your 
 father. ' ' He finally said he would do this. 
 
 Shortly after 4 o'clock p. m. my office door opened 
 quietly and Alex with a face all beaming, stepped in. 
 I looked up and nodded come on, and as he came up to 
 my desk, he said: "I talked with dad." 
 
 I asked: "What did your father say?" 
 
 He replied: "Dad said he'd rather have me go to 
 school than do anything else ; for me to go home and be 
 ready for school in the morning." 
 
 I then asked where I would find his father. He told 
 
MISTRUSTFUL OF PARENTS 87 
 
 me I would find him at that hour, five o'clock p. m. in a 
 certain room at one of the clubs of the city, playing 
 cards. 
 
 But before I tell of my call on the father, I must 
 tell you some other things Alex said that were very in- 
 teresting. 
 
 He said: "Dad says boys should stay at home at 
 night and study like lie did when he lived on the farm ; 
 that boys have no right to go out to clubs at night and 
 to stay out late; but dad goes to a club every night 
 in the week and plays cards, and comes home late. He 
 don't seem to know that times have changed for boys as 
 well as for men, and that boys have some rights as well 
 as men. ' ' 
 
 I called at the club as Alex had directed me, and 
 found the father in the midst of a game of cards. I 
 made know my errand, that I had come to talk with him 
 about Alex. 
 
 He left the game and we passed to a room where we 
 could talk privately. When we were seated he looked 
 at me, the tears streaming down his face, and said : ' ' It 's 
 all settled now, Alex and I buried the hatchet this after- 
 noon. It's all settled and there won't be any more 
 trouble." 
 
 After we had had a good talk about Alex, I said to 
 him: "I feel sure Alex's intentions are all right, how- 
 ever you must not be surprised if Alex does not do all 
 that you hope he will do. If he should fail to do as we all 
 wish he would do, don't put him out of your home; let 
 him work, that is all right ; but he is your boy, keep him 
 in your home." 
 
 The next morning Alex's mother, she was his step- 
 mother, but was a real mother to Alex, called at my office. 
 She first asked if Alex were in school, and was happy to 
 
88 YOUR PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 know that he was. She was the boy's best friend and did 
 all that she could to help him to do right ; but she said 
 his father worshipped him and humored him almost to 
 his ruin. She said he spent money without counting 
 it in buying clothing and other things that Alex wanted, 
 never denying him anything. But that once in a while 
 when Alex would go too far or greatly disappoint him, 
 his father would get desperately mad and go to some 
 unreasonable extreme with the boy. She had been 
 greatly worried over the father's driving the boy from 
 home, and was glad that I had asked him not to do it 
 again. 
 
 Alex tried hard to do his work and made a marked 
 improvement for a time, but did not continue in school 
 to complete a high school course. 
 
 Alex knew the weaknesses of his father, and made 
 them an excuse for his own shortcomings. At that time 
 he had no wholesome respect for his father and when 
 face to face he would upbraid his father, unmercifully 
 lashing him with his tongue, never failing to hit him 
 at his most vulnerable points. I learned this by hap- 
 pening to be present once when the father and Alex 
 were having a talk. 
 
 In the first two cases given in this chapter, the boys 
 found no fault with their fathers, nor would either of 
 them permit one to speak in any but the highest terms 
 of his father without a protest. They held their fathers 
 in high esteem, yet at the same time, for a year or two, 
 chose other persons for their confidential friends. Alex 
 had a certain contempt for his father, yet all the while 
 made his father's weaknesses, that called forth his con- 
 tempt, his own excuse for failure to do his best. A few 
 years later, Alex, while still recognizing the weaknesses 
 of his father, appreciated his many good qualities, and 
 had a very different attitude toward him. 
 
CHAPTER IX 
 
 CHEATING GRAMMAR GRADE PUPILS, HIGH 
 SCHOOL SCHOLARS 
 
 I have said it before and say it again, that high school 
 scholars have a wonderfully high sense of honor, higher 
 by far than that of most of the fathers of these young 
 people. If I were to be tried before a jury I would 
 rather have a jury composed of high school scholars than 
 of any other group of people. They have a fine sense of 
 justice. 
 
 But this having a fine sense of justice does not in- 
 terfere with their having a keen sense of humor, nor 
 does it always prevent their keen sense of humor from 
 leading them to do things that, to those who know them 
 not, would seem to indicate an entire lack of honor. 
 
 To cheat in a class having a teacher who fails to 
 make every condition conducive to honesty in answering 
 test questions, does not appeal to many high school 
 scholars and grammar pupils as cheating, but rather as 
 a means of self -protection. 
 
 In one of our seventh grade rooms for a part of a 
 semester we had a teacher under whose care the pupils 
 made a regular practice of cheating. I never saw a room 
 more completely given over to this kind of work. I 
 talked with the teacher who was quite unconscious of the 
 extent to which it was being carried. The teacher could 
 give no explanation. I followed closely her plan of giv- 
 ing a test or written lesson, then I found that she took 
 no care to see that everything was conducive to honesty 
 on the part of those taking the test. Instead of de- 
 voting her undivided attention to those writing, she 
 placed the questions on the board, set the class to writing 
 
 89 
 
90 YOUR PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 while she looked over some other written work, or busied 
 herself with arranging other things. The order of those 
 writing was quiet and not at all to be criticised till one 
 noted what they were doing, then it required no effort to 
 see that the test was a farce, that it was largely copy 
 work. 
 
 Again I talked with the teacher. I said: "Why, 
 they copy right in your presence and seem to think noth- 
 ing of it. ' ' 
 
 She still could not understand why they should be 
 so dishonest. She said that after having the books put 
 into the desks, the papers, pen, and ink ready for work, 
 she tried not to watch them too closely, for fear they 
 would think she thought them dishonest ; that she thought 
 it would do them great harm, would tend to make them 
 dishonest, if they thought she were watching them. 
 
 Then that she might see the situation from the pupils' 
 point of view, I told her that the best boys and girls in 
 her room said that she did nothing to protect them when 
 they tried to be what she would call honest, but by her 
 lack of attention to what was being done permitted those 
 who did not hesitate to copy, to copy all they pleased, 
 and that then she graded their papers giving credit just 
 as if they had been honestly written. This they said 
 made it necessary for those who would be strictly honest 
 to work on the same plane as the others in order to 
 have a fair show ; that they did not feel that they were in 
 the least dishonest, but were simply acting in self-defense. 
 
 This teacher's services were soon dispensed with. 
 Many teachers have her wrong point of view. 
 
 When a little later on these same pupils passed into 
 the eighth grade under the care of another teacher, all 
 was changed. The scholars would tell you that nobody 
 cheated in Miss G 's room; that she protected the 
 
CHEATING 91 
 
 honest ones from those that would cheat by making it 
 impossible for anyone to cheat. They would say "No 
 
 one could cheat in Miss G 's room. It doesn't seem 
 
 that anyone wants to cheat in her room. ' ' 
 
 The fact was that Miss G was one of the ablest 
 
 teachers in the school, a woman of fine personality that 
 created an atmosphere in her room that lifted her pupils 
 above mean, little things. But how carefully she 
 guarded that she might not tempt any of them to do the 
 unfair thing. When she wished to give a written lesson, 
 test, if you prefer so to call it, she quietly asked the 
 pupils to clear their desks and get their paper, pen and 
 ink ready for a written lesson. And the pupils just as 
 quietly as she had given the instructions, cleared their 
 desks, put paper, pen, and ink in order for the lesson and 
 waited a moment for her to place on the board a few 
 well-selected questions to be answered. Then at a word 
 from her they began thinking the questions and writing 
 the answers. 
 
 For the hour of the test she gave her undivided at- 
 tention to the class. She knew what each one was doing. 
 She watched them carefully. Was she spying on them? 
 It would not have been well for anyone to ask one of her 
 pupils that question. It would have been taken as almost 
 an insult. Their teacher never spied on anyone; she 
 was ' ' tending to her business. ' ' 
 
 She was studying her pupils. From their manner of 
 writing a test she learned much of their habits of think- 
 ing. It is true that studying the faces of pupils writing 
 a test gives quite an insight into their thinking. She 
 asks John to take a little more time for thinking his 
 answers before writing them down, to go just a little 
 more slowly as he had hurried the last written lesson 
 too much to do his best, As she notices William's paper, 
 
92 YOUR PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 just a glance, she says "Fine, William, try to write a 
 little faster, but don't hurry." William was a very 
 scholarly boy but was of slow movement in all that he 
 did. John was a fair student, but quick and a little 
 scattering. It was his custom to hurry through a written 
 lesson omitting many things that a little time for thought 
 would have enabled him to put down. Then at the close 
 of school after the other pupils had passed out, he 
 would step up to the teacher to tell her how much he 
 knew of the answers to the questions that he forgot to 
 write down. 
 
 I agree with the pupils that some apparent cheating 
 is not cheating. 
 
 Then I've seen the high school scholar who prided 
 himself on his smartness in, as he said, "getting by" 
 with certain teachers who were so sure no one could 
 cheat in their examinations. He does not consider that 
 he is dishonest, he is only as he puts it, "pulling off a 
 great joke." 
 
 I am reminded that this sense of getting ahead of the 
 teacher is taken as a joke by students in schools higher 
 than grammar grades and high schools. Two young 
 friends of mine, former high school scholars were at- 
 tending a college of fine standing. It was nearing the 
 close of their second year. One of the young women 
 had been out of school sick for several weeks and as she 
 was an excellent student, was given the privilege of 
 making up the work she had missed. She was to take an 
 examination on a certain textbook in school management 
 one afternoon, and asked the other young woman her 
 friend, to go with her to the professor's classroom. The 
 second young woman had this same textbook to make 
 up before the close of the year. She had never looked 
 inside the book; but she not only agreed to go with her 
 
CHEATING 93 
 
 friend, but said she believed she would try to pass the 
 examination too. She took her friend's book, spent a 
 half -hour in studying the table of contents, then to- 
 gether they presented themselves for examination. The 
 one who had really studied the book made herself the 
 more prominent. As there were only two of them, the 
 professor examined them orally. The one who had never 
 read a word farther than the table of contents very 
 skilfully seconded what the other one answered, and also 
 managed to ask the professor if he really agreed fully 
 with the author in what he said on this subject and that 
 subject in certain chapters of the book. The professor, 
 who was quite susceptible to flattery, felt called upon to 
 air his views and to point out wherein he did not wholly 
 agree with the author. 
 
 At the end of a very pleasant hour, the professor 
 said he was more than satisfied with their thorough 
 mastery of the book, and passed them with grades well 
 up in the eighties. 
 
 The two young women left the examination con- 
 gratulating themselves on the exceedingly smart trick 
 they had worked on the professor. And to this day the 
 young woman who made an 86% on a book she had not 
 even read, thinks that about the smartest thing she has 
 ever done. 
 
 I leave you to judge of the honesty of this young 
 woman. 
 
 There are high school students and grammar grade 
 pupils who would not hesitate to deliberately take ad- 
 vantage of any help in recitations or in tests with the 
 object of making a grade. No one could justify this in 
 the least ; but in dealing with such offenses we must not 
 treat the offender as a criminal but help him to appre- 
 
94 YOUE PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 ciate the unfairness of it and, as it were, lift him above 
 committing such offenses. 
 
 One day one of our high school teachers of English 
 handed me two book reviews of the same book by two 
 of her scholars and asked me to read them and tell her 
 what I thought of them. I read them and then said that 
 they were so nearly the same in all points that they 
 must have been prepared as a piece of joint work, or that 
 one was a copy of the other. 
 
 She then told me she had talked with both boys ; and 
 
 that Morris R had admitted that he had copied 
 
 the other boy's paper. He had said that he was pushed 
 for time, and so copied the paper. She said further that 
 Morris did not seem to appreciate the dishonesty he had 
 been guilty of, so she thought he needed a severe punish- 
 ment as a lesson. 
 
 I listened attentively and then asked what she 
 thought should be done. To which she replied that she 
 thought he ought to be dismissed from school; that it 
 would teach him a good lesson and be a lesson to others. 
 
 "No," I said, "I can't quite agree with you. I will 
 talk with Morris and try to help him to see that he 
 should be above taking what he has not earned. I would 
 like you to assign him another book for a written re- 
 view, one as difficult as the first one. He must make 
 good the work. This, together with my talk with him, 
 will be sufficient for the present. " Then I called at- 
 tention to his record in high school. This was near the 
 end of his third year. No other complaint of any kind 
 had been made against him this year; during the years 
 before he had given us great concern on account of his 
 conduct. In fact, the year before he had been out of 
 school at least three months of the year, rather than do 
 
CHEATING 95 
 
 as his teachers had requested in class work. He had 
 become so disagreeable toward his teachers, and so de- 
 termined to have his own way, that when his case was 
 finally referred to me, I talked with him and told him 
 there were only two ways open to him ; one was to con- 
 tinue in school obedient and respectful to his teachers; 
 or the other, to drop out of school until he was willing 
 to conduct himself in the proper manner toward his 
 teachers. 
 
 He finally decided he would drop out of school 
 rather than do as the teachers wished him to do. All I 
 could do was to say : ' * I 'm sorry, Morris, that you take 
 this stand and I hope some day you will see things in a 
 better light, and will return to us ready to do your 
 part and finish your high school education/' 
 
 We parted friends, even though I could not recog- 
 nize his way of looking at things. 
 
 He secured a job of work and was busily employed 
 all summer. I often met him on the street as he went 
 to and from his work. There was always a friendly 
 word between us, and sometimes we walked along to- 
 gether and chatted. 
 
 One day just before the opening of school in Sep- 
 tember, Morris called on me at my office. He came in 
 looking happy-spirited and almost in his first words 
 asked: "Mr. Stableton, I want to come back to school, 
 will you let me? I'll do anything any teacher wishes 
 me to do." 
 
 I answered as I extended my hand to him, "Let you 
 come back? I'm mighty glad to have you come back. 
 By your words, you have already cleared away every- 
 thing that stood in your way. I've been sorry to have 
 
96 YOUR PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 you out at all, but could not help it when you took the 
 stand you did." 
 
 He replied: ''I know how you have felt. You and 
 the teachers were right all the time, but something was 
 wrong with me, I don't know what, but I'll do my best 
 this time." 
 
 Then he asked me if it would be possible for him to 
 have the privilege of taking one study more than was 
 ordinarily permitted, saying that he had already made 
 so many extra credits that if permitted to carry the ad- 
 ditional work, he could still graduate with his class, 
 and added that the heavy work would help to keep him 
 busy so he would have no time for other things. "My 
 conduct," he said, "I know, will be better if I have 
 about all I can do. ' ' He obtained his request. 
 
 Do you wonder that I was deeply interested in all 
 that he did that year? Do you wonder that I felt there 
 was a better way than the teacher suggested to help him 
 when he had blundered? 
 
 I talked with Morris. He was very frank in admit- 
 ting that he had done wrong. He said his work was 
 pressing and without much thought he had copied the 
 paper and passed it in, although he knew it was not 
 right. He did not justify his act at all, and was willing 
 to do anything in his power to make it right. 
 
 The affair was settled as I had suggested. This was 
 his only offense during the entire year. When the year 
 closed, he had done the greatest amount of school work 
 of high grade of any student that year in the high 
 school. You may judge whether or not we dealt justly 
 with him. 
 
 After all is said of cheating in the grammar grades 
 and the high schools, it comes back to the teacher. 
 There are teachers who so carefully guard against op- 
 
CHEATING 97 
 
 portunities for cheating, and whose personalities create 
 such an atmosphere of fair play and honesty that no 
 one thinks of cheating in their presence. These teachers 
 at the evening hour can with a good conscience pray: 
 "Lead us not into temptation" for they have tried not 
 to lead their scholars into temptation. Their slumber 
 should be sweet. But these other teachers who have 
 been so afraid of their pupils ' thinking they were spying 
 on them, who so ignorantly have trusted the boys and 
 the girls above what they were able to bear and so have 
 tempted them to wrong, these teachers as night closes 
 about them could not well pray the Lord's Prayer, 
 "Lead us not into temptation," but rather, each should 
 in all humility pray, "Lord be merciful to me, a 
 
CHAPTER X 
 THE TAKING OF THE PROPERTY OF OTHERS 
 
 The taking of property belonging to others often 
 presents problems to the teacher, to the principal, to 
 the superintendent, and to parents. 
 
 Omar G was in the sixth grade when he came 
 
 to us and continued in school with us to the close of his 
 second year in the high school when he dropped out to 
 go to work. He was a bright, attractive boy, polite and 
 manly, and soon won the respect and confidence of his 
 schoolmates and teachers. His mother worked hard to 
 make a home for him and herself, doing any kind of re- 
 spectable work she could find to do. 
 
 His record in scholarship was not high, though he 
 was by no means a failure and his deportment had 
 always been so correct that I was somewhat disappointed 
 when one day, during his second year in the high school, 
 the high school principal reported to me that Omar had 
 taken some property that was not his, had written his 
 name in it, and was using it as his own. We had been 
 having considerable trouble with book stealing so this 
 offense was quite serious. 
 
 The principal asked me to talk with him, saying: 
 ' ' You Ve had him so long on your mind and heart that I 
 know you can do him good. He has returned the prop- 
 erty and has confessed everything; but I feel a talk 
 from you will help him to do right in the future." 
 
 Omar came to talk with me, ashamed that he had 
 taken what did not belong to him, and that he had done 
 it knowing it was wrong. We talked it all over, just 
 what it meant to take property that was not his, and 
 that while it was not of great value, the principle of the 
 
 98 
 
STEALING 99 
 
 act was as wrong as though it had been something of 
 much greater value ; and how he had always had a name 
 free from any tarnish of wrong, and how important for 
 him that he live so honest a life that all of his friends 
 could recommend him for the best places he might be 
 able to fill; but above all that he be honest because it 
 was right. 
 
 He was greatly broken up and felt keenly the dis- 
 grace of his wrongdoing. Up to this time so far as we 
 knew he had been honest and straightforward. His be- 
 ing detected and called to account for this his first act 
 of this kind so far as anyone knew, would in all prob- 
 ability prove a lasting lesson to him. It takes repeated 
 acts of wrongdoing at this time of life to form bad 
 character, to establish the habit of wrongdoing. As one 
 writer says, ''repeated acts either good or bad, at this 
 time in life mean character-building. ' ' If by any means 
 we can keep the boy who has made one mistake by doing 
 a wrong, from repeating that wrong, we can help to 
 keep him out % of the criminal class. 
 
 Just after the close of school in June that year, one 
 of our leading merchants called me on the phone and 
 
 said: "Omar G has applied to me for a position 
 
 in our store and has referred me to you for a recom- 
 mendation. "We need a boy. Is he one for us to take? 
 Will you recommend him to us?" 
 
 I replied : "I would like very much for you to take 
 Omar into your employe, but before you take him, I 
 wish to have a talk with you about him ; though you must 
 give him the place." 
 
 He then said: "I'll come to your office right away, 
 if you can talk with me now?" 
 
 I replied : ' ' Come on. I '11 talk with you. ' ' 
 
100 YOUR PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 When he came, I said to him that while I recom- 
 mended Omar to him and was very anxious for him to 
 give the boy a place, still I felt that for the boy's sake 
 and for his sake he must know the boy as I had come to 
 know him by having him in school five years. I then 
 told him all I knew of the boy, including the taking of 
 the property of another scholar; and said that I be- 
 lieved the boy would prove honest; but that I would 
 rather he would refuse Omar a place than for him to 
 put him where he would continually be tempted by 
 handling money so loosely that no one could call him to 
 account definitely at the close of each day for every 
 penny that passed through his hands ; that with careful 
 guarding for a year or two he would make an honest, 
 trustworthy man, but that by being placed where he 
 would be tempted too strongly at that time, he might, 
 little by little, fall into the habit of dishonesty. To me 
 for the boy, it was a very serious matter. I remembered 
 then and I have never forgotten what a business man in 
 a Nebraska town said to me when I was a schoolman of 
 but little experience. This business man had taken a 
 boy who had graduated from our high school the year 
 before into his office, and had placed him where he 
 handled much small change in a way that from day to 
 day no one kept close account of it. After a number of 
 months, this business man came upon positive evidence 
 that the boy was taking of this money and spending it. 
 The boy lost his position. This man said to me that 
 while he let the boy out of a job, he felt that he him- 
 self had not done right by the boy in placing him 
 just at the uncertain time of the boy's life, where it 
 was easy for him to steal; and he said further that he 
 thought many, many boys were ruined by business men 
 in placing them as he had placed this boy, where no one 
 
STEALING 101 
 
 could know definitely, at the close of each day, the exact 
 amount of money for which the boy should be held ac- 
 countable; that it was a great sin against boys to put 
 them where they would be tempted with no protection 
 to hold them from yielding. The very fact that the boy 
 knows that every penny that passes through his hands 
 can be traced up and will be each day, is a wonderful 
 protection to him. It keeps temptation out of his mind. 
 
 One of my Bloomington business men friends had 
 this experience with a boy in his employ. This was 
 fifteen years ago. He was paying the boy a fair salary 
 for the work he was doing, a good salary for a boy in 
 his early "teens." One day, he accidentally learned 
 that the boy had a weekly increasing deposit at one of 
 the banks. The amount of the deposit was so large that 
 it was an impossibility for the boy to have accumulated 
 it out of his weekly earnings and he had no other source 
 of money. Up to this time, the boy had not been sus- 
 pected of dishonesty, but now he was under suspicion. 
 He was carefully watched, and found depositing money 
 that had been marked and put into the channels in the 
 business where it would pass through his hands; but 
 it failed to appear after reaching him, and a little later 
 he gave it in for deposit at the bank. 
 
 The next morning after he had deposited marked 
 money, my friend, the head of the firm, decided that as 
 he now had the evidence in good shape, he would not 
 delay, but send or ask the judge to commit the boy to 
 the State Reformatory. Thus far he had said nothing 
 to the boy or to his people, but now he called the boy 
 to the office and asked him to go over to the courthouse 
 with him. The courthouse was just across the street. 
 His intention was to take the boy into the judge's office 
 to lay the case before the judge, and ask that the boy 
 
102- IOUR PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 be sent to the reformatory. But after going to the 
 courthouse, he began to think: "I'm a Christian man; 
 this boy has done wrong. Is it right for me to send him 
 to an institution where he will be associated with many 
 of the worst boys of the state, without trying myself 
 to help him to do right; am I not taking advantage of 
 the boy; I put him where he was tempted; ought I not 
 to help him now that he has done wrong?" 
 
 He turned about and said to the boy: "Come on, 
 we'll go back to the office." He took him to his private 
 office ; told him all that he knew of his taking the money ; 
 that he had gone with him to the courthouse to ask the 
 judge to send him to the reformatory; but that he could 
 not feel he would be doing right not to give him a 
 chance. 
 
 It was not now the money that concerned this man, 
 but it was the saving of this boy, that deeply stirred his 
 soul. He felt he must save the boy. 
 
 The boy told him how day after day for months he 
 had been taking out the money and depositing it in two 
 of the banks. He had two bank accounts instead of one. 
 He, with the help of the business man, made an estimate 
 of what he had taken. The boy turned over his deposits 
 and promised to pay a certain amount each week till all 
 lie had taken was paid back. 
 
 The business man said to him that he would show 
 his faith in him by continuing him in his position, and 
 would befriend him in every possible way; but said he, 
 "If I find I cannot help you to do right, if I find you 
 taking money again, then I shall feel it is my duty to 
 you to ask that you be sent to the State Reformatory." 
 
 That boy never again betrayed the confidence placed 
 in him, and became one of the most trustworthy and 
 valuable men in the employ of that firm. 
 
STEALING 103 
 
 These cases, and other like ones, and my belief that 
 a boy ought not to be tempted at this unsettled time of 
 life by being placed where there is too great responsi- 
 bility, or where he handles money in a somewhat loose 
 way, except under the very closest, most careful super- 
 vision, made me feel that I would rather Omar would 
 fail of appointment to a place in this store than to see 
 him put where he would be too strongly tempted to take 
 what did not belong to him. "How oft the sight of 
 means to do ill deeds makes ill deeds done" is especially 
 true of some boys. 
 
 Omar was given the position in the store under the 
 best of conditions. That was eight or nine years ago. 
 He has made good, and today stands high with the firm. 
 
 ********* 
 
 One day the high school principal reported to me 
 that one of the high school girls had had a beautiful 
 pair of gloves taken from her cloak pockets in the 
 cloak-room a few days before and that she had the day 
 
 before found another girl, Nellie M , wearing 
 
 them ; that the gloves in the possession of Nellie M 
 
 were the ones that had been taken from the cloak 
 pockets; that after Nellie M - had gone to her 
 first recitation that morning, he had taken the gloves 
 
 from where Nellie M had placed them, and had 
 
 found them marked on the inside just as the girl who 
 had lost her gloves claimed they were. The loser of 
 the gloves also claimed that her father had purchased 
 the gloves in an eastern city and that there were no 
 gloves of the kind in any store in our city; that to 
 make sure this last statement as to there being no other 
 gloves like them in the city, he had taken the gloves to 
 every store carrying gloves in Bloomington, and had 
 
104 YOUE PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 learned that no gloves of the kind had been sold in the 
 city, and that no store had them in stock. 
 
 The principal had, so it seemed to me, taken every 
 precaution against accusing the girl unjustly by care- 
 fully examining every claim made by the girl who said 
 the gloves were hers. The next step was for him to 
 talk with Nellie M . The principal wished to have 
 a woman present when he talked with her about the 
 
 gloves, so Miss , secretary in the superintendent's 
 
 office, was asked to be present. 
 
 The principal stated to Nellie M that one of 
 
 the girls had made the complaint that her gloves had 
 been taken from her cloak pockets in the cloak-room, 
 and that Nellie was wearing them to school; that it 
 would be for her to tell how they came to be in her pos- 
 session if they were hers, and to establish her right to 
 them. 
 
 She immediately said she had bought them at a cer- 
 tain store in the city and that they were her own gloves 
 and belonged to no one else. 
 
 The principal then said that the store where she said 
 she had bought them had told him that day that they 
 had never carried that kind of glove in stock, so had 
 never sold them; that every glove store in the city had 
 made a like statement. 
 
 After a little while, she said that she had taken the 
 gloves from the other girl's cloak-pockets. She cried 
 and cried, and asked if the whole school would have to 
 know it. The principal replied : "No, Nellie, the super- 
 intendent, the secretary present, and myself, are the 
 only ones of the high school who will know this, so long 
 as you do right and take nothing that belongs to some 
 one else." 
 
STEALING 105 
 
 I can't make you understand how kindly the prin- 
 cipal talked to her, for he was deeply touched with pity 
 that she should yield to temptation and take the gloves. 
 He knew too that she was almost homeless, and had but 
 little except what was given her in charity. 
 
 A short time after, in talking with her former ele- 
 mentary school principal, who had always been deeply 
 interested in Nellie, I told her of the gloves. 
 
 She replied: "I'm not surprised, but I'm very, 
 very sorry for Nellie. Poor girl ! She took things when 
 she was in our school, and I talked with her and did 
 everything I could, but the disposition to take things 
 that did not belong to her still clung to her. Poor 
 girl, she has always craved beautiful things and has 
 never had anything to satisfy her craving. It is hard; 
 her parents dead, an imbecile sister and the aunt with 
 whom they make their home, are her only people. The 
 aunt cannot do anything more than give them a place 
 to stay, for she has nothing. Nellie's ambition is to be 
 a teacher, that she may be able to take care of her 
 sister. She is in school through the kindness of friends. 
 It does seem too bad that her love for beautiful things 
 has never had anything beautiful to satisfy it. My 
 heart aches for the child, yet it seems we are all helpless 
 when we try to do anything for her. Poor girl!" 
 
 At the close of the term, Nellie dropped out of 
 school. Two or three years later, I was surprised to 
 see her acting as cashier in one of our city stores. I 
 feared and feared greatly, but said nothing. I did not 
 know the man who had employed her sufficiently well 
 to know how to talk with him confidentially about her. 
 I did not wish to do her harm by arousing suspicion in 
 his mind, if she had changed, and was worthy the trust 
 he was placing in her. When taking things is only an 
 
106 YOUR PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 outcropping of the ferment of adolescence, and it is not 
 fixed into a habit by unfortunate circumstances sur- 
 rounding the youth, it is apt to fade out, leaving nothing 
 of dishonesty to mar the after life. For this reason, it 
 sometimes does great harm to the young person for 
 someone to arouse suspicion in the employer's mind as 
 to the honesty of an employee, and causes him to let out 
 of his service one who is most worthy his confidence. 
 
 But after a few months, Nellie lost her position. A 
 friend of Nellie's asked the proprietor of the store why 
 he had given the position Nellie had held to another. 
 He replied that Nellie was always short in her cash ac- 
 count, and that while he had never caught her in any- 
 thing dishonest, as soon as he put another person into 
 the place, there was no further trouble with the cash 
 account. 
 
 I have always tried to be strictly honest and fair 
 when called upon to recommend a young man or young 
 woman for a position. Sometimes in my frankness I 
 have been told that I surely was a little too careful ; but 
 later on even these cases proved me at least on the safe 
 side. 
 
 A friend of mine, Mr. Mains, came to me one day 
 and told me of his plans to open a branch store in a 
 new addition to the city where he was then living, and 
 asked me what I thought of his putting a certain former 
 
 schoolboy of ours, Nelson R in full charge of the 
 
 store. Without waiting for my answer, he proceeded 
 to tell me that he had had him in his employ for several 
 months and was greatly pleased with the way he did 
 things; that he was a regular pusher in the business 
 and seemed a first-class man to run the branch store. 
 
STEALING 107 
 
 Then he asked me if I would recommend Nelson for the 
 place ; if I thought it safe to place him where he would 
 have everything in his hands. 
 
 I saw my friend's heart was set on giving Nelson, 
 he was scarcely more than a boy, the place but that he 
 would feel just a little easier if he could have my word 
 favoring it. But I could not give him that word. I 
 replied that I was pleased to know Nelson was doing so 
 well, and wished him all the good that could come to 
 him, but that I could not honestly recommend him to a 
 position of so great trust and responsibility; that I did 
 not think it best for Nelson nor best for my friend. 
 
 However, as I have said, my friend's heart was set 
 on giving the young man the position, so he placed him 
 in charge of the store. 
 
 For more than a year the business venture went 
 well. Nelson was a " hustler" there was no question of 
 that. He made things move. 
 
 At the close of the first year my friend said to me 
 that I had placed too little confidence in the young man. 
 "Why," said he, "Nelson is doing a wonderful business 
 in our branch store. He is the ablest and most trust- 
 worthy man I've ever had in my employ. This one year 
 has proved to me that he can run the business as well 
 as I could do it myself, so I 'm giving him a free hand. ' ' 
 
 The next year my friend was sick for several months. 
 When he was again able to look after his business, he 
 found that this "trusted young" man had unmercifully 
 robbed him, and had so involved him that he came near 
 losing not only the branch store, but all his property. 
 
 Shortly after Mr. Mains discovered how he had been 
 robbed, he and his wife were in our city, and called at 
 my office. They both were greatly distressed, for they 
 then feared they might lose all their property. They 
 
108 YOUR PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 said to me : ' l Your fears were well founded, we should 
 have listened to you, but Nelson had sort of blinded us, 
 so that we thought it was just a case of a school 
 teacher's letting his prejudice for some past wrong of 
 the boy affect his judgment, thus interfering with the 
 boy's advancement." 
 
 Why had I felt it would be unsafe to give Nelson the 
 position? I will tell you as I had told Mr. and Mrs. 
 Mains. The boy had caused us no trouble of any kind 
 in school; he learned easily, and was always obliging 
 and of pleasant manners; and his father was a warm 
 personal friend of mine. But I knew the boy was un- 
 truthful; that he had helped to rob one or two stores; 
 that out of consideration for his parents, very little had 
 been said publicly about his store-robbing. This was 
 while he was a scholar in the high school. I knew, too, 
 how little consideration he had for his father's wishes. 
 These things were not characteristic of him for a year 
 or two only of his adolescent life, but had been a part of 
 him for a number of years, even before his adolescent 
 years, so that while these characteristics might disap- 
 pear as the years of adolescence were passed, still for 
 the safety of the boy and of all, I felt it would be better 
 not to tempt him too greatly, but to hold him where his 
 work would be so closely supervised that there could 
 be little temptation to further wrong-doing ; to hold him 
 until his own faith in his ability to do right had be- 
 come strong, and the habit of honesty somewhat fixed. 
 
 ********* 
 
 One Friday morning, Mr. Smith, the head of the 
 manual training work in the high school reported to the 
 high school principal that one drawing-board and three 
 sets of drawing-tools had been taken from one of the 
 
STEALING 109 
 
 mechanical drawing rooms; that the drawing sets cost 
 $9 a set. The classes had used them the fore-noon of the 
 day before. Mr* Smith was the only one who carried 
 a key to the room, and he still had the key in his pos- 
 session. He had locked the room the day before at the 
 close of his class work, and it was still locked when he 
 went to meet his classes on Friday morning. The room 
 was on the third floor, the windows were so placed that 
 they could not be reached from the outside except by a 
 ladder reaching to the third floor. The question was, 
 Who took the board and drawing tools, and how did he 
 get into the drawing-room? 
 
 Monday morning a package delivery boy from the 
 Western Union Telegraph Company delivered the draw- 
 ing-board at the principal's office. The principal asked 
 him where he had gotten the board. The boy replied 
 that a call had come to the Western Union office asking 
 that a boy be sent to a certain number on Front Street 
 for a package to be delivered at the high school; that 
 he was sent to get the package and deliver it; that 
 when he got to the Front Street number, he found a boy, 
 waiting for him; that the boy paid him fifteen cents 
 to bring the board to the high school. When asked if 
 he knew the boy he said that he did not, and had never 
 seen him before. When asked as to how old the boy 
 appeared to be, he said that the boy had told him to 
 tell the principal that a young man about seventeen 
 years old had given him the board, but the delivery boy 
 said he did not think the boy was more than fifteen. 
 
 The principal called up the Western Union office 
 and the manager there confirmed what the delivery boy 
 had said about the call for a delivery boy to be sent to 
 the number on Front Street. 
 
110 YOUR PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 Nothing more could be learned about the theft until 
 the next Monday morning, when a high school boy re- 
 ported that he had seen the delivery boy at Sunday 
 School the day before and that the delivery boy had 
 told him of meeting the boy who had had the board Sat- 
 urday afternoon, and that he had looked at him closely 
 and would know him if he should see him in the high 
 school. 
 
 The delivery boy was called to the high school. He 
 said to the high school principal and superintendent 
 that he had met the boy who had given him the board 
 to deliver Saturday afternoon, and that the boy had 
 wanted to know if the police had asked him anything 
 about the board, and had added: "If the police do ask 
 you about me and the board, don't tell them anything, 
 and I'll give you some more money." 
 
 After talking with the delivery boy, we sent him 
 for a little visit to the drawing room to see if he could 
 identify the boy who had given him the board. He re- 
 mained in the room but a few minutes. When he came 
 out he said: "The boy at desk No. 2, in the second 
 row is the boy who gave me the board to deliver." I 
 immediately called the boy designated into the corridor. 
 The delivery boy said: "Yes, he is the boy who gave 
 me the board. He is the boy." 
 
 I then asked the boy, Melvin M how he had 
 
 gotten the board out of the drawing-room. He replied 
 that he was permitted to do some extra work in the 
 west drawing-room of afternoons, and that on the day he 
 took the board he had needed some drawing-paper and 
 had asked the teacher to let him go to his desk in the 
 east drawing-room to get it; that the teacher let him 
 have the key to the east room, that while he was getting 
 the paper he took the board, then hid it behind his 
 
STEALING 111 
 
 clothes locker until school was out and then slipped it 
 home. 
 
 Then I asked: "What have you done with the 
 drawing sets?" 
 
 He replied: "I did not take the drawing sets, I 
 don't know anything about them." 
 
 The drawing teacher when told what Melvin had 
 said, remembered that he had loaned the boy the key to 
 get into the east room for drawing paper that afternoon. 
 
 We did not bluff Melvin by trying to make him 
 think that we knew he had taken the drawing instru- 
 ments. We said that the fact that he had taken the 
 drawing board at the time the instruments disappeared 
 and also the fact that he was the only one who had had 
 access to the room, made it look very much like he had 
 taken the instruments. 
 
 He replied when this statement was made: "I did 
 not take the instruments, I know nothing about them." 
 
 We were waiting a few days, hoping to find some 
 clue that would help us to get the facts about the in- 
 struments, when one afternoon the chief of police 
 'phoned my office asking me, if possible, to come over 
 to police headquarters at once. I reported at police 
 headquarters immediately, not knowing why I had been 
 called; but I soon found out that Melvin, the boy who 
 had taken the drawing board, was the center of in- 
 terest. 
 
 But before finishing this part of the story I must 
 tell you something of the history of the boy before the 
 time of his taking the drawing-board. 
 
 He came to our school in the fifth grade. He had 
 been in an excellent school before he came to our school. 
 His transfer showed a fair record in scholarship and de- 
 portment. After entering our fifth grade, he continued 
 
112 YOUK PROBLEMS AXD MINE 
 
 to make about the same standing he had previously 
 made. 
 
 He was a fine-looking boy, of sturdy physique, with 
 an expressive intelligent-looking face, well dressed, and 
 gentlemanly in manner. He, in fact, was to a person 
 who did not know him, one of the most attractive-look- 
 ing boys in the school. 
 
 He had not been a pupil in our school long when one 
 noon he brought to school some property that had so 
 evidently been taken from one of the stores in the city 
 that his teacher reported the matter to her principal. 
 The principal, after examining the goods in the boy's 
 possession and talking with him, phoned the mother, 
 who lived nearby, asking her to come to the office, as she 
 wished to talk with her about her boy. The mother was 
 at the principal's office in a very few minutes, and soon 
 had the boy's confession that he had taken goods from 
 a certain store. The mother accompanied by the boy, 
 returned the property to the store from which the boy 
 had taken it. More than once this same thing occurred 
 while he was in our elementary school. He was only in 
 the sixth grade when the police came to know him 
 through his frequent thefts. His eighth grade year he 
 spent in a school in another city where he was living 
 with his father. After living with his father the year, 
 he returned to live in Bloomington and in September 
 entered our high school. 
 
 The high school principal and teachers knew noth- 
 ing of him and they were not enlightened at that time. 
 His past was dead unless he himself should bring it to 
 life. 
 
 He was now fifteen years of age, but had not yet 
 entered the stage of puberty. He was physically as 
 much a boy as he was at eleven years of age. He was 
 
STEALING 113 
 
 a beautiful boy to look at, a good reciter, and of pleas- 
 ing manners and so made a fine impression on the high 
 school teachers to whose classes he was assigned. I 
 alone knew that he had a bad record at police head- 
 quarters, but kept this fact to "myself . 
 
 This is Melvin's history so far as I knew it up to 
 the time he became involved in the drawing board 
 trouble at the high school. 
 
 Now I return to police headquarters to continue my 
 story. First, we had notified the police of the disap- 
 pearance of the drawing instruments, hoping their de- 
 tectives might happen on some trace of the instruments. 
 Now I'll move on to the close with my story. 
 
 The chief of police said to me that they had Melvin 
 
 M in another room, and were holding him for 
 
 robbing a safe in a store; that he had gone into the 
 store in daytime the day before, on pretense of using the 
 phone which was in the rear part of the store not far 
 from the safe; that he had taken from the safe thirty 
 dollars and had lost most of it playing craps. 
 
 He said further: "We thought possibly if you 
 would come over while he is held for this, we might find 
 out something about the drawing instruments; but he 
 is the most hardened boy offender I have ever met; he 
 has no feelings about wrongdoing; he would as soon be 
 locked up in jail and sleep there as to be out, so far as 
 anyone can judge from his actions ; his father has been 
 here for an hour talking with him; but nothing his 
 father says has any effect whatever on him." 
 
 "We then went into the police court-room where 
 Melvin and his father and others were. Melvin looked 
 at me and smiled as pleasantly and unconcerned as if he 
 were sitting in the high school assembly room waiting in 
 happy anticipation for the opening act of some school 
 
114 YOUR PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 play for which the curtain might be drawn at any 
 minute. 
 
 We learned nothing about the instruments from him. 
 If he knew where they were, he revealed nothing. 
 
 The father took Melvin with him to live in another 
 city. His history since he left Bloomington is unknown 
 to me. 
 
 Melvin was as I have said, physically as much a boy 
 at fifteen years of age as he was at eleven. At fifteen, 
 physically, he had not passed the threshold of youth. 
 Why the changes of puberty were so long delayed in his 
 case I know not. As he was out of the ordinary in this 
 respect in his physical development, may it not be that 
 some physical defect lies at the basis of his moral de- 
 linquency? May it not be that that part of the brain 
 through which the soul functions in moral perceptions 
 is defective? I only ask the question. 
 
 *****#*** 
 
 Mr. L , President of one of our banks, called 
 
 on me just after the close of the school term one year to 
 look up the record of one of the boys who had just 
 graduated saying: "If his record shows up well, I'd 
 like to take him into our bank. I hope you will, as I 
 know from the past you will, give me a full account of 
 him, for if he is of the right stripe, I 'm anxious to give 
 him the position; but it would be a serious mistake for 
 me to put him into the place if he is not all right. Now 
 tell me what you know about him, please." 
 
 I replied: "Samuel has an unusually fine mind; 
 he stands in scholarship in the highest fourth in his 
 class and with little effort. If he had applied himself 
 as some members of the class did the past school year, 
 he could have stood at the very head; but he did not 
 
STEALING 115 
 
 care to do it. Still to rank in scholarship in the best 
 fourth of his class, is an honor. He is something of a 
 leader among the school boys and girls, and is well liked 
 by all scholars and teachers. His deportment in school 
 all the years he has been with us has been good ; but at 
 the early part of the school year just closed, I learned 
 he was becoming quite a gambler to the extent that he 
 was bragging a little unguardedly of the money he was 
 winning. He was spending considerable time of eve- 
 nings in some of the 'called' gambling places of the 
 city. My information came so direct that I could not 
 question it, so I called Samuel into my office and told 
 him what I had heard, giving the facts as they had been 
 given to me. ' ' 
 
 "He made no denial of them, but said that he would 
 not engage in the practice any more. ' ' 
 
 "I said to him: 'You are a senior, and nothing 
 should come up to prevent your graduating next June; 
 but Sam,' said I, 'if I should learn that you still engage 
 in gambling after our conference today, I will refuse to 
 sign your diploma. The diploma certifies that the 
 bearer is of good moral character. I could not put my 
 name to a diploma for you if I know of your gambling 
 again.' ' 
 
 "He gave me his word that that kind of work was 
 forever past with him. From that day on to the close 
 of the year I never knew of his gambling." 
 
 Mr. L then said: "He has touched the one 
 
 thing I fear above all others in an employee of the bank. 
 Boys may go far wrong in some ways and yet be strong 
 in honesty ; but the boy or young nWn who gambles is 
 taking other peoples' money for nothing, and should 
 never be put where he handles other peoples' money as 
 
116 YOUE PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 in a bank. To my mind, gambling in young men is a 
 most difficult habit to overcome. 
 
 "Much as I had hoped to give him the place, I can- 
 not do it." 
 
 One morning, a number of years ago, a hardware 
 merchant of the city called at my office to make in- 
 quiry about two high school boys who were applicants 
 for a position in his store. He explained that he had 
 put an advertisement in the paper, and two boys had 
 applied in answer to the notice. "From the character 
 of the letters," said he, "I think they are your school 
 boys. One is a little older than I care to put into the 
 place." 
 
 I read the letters of application, and replied: "Yes, 
 they are both our boys. The younger of the two is now 
 in the manual training shop; you can speak to him if 
 you wish." 
 
 He then said : ' ' For some time, we have been having 
 trouble with the boys we have had in the store. They 
 have been continually tapping the till. For some reason, 
 we have not been able to guard sufficiently well to keep 
 them from taking money out of the money-drawer. I 
 have just let a boy go because he was stealing from us. 
 I thought it might make a change for the better to come 
 to you for your recommendation of the next boy we 
 employ." 
 
 I replied: "This younger boy Mack has always 
 been honest and straightforward in all his school life. 
 He is studious and painstaking in his school work, quiet 
 and manly in his bearing. We consider him a very 
 trustworthy boy, but he is only a boy. I will go with 
 you to the shop. I will stop at his bench and talk with 
 
STEALING 117 
 
 him a moment. If you like his looks, you can step up 
 to us and I will introduce you. Then you can talk with 
 him if you wish." 
 
 He liked the boy's looks; I introduced them. Mr. 
 
 N spoke to him of his letter, and offered him the 
 
 position. 
 
 Mack replied that he would like very much to accept 
 his offer but must first talk with his father. "My 
 father is a traveling man," said Mack, "and will be 
 home within the next day or two. Could you hold the 
 place open till I talk with father?" 
 
 Mr. N replied: "Yes, let me hear from you 
 
 as soon as your father and you have talked it over. I 
 hope he will favor your taking the place." 
 
 The boy's father gave his consent, and Mack became 
 a valuable man to that firm. Several years after, in 
 
 talking with Mr. N he said: "Mack has always 
 
 been honest and attentive to business, and he is the 
 ablest stock man we have ever had in our employ." 
 
 *####*#*# 
 
 I have said so much about safe-guarding scholars 
 who handle money or are placed in unusually re- 
 sponsible positions, that one might be led to infer that I 
 think that all boys and girls at this time of life are 
 likely to become dishonest when handling money in of- 
 fices and stores, unless there is a daily checking up plan 
 that easily discloses the slightest irregularity. Let me 
 say plainly that I do not hold any such views. I be- 
 lieve there are boys and girls, unlimited numbers of 
 them, most of the boys and girls in your school, most 
 of them that have been known to me, who would suffer 
 the loss of their right hands rather than to take money 
 that did not belong to them. But while this is true, still 
 
118 YOUR PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 there may be some who are open to temptation. You 
 and I cannot always tell who they are, but all of us who 
 have lived for a number of years with school boys and 
 girls know this is true, and knowing it, we are not re- 
 flecting on the quality of honesty of those who would 
 be strictly honest under all conditions, nor are we mis- 
 trusting them, when we say the safe thing for all boys 
 and girls when taking their places in offices, stores, and 
 business life, is to guard them; possibly, a better term 
 is to "protect them," by the employers' reducing to a 
 minimum the opportunities for dishonesty. Too many 
 business men have ignorantly trusted boys and girls 
 and so have wronged them and destroyed their own 
 faith in youth ; while an intelligent trust, placed in these 
 same boys and girls, would have saved them from drift- 
 ing into the wrong class and would have kept the em- 
 ployers' faith in youth strong. 
 
 ********* 
 
 Many homes fail to practice honesty in dealing with 
 their children. These children's first lessons in honesty 
 at all times are learned, if learned at all, at school. 
 
 One morning several years ago, as I was on my way 
 to my office, I fell in with the editor of one of our daily 
 
 papers, Mr. B . He immediately said: "Mr. 
 
 Stableton, I've been wondering what more the public 
 schools could do to teach honesty? I am shocked by 
 reading of the great number of crimes committed by 
 young men and boys not out of their teens." 
 
 I replied: "Mr. B , we do try pretty hard to 
 
 teach honesty, but no doubt we should accomplish more 
 than we do." 
 
 "Oh, Mr. Stableton, I know you do. I'm not crit- 
 icising at all, but the number of youthful criminals is 
 appalling. ' ' 
 
STEALING 119 
 
 "We school people need help," said I, "Please tell 
 me what you would do in the following case : 
 
 "At the opening of each semester, we give to each 
 child in the first primary grade, an enrollment slip to 
 take home to be signed by one of the parents and re- 
 turned to the teacher. On this slip the parent is asked 
 to state the day, the month, and the year the child was 
 born. The teacher examines these cards when returned, 
 and from the date of birth determines whether or not 
 the child is of school age. The state law says children 
 are of school age when they are six years of age. Our 
 board of education, in order to have a better classifi- 
 cation, gives parents whose children will be six years of 
 age by the first day of December, the privilege of en- 
 tering them in September ; and for the second semester, 
 a like privilege is extended. 
 
 "In examining the returned enrollment cards, it 
 not infrequently happens that the teacher discovers that 
 some of the children are as much as a year under school 
 age. All are returned home, with a note of explanation. 
 
 "One morning after a number of under age children 
 had been sent home, a mother and her boy came to my 
 office. On my asking what I could do for her, she re- 
 plied that she wanted her boy in school. I said that I'd 
 be pleased to have the boy in school were he of school 
 age; that the card she had filled out showed him six 
 months under age, too young to enter that semester. 
 
 "The mother was somewhat indignant, and left the 
 office. In a few minutes, she and the boy returned, ac- 
 companied by her husband, the father of the boy. The 
 father appeared very angry and said to me: l We 
 want this boy in school.' Again I explained the age 
 requirements for entering school for the first time. 
 
120 YOUR PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 "The father replied: 'Give me that card. I'll fix 
 it so he'll be old enough. If we had known what you 
 were after, we would have fixed it in the first place.' 
 
 "I was somewhat surprised, and said, 'Why, you 
 would not give me a false report of his age to get him 
 in school?' 
 
 ' ' ' You better believe I would. Just let me have that 
 card/ he replied. 
 
 "Will you please tell me how to make a man of high 
 ideals of honesty, out of that boy with that kind of 
 home training?" 
 
 Mr. B - shook his head, and replied: "I don't 
 know. I've nothing to offer. It's a big job." 
 
 See the situation with this boy. His father was the 
 proprietor of a store. He was a wonderful man in the 
 boy's eye. Father would be untruthful in the boy's 
 presence with the boy understanding all about it. What 
 would be the effect on the boy? 
 
 One day, I had just seated myself for my noon lunch 
 when I was called to the phone. A woman's voice with 
 a laugh as if something funny had happened said: 
 "Oh, Mr. Stableton, you've got me into a lot of 
 trouble." 
 
 "Who is this talking, and what is the trouble?" I 
 asked. 
 
 Back came the answer. "I'm Mrs. Morley, of 
 E - School. You know my boy Jesse in the fifth 
 grade, well he got mad at his teacher Friday, and 
 brought his books home and said he was going to one of 
 the parochial schools. Now I didn't want him to go to 
 a parochial school, and didn't know what to do, so I 
 told him I'd seen you and you said he'd have to come 
 
STEALING 121 
 
 back to his own school ; that you wouldn 't let him go to 
 a parochial school, so he went back to his own school 
 and told the principal what I 'd said, and she asked you 
 on the phone if you had told me that ; and you told her 
 that you had not seen me, nor told me anything; and 
 Jesse was right in the office and the principal told him 
 what you told her. Now he's come home to his dinner, 
 and says I lied to him, and I don't know what to do." 
 
 I phoned in reply: "Yes, I did tell the principal 
 that I had not seen you, nor talked with you. The only 
 help I can give you is my advice that you tell the truth 
 and you will not be in trouble." 
 
 What effect on the character of the boy must this 
 kind of home training have? Six hours a day, month 
 after month, throughout the life of even his compulsory 
 school years, under the teaching and training of force- 
 ful, honest, earnest teachers in the school, are a mighty 
 power shaping the boy's character for good; and while 
 this school life may not wholly overcome the evil effects 
 of bad home training, still as one of the forces contend- 
 ing for the mastery of the character of the boy, it will 
 at least bend the line of his character a little more to- 
 ward the right, even though in the end the character be 
 faulty. We are teachers of little faith if we are dis- 
 appointed because we cannot always see the results of 
 our work in the lives of the present generation. Much 
 that we do for the boy today may not shape his life as 
 we wish, but it implants in him the ideals that will 
 shape the character of his boy tomorrow. 
 
CHAPTER XI 
 
 WRONGDOING RESPONSIBILITY, TEACHER'S ? 
 PARENTS'? CITY GOVERNMENT'S? 
 
 As one writer says, there is always the possibility 
 that some of the ordinarily fleeting experiences of youth 
 may become fixed as traits of character; youth is the 
 period when one is open to moulding influences as at no 
 other time in life; influences that may determine the 
 whole after life; adolescent longings and activities 
 wrongly directed lead to crime; and if there is con- 
 tinued repetition of criminal acts, criminal character is 
 the result. 
 
 Mr. W. D. Morrison, an authority on youthful crim- 
 inology, says, that from sixteen years of age there is a 
 very rapid increase in crime ; and that if the youth from 
 sixteen years of age to twenty could be kept from em- 
 barking on a criminal career, the drop in the criminal 
 population would be far-reaching; that if this critical 
 period could be tided over without repeated acts of 
 crime, there is much less likelihood of a youth's degen- 
 erating into a criminal of the professional class. One 
 offense does not fix character, but continued repetition 
 of acts, either good or bad, at this time in life, means 
 character-building. Often a parent says: "Oh, if my 
 boy could only be under good surroundings that would 
 attract him for a few years, he would be all safe. ' ' And 
 the parent is often right in what he says. 
 
 For eighteen years, I kept a pretty close tab on the 
 boys of our city who drifted into the criminal class, boys 
 who during their school life were in our schools. Most 
 all of them I knew very intimately as school boys, and I 
 also knew much about their own home life. This 
 
 122 
 
WRONGDOING 123 
 
 knowledge made me consider well who they were and 
 whence they came that swelled the too great number of 
 the criminal class from our city. 
 
 This study increased my faith in the good early 
 home training of children. They may drift, they may 
 be full of all sorts of wild pranks, may even steal and 
 lie shamefully in youth, but if detected and held from 
 repeating these acts, as the later high school years of 
 this period come, the character of childhood begins to 
 assert itself again. 
 
 I believe this is true, as other writers have said that 
 where certain habits were firmly fixed in childhood, and 
 some untoward influence has not too strongly affected 
 the youth, the firmly-fixed habits of childhood again 
 appear, though somewhat modified; that all training in 
 childhood is not lost as the youth goes through the 
 breaking-up and recrystallization period of adolescence. 
 Good early training and good parentage tell at this 
 time of life. We are told, too, that it is the time when 
 inherited tendencies crop out, and no doubt this is true ; 
 and it is also true that the better the training in good 
 habits in childhood, the greater the possibility of good 
 habits setting in in later adolescence, even with a poor 
 inheritance. 
 
 Most of these boys who entered the criminal class 
 from our city during the eighteen years of my life in 
 Bloomington, never had good home training. Nowhere 
 were they taught obedience and respect for law except 
 in school. Their homes were places to sleep a part of 
 the night and to eat some of their meals, though their 
 homes were often homes of plenty. When not in school, 
 they lived on the streets. Some of them never gave any 
 trouble at all in school, while others were restless under 
 restraint. 
 
124 YOUE PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 One morning a number of years ago, one of our prin- 
 cipals asked me to come over to her building saying she 
 thought some of her boys had been stealing down in the 
 city. I immediately responded to her call. The prin- 
 cipal said that from some things one of her boys had 
 told to his teacher about a cigar he had brought to 
 school, she believed a half-dozen of them had been rob- 
 bing cigar-stores. 
 
 I asked the principal to call one of the boys into the 
 office to talk with me. This boy was almost fourteen 
 years of age, the oldest of the half-dozen. As he stood 
 at the side of my chair, I placed my hand on his 
 shoulder in a friendly way, and kindly asked him where 
 he had gotten the cigars he had had. Turning his face 
 away so that I could not look him in the eyes, he said 
 he had bought them at the Phoenix Cigar Store for 15c 
 a box. Then he told me where he had gotten his money. 
 I knew from his manner he was untruthful, so asked him 
 to stand in the hall while I talked with another boy. 
 
 The next boy was a beautiful little fellow about ten 
 years of age. I put my arm around him as he stood by 
 my chair and asked him if he would tell me where he 
 got the cigars. 
 
 Looking me full in the face he said: "Yes, Mr. 
 Stableton, we got part of them at the Phoenix Cigar 
 Store on Main Street." 
 
 "What did you pay for them?" was my next ques- 
 tion. 
 
 "Oh, we never paid anything for them, we just took 
 them," said he. 
 
 He then told me that every evening after they had 
 had their suppers they went to the Y. M. C. A. and 
 stayed there till the time they put all young boys out; 
 that when they left the Y. M. C. A. they would go to 
 
WRONGDOING 125 
 
 the Phoenix Cigar Store on North Main Street, or some- 
 times they would go to Mr. S 's store on East 
 
 Front Street; that they did not go to the stores every 
 night, but that they went pretty often. 
 
 "But how do you get the cigars ?" I asked. 
 
 He replied: "You know when you go into the 
 Phoenix Store there is a flower stand on this side," 
 motioning with his right hand to the right to give its 
 proper location, "We go past it and turn to the other 
 side past the cigar counter, and go out that elevator 
 room door," using his hand to give everything its posi- 
 tion in the store, "and as we pass the cigar counter, we 
 reach down under the counter and take the packages of 
 cigars, as many as we want, then go on into the elevator 
 room and out the front door of that room into the 
 street." 
 
 "What kind of cigars do you get at this store?" I 
 asked. 
 
 "We get packages with nine cigars in a package. 
 At the other store we get tin boxes with twenty-five 
 cigars in each box," he replied. 
 
 "How do you get them at the other store?" I asked. 
 
 In reply he said: "You know the central fire de- 
 partment station is next to the store on Front Street. 
 We go in back of it to the back part of the cigar store. 
 There is a side door to the store and a window next to 
 it. Well, there's some steps up against the side of the 
 building under the window, and one of the boys goes 
 up the steps " 
 
 I here broke into his story with, "and goes in through 
 the window?" 
 
 "No sir," he replied, "goes up the steps and pulls 
 down the upper part of the window, and reaches in and 
 
126 YOUR PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 takes the boxes and gives them to the rest of us, every 
 one a box. These are tin boxes, twenty-five in a box. ' ' 
 
 After he had told me this and much more of how 
 they operated, I met the six boys together in the pres- 
 ence of the principal. As soon as they knew I had full 
 possession of the facts about the cigars, they had many 
 other things to tell me. They were more skilled than 
 one would like to believe in the art of lifting goods from 
 the Ten Cent Stores and various notion stores. 
 
 None of these boys caused any unusual trouble at 
 school. One or two of them were a little restless under 
 the confinement of school. The others were excellent in 
 deportment at school. In one sense, this was not my 
 affair; in another it was. I was interested in the boj-s. 
 
 I called at the Phoenix Cigar Store and asked the 
 proprietor if he had been missing any cigars. He re- 
 plied that he had not. I then told him the boy's story, 
 but he said there was nothing to the story. Next I 
 offered him some of his own goods given me by the boys. 
 That was too much ; he knew the goods. He then looked 
 under the open counter where the boy had said they had 
 gotten the cigars, and was greatly surprised to find they 
 had been taking freely of his package cigars that were 
 stored under the counter. He was somewhat chagrined 
 that he had been so easily * ' worked ' ' by the boys. 
 
 Next I called on Mr. S , the proprietor of the 
 
 East Front Street cigar store. He was standing at his 
 front door when I told him that some of our school boys 
 said they had been taking cigars from his store. Mr. 
 
 S smiled and said there was nothing to their 
 
 story, that he had not lost any cigars. Then I spoke of 
 his side door, and the window with steps under it, and 
 how the boys claimed they had taken the cigars; that 
 
WRONGDOING 127 
 
 they said the cigars were in tin boxes, twenty-five in a 
 box. 
 
 Then he said : " I carry that kind of goods, and I 'm 
 the only man in the city that does. Come in, let's see 
 what we can find out." 
 
 We found out that the boy had given an exact de- 
 scription of the place and manner of taking the cigars ; 
 and that they had taken about five hundred cigars. 
 
 Of these six boys, two finally entered the professional 
 criminal class. 
 
 From similar gangs of boys come many who con- 
 tinually fill up the ranks of professional criminals. 
 
 Too many cities and towns offer but little protection 
 to these younger boys whose homes permit them to roam 
 the streets from early evening till midnight. These are 
 the hours when the forces of evil get a hold on these 
 boys that means their ruin. 
 
 Public school teachers all over this land by their de- 
 votion to the boys and girls of their schools are exerting 
 so strong an influence on many that it saves them from 
 the street temptations that surround them; but there 
 are city responsibilities and parental duties that can 
 never be shifted to the teacher's shoulders. I will ill- 
 ustrate this point by telling a little story. 
 
 It was Monday morning following a Thanksgiving 
 vacation of Thursday and Friday, that a prominent 
 patron of one of our elementary schools called at the 
 principal's office to lay a complaint against a boy of her 
 neighborhood who attended this particular school. 
 
 The principal, a woman of sincere and gracious 
 manners, listened to the complaint and the request that 
 was coupled with it. 
 
 The caller proceeded : "I have come to make a com- 
 plaint against Henry Smith. He is one of your pupils 
 
128 YOUR PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 and you are responsible for his conduct. Last Friday 
 afternoon Henry attacked my son. Knocked him down 
 and beat him until his face was a fright to see. Henry 
 is as mean a white child as I know though his mother 
 thinks he is perfection. They live just across the street 
 from us and I know she resents it if anything is said 
 about him. I can not go to her about this as she and I 
 mingle socially and I do not wish any trouble to come 
 between us. 
 
 "Now you are responsible since we employ you to 
 look after the conduct of your pupils, so I've come to 
 make this complaint and to request you to whip Henry 
 severely for attacking my boy. It is your duty to do 
 this." 
 
 The principal gave respectful attention to the recital, 
 and then asked: "When did you say this took place?" 
 
 4 :< Last Friday afternoon, right in front of my own 
 home," answered the caller, nodding her head. 
 
 "Last Friday?" echoed the principal, "Why, that 
 was during vacation. I have no control over these boys 
 and girls when they are at their homes during vacation 
 time. I have no right whatever to punish or correct 
 Henry in any manner, so I must respectfully decline to 
 consider it, as it is wholly beyond my jurisdiction." 
 
 This principal always exercised good judgment in 
 drawing the line between what responsibilities were 
 hers and what were not hers. Most carefully, and most 
 conscientiously, she discharged all that were hers. 
 
 Teachers may say this story is of a rather extreme 
 case. I grant them that is true, but it is an honest re- 
 cital of an actual occurrence. The woman was a woman 
 of wealth and high social standing. It brings prom- 
 inently to view the fact that the teacher has her re- 
 sponsibilities, and that the parents have theirs. 
 
WRONGDOING 129 
 
 It is a great opportunity to be helpful, the oppor- 
 tunity to teach the ordinary lessons as arithmetic, his- 
 tory, geography, spelling and others, cheerfully, in- 
 telligently, conscientiously, living a life that exempli- 
 fies in the midst of the teacher's school, the ideals he 
 would implant in the minds and hearts of the boys and 
 girls who are daily in his presence. 
 
 It is the great opportunity that comes to teachers. It 
 is their direct responsibility. 
 
 ********* 
 
 One morning our compulsory attendance officer said 
 to me that he had found some more work for me to do. 
 
 "What is it?" I asked. 
 
 The attendance officer replied: "I happened to 
 
 meet Mr. A on the street last evening, and he 
 
 stopped me and said for me to tell you that some boys 
 were running a gambling den in a room in a certain down 
 town office building; that his own boy, a high school 
 boy, was one of them; that several other high school 
 boys went there sometimes; but other boys not high 
 school boys made up most of the gang; that it was a 
 bad thing, and he wanted me to tell you he hoped you'd 
 'clean it out.' " 
 
 Now Mr. A who had sent this word to me, 
 
 was one of the ablest attorneys in the city. 
 
 I replied to the attendance officer that looking after 
 delinquent school children, and parents who tried un- 
 lawfully to keep their children out of school, was a part 
 of my legitimate work as superintendent of the city 
 schools ; but that gambling dens and especially those fre- 
 quented by minors, should be reported to the mayor; 
 that it was the city government's place to "clean out" 
 the gambling dens; that I could do nothing in the 
 matter. 
 
130 YOUR PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 Mr. A appreciated my position and through 
 
 the proper officers had the den "cleaned out" and 
 closed up. 
 
 A superintendent's field is broad enough for the full 
 exercise of all his powers. He makes a serious mistake 
 when he assumes authority that rightly belongs to the 
 city government. He should lend his influence to fur- 
 ther all good works but to further them through the 
 proper channels. 
 
 One afternoon the second week after the Christmas 
 vacation, one of our high school teachers of English 
 called at my office to talk with me about one of her 
 scholars. After we had talked a few minutes, she said 
 to me that she had at last found one thing at which 
 Hiram F could make good. 
 
 "What is that one thing?" I asked. 
 
 She replied: "He would make a good reporter for 
 a sporting paper." 
 
 Then she said that the week after the vacation, for 
 a class exercise, she had asked each member of her first 
 year English class to write some incident of the vaca- 
 tion, and that Hiram had written the paper she held in 
 her hand. She then passed me the paper saying that 
 it was the first written paper that he had ever given her 
 that could be marked above a passing grade; that this 
 paper was an excellent bit of English and Would grade 
 in the nineties; that she knew it was his own composi- 
 tion for he had written it under her own observation in 
 class; that it was the first subject she had discovered 
 that he could write about. 
 
 I then read the paper. In the paper he told of his 
 going to a club-room and engaging in a game of cards 
 for money. He gave every move in the game from start 
 to finish, telling just how much money passed hands and 
 
WRONGDOING 131 
 
 how much he won. The story was told with a movement 
 that would lead one unacquainted with the game to be- 
 lieve the writer knew well the game, knew it as only a 
 good player could know it. Without giving the boy's 
 name, the paper was passed to one of the expert gam- 
 blers of the city who said no one but an expert could so 
 perfectly describe every move of a game. 
 
 A short time after I had a talk with Hiram. I 
 asked where he had learned to play the game that he 
 had become so expert in playing. 
 
 He replied that his father and mother had taught 
 him; that they played a great deal. "Why, Mr. Stable- 
 ton, all the people my father and mother go with so- 
 cially play cards," said he. 
 
 "But," I replied, "Hiram, they do not play for 
 money. ' ' 
 
 "Yes, Mr. Stableton, they do play for money, my 
 father and mother, and the people with whom they play, 
 all play for money. They play for money to make the 
 game interesting." 
 
 Knowing the boy as I did, I had no reason to doubt 
 his statements, he had always been honest and truthful. 
 
 A few months later, one of the leading ministers of 
 our city called at my office for a little visit. He was not 
 the pastor of my own church, but we were warm friends. 
 In the course of our conversation, he remarked that we 
 educators seemed to think education was everything even 
 to the extent of giving religion but little place. 
 
 I replied, laughing, that I thought I was trying to 
 live a Christian life just as hard as he was, but that 
 my work was with young people, not in the pulpit; I 
 then talked over a number of the boys to whom we 
 school people were trying to be helpful, not only as 
 teachers of lessons, but as friends, to guard them from 
 
132 YOUE PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 wrong ; that often we could do little on account of home 
 influences. Among others, I told him in strict confidence 
 
 for I could trust him, of Hiram J , not at first 
 
 giving him the boy's name. 
 
 11 What !" said he. " Hiram J ! He is a mem- 
 ber of my church ; his mother is a teacher in my Sunday 
 School/' 
 
 Who is responsible for Hiram J 's being more 
 
 familiar with gambling than with any other subject on 
 which he ever wrote in a year's work in high school 
 English? 
 
 ********* 
 
 As I have said elsewhere, most of the acts of scholars 
 of this period of life are unmoral, not immoral; but as 
 the scholars pass on to the later high school years of 
 adolescence, to early manhood and womanhood, if there 
 is not discernible at least a tendency to correct the uri- 
 truthfulness or stealing that has marked them during 
 the earlier years of adolescence, there is great danger 
 that these commonly fleeting characteristics of this 
 period will, as a consequence, become fixed as traits of 
 character. 
 
CHAPTER XII 
 AWAKENED TO A CONSCIOUSNESS OF POWER 
 
 A number of years ago when as superintendent I 
 took charge of the schools at Charleston, Illinois, I found 
 the high school well organized and doing excellent work. 
 One day the principal and I were talking over the high 
 school work and as there was no interest in public speak- 
 ing in the school I suggested that we hold a declamation 
 contest some time the latter part of the semester. For a 
 number of years I had been in the habit of helping to 
 conduct similar contests and had given considerable 
 attention to training the speakers. I had found that a 
 well-directed contest of this kind has a fine effect in 
 arousing an interest in public speaking on the part of 
 the scholars. The principal favored my suggestion, but 
 asked who would help with the training, as all the high 
 school teachers were carrying heavy work. I replied 
 that I had helped with it in other schools and would 
 help there; that I was not an expert but could and 
 would help. 
 
 The principal said further that he did not believe 
 any of the high school boys would be willing to take 
 part. 
 
 I replied that I had no fear of their not being willing 
 to take part ; that I had never met high school boys who 
 would not enter heartily into a contest of this kind 
 when it had been rightly presented to them ; and that I 
 felt sure I should find the Charleston boys willing to do 
 their best in making a program of this kind a success. 
 
 The principal then asked who I thought would be 
 good ones to select for contestants. I had been in the 
 school only a short time, and had not become well ac- 
 
 133 
 
134 YOUR PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 quainted with the boys of high school, but I had ob- 
 served which ones the scholars recognized as leaders, or 
 as "shining lights" in athletics, and I knew it would 
 be wise to use one of the leading athletes on the program 
 as I believed it would have a favorable influence on 
 others who would be invited to enter the contest. 
 
 With this thought in mind, I replied that I thought 
 Meyers Carter, the greatest athlete in the high school, 
 should be asked to be one of the contestants. Meyers was 
 a great big, likable, handsome fellow, the school's great- 
 est asset in things athletic. This was before a scholar- 
 ship standing was required to be eligible to play on an 
 athletic team. When I named him for a contestant, the 
 principal said: "Why, Mr. Stableton, he couldn't do 
 anything. He's a . mighty fine fellow, but he's no 
 student ; he 's about the poorest scholar in the freshman 
 class. Why, he can hardly learn a lesson, and would 
 be an impossibility so far as a declamation contest is 
 concerned. ' ' 
 
 I replied that I'd like to try Meyers and see if I 
 could do anything with him. It would do no harm to 
 try him out. 
 
 The principal then asked me if I had ever heard 
 Meyers try to recite, saying that he stammers so that it 
 is very hard to follow him in what he says; but if I 
 would like to try him, he'd be pleased to have me do it. 
 "There's one thing about him," he said, "he is a fine 
 fellow if he isn't a student." 
 
 The declamatory entertainment was a great success. 
 It was held in the First M. E. Church, and the seating 
 capacity and standing room were taxed to the limit. 
 
 Meyers was an athlete and knew what it was to be in 
 the foot races and other athletic contests. He was big, 
 somewhat loose-jointed as would be expected at his age, 
 
CONSCIOUSNESS OF POWER 135 
 
 and yet with these handicaps, still had much of grace in 
 his movements. I knew I must assign him, or rather 
 help him decide on a selection that would give plenty 
 of opportunity for the bigger movements of his body, 
 the play of the big muscles, whose ease and beauty of 
 motion called forth the thrilling admiration of the crowd 
 when he was leading to victory his high school team on 
 the athletic field. As he had won in the foot-race, so 
 had Dr. Holmes' Old Horse, so "How the Old Horse 
 Won the Bet" was his selection. 
 
 I had no difficulty in overcoming his stammering and 
 bringing out a voice well suited to the selection. The 
 piece gave him great freedom. Long before the night 
 of the entertainment I knew he would surprise all his 
 friends. 
 
 Before the evening of the contest, it was decided 
 there would be no judges, no awarding or announcing 
 of honors. 
 
 That night all did well, but none better than Meyers. 
 The audience was spell-bound as Meyers' interest in the 
 Old Horse and his jockey became so intense that he was 
 lost to all about him and was swinging around that 
 course, every power of body and mind bent on pushing 
 on to victory the Old Horse and rider. As the Old 
 Horse went round and round with mighty stride, so 
 Meyers' big body swayed rhythmically in harmony 
 with the Old Horse, till in triumph he passed the goal. 
 
 Meyers too had reached a goal. The people gathered 
 about the contestants and congratulated each one on his 
 part in the program. None were more warmly congrat- 
 ulated than Meyers. It was the first thing in the line 
 of school work, except in athletics, that he had ever 
 done for which he had received praise. His goal was 
 
136 YOUR PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 that he had become conscious that he could do things 
 other than athletics that were worth while. 
 
 His principal, teachers and schoolmates, and his 
 friends in the community, recognized the man they had 
 not known before. 
 
 The principal and teachers expected better class- 
 room work than he had done before and were not satis- 
 fied with his former standard. It is a great blessing 
 to young people to know that their friends expect a 
 good report of them in whatever they do. For a scholar 
 in the high school to feel that his principal, teachers, 
 and school-mates, and his community friends, expect a 
 good quality of school work from him, is a wonderful 
 stimulus to his doing what is expected of him. 
 
 Meyers felt that he must meet these expectations. 
 Then too he now had faith in his ability to do better 
 school work than he had done and determined to do it. 
 And he did it. Not that he became a brilliant student, 
 for he did not. His grades were only fair, but they were 
 not that before. He finally graduated from the high 
 school having made an excellent record in a few of his 
 studies and only fair records in others, and with the 
 highest esteem of the faculty, the scholars of the school, 
 and of those in the community who knew him. 
 
 The two things the declamation contest did for him 
 were, first, it made him conscious of his power or ability 
 to do work in this line that called forth commendation 
 and that awakened in him faith in his ability to do other 
 school work if he only put forth the effort; the second 
 was that he must not fail to meet the expectations of his 
 friends; his pride was touched in a good way. 
 
 Again and again I have seen that when a high school 
 scholar is indifferent to his work, practically doing noth- 
 ing, that if something can arouse an interest in one 
 
CONSCIOUSNESS OF POWER 137 
 
 study so he does what he knows is creditable work in 
 that subject, he can be led to be interested in other sub- 
 jects or studies, and finally to good work in all his high 
 school studies. This is especially true if he has had but 
 little faith in his ability to do good work in any study. 
 
 Meyers continued his school education until he grad- 
 uated from a higher institution of learning. His schol- 
 arship in this higher institution was not of the highest ; 
 but it was of sufficiently high grade to give him a 
 diploma from the institution, an institution that never 
 gives diplomas to those who do not deserve them. 
 
 At a meeting of the Superintendents' Department of 
 the National Educational Association a few years ago, 
 I became acquainted with the State Superintendent of 
 Public Schools in the state where Meyers was then teach- 
 ing. I had lost track of Meyers, and so did not know 
 where he was located. In the course of our conversa- 
 tion, the Superintendent told me that one of my former 
 scholars was principal of a large elementary school in a 
 certain city in his state, and that he had made a great 
 record; that he was considered the finest principal in 
 that state in his ability to deal with boys and hold them 
 to their school interests. 
 
 Frank K entered the high school at fourteen 
 
 years of age having made a good record in his grammar 
 grade studies. He was rather small for a boy of 
 fourteen, and gave no indications whatever of having 
 entered the stage of puberty, but was in excellent health. 
 He came of good parentage and was well cared for in 
 his home. 
 
 The first year in the high school he carried all his 
 work but made no high grades. The second year in the 
 
138 YOUR PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 high school, he was listless, dreamy ; and while he passed 
 in all his studies, his grades were so low it almost seemed 
 that he had been passed "by grace." 
 
 The second high school year he was evidently under- 
 going great physical changes. He made quite a growth 
 in height, although he never attained a height of more 
 than five feet five inches. 
 
 He had always been neat in his dress, but his third 
 year in the high school he was one of the most dressy 
 boys in the school, caring more for the brush of his hair, 
 the color of his neckties, of which there were many, the 
 crease of his pant legs, and the shine on his shoes, than 
 for any of his studies that the teachers forced on his 
 attention. 
 
 Physically he had passed from boyhood to youth, 
 and the emotional and the mental characteristics were 
 those of this stage. To look at his hair one would think 
 he thought the hairs of his head were all numbered, by 
 the girls, they were so exactly combed. In the some- 
 what select dancing party, he found his greatest pleas- 
 ure. But he was the despair of his teachers. They 
 called upon the principal for help to hold him up in his 
 studies, and the principal called upon the parents, but 
 all to little effect. In some of his studies he failed com- 
 pletely, and in the others made only passing marks. 
 
 When his third year closed, he did not expect to re- 
 enter school for his fourth year; but his parents still 
 hoped he would change his mind and continue in school 
 to his graduation. Two or three weeks before the open- 
 ing of school in September, he called on me at my office 
 to tell me he was thinking of returning to school and to 
 ask what I thought he could do. He asked if I thought 
 it would be possible for him to make up all he had lost 
 the year before and graduate with his class. 
 
CONSCIOUSNESS OF POWER 139 
 
 I replied that it was "up to Mm," he could do it 
 if he would, but that it would mean a year of close, hard 
 work; that he would have no time for any other in- 
 terests ; that all outside interests would have to be given 
 up that he might have time for the work he would have 
 to make up ; but that I had no question of his ability 
 to do it if he only would ; that we would give him the op- 
 portunity and every help possible, but that he alone 
 could say whether or not he was willing to pay the 
 price of graduation. 
 
 I then said further : ' ' Here you are, Frank, a young 
 man of excellent physical health, good mental ability, 
 of polished manners, a representative of one of the best 
 of homes, willing to work at anything you can find to do 
 to earn money, but too intellectually lazy to finish a 
 high school education. You are a young man of good 
 moral character. We all know how finely your brother 
 did in high school. You are as well-equipped mentally 
 as your brother, but you do not seem to be willing to 
 hold yourself down to hard study as he did. There is no 
 need of my telling you of the value of a high school ed- 
 ucation for you know this without words from me. It 
 seems to me it is only a question of your willingness to 
 hold yourself strictly to hard school work for a year in 
 order that you may graduate next June. It's a test of 
 your 'grit.' A fellow with plenty of 'grit' would never 
 question as to whether or not he could hold out, he 
 would simply start in to do it and would do it. He 
 would never for an instant weaken himself by wonder- 
 ing if he could do it. The teachers have but little faith 
 in you as a student, in fact, they think you are a 'dead 
 beat' in class work. You can and must change this. 
 You must do a grade of work that will command their 
 respect. 
 
140 YOUE PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 "To graduate next June is a big undertaking, but 
 I'd clench my teeth in determination to do it. Teachers 
 may have an incredulous smile when they learn you are 
 counting on graduating next June; but all this will 
 change when you show them you are doing the work. 
 
 "Don't be a quitter, come back and show your met- 
 tle. " 
 
 He left the office pretty well decided to make the at- 
 tempt. On the day for enrolling seniors he was on 
 hand to arrange his work. I do not think there was a 
 teacher in the school who had any faith in his carrying 
 the studies he was permitted to take; but for some 
 reason I believed he would do it. The first month had 
 not passed before all knew he was a changed boy. When 
 at the close of the first report period, five weeks, the 
 teachers put their grades on the cards to be sent to par- 
 ents, they would say: "Look at what Frank's done. 
 That's great for him!" And as month after month 
 went by, he rose higher and higher in the esteem of his 
 teachers. 
 
 When he received his first report card with his 
 grade, I looked at his report, grasped his hand and said : 
 ' ' Good, Frank, I believed you would do it. ' ' He smiled, 
 that was all. 
 
 His parents were amazed at the change in him. Other 
 years, he never studied at home however hard the par- 
 ents pressed him to do it ; but now said the father : "We 
 never speak to him about studying his lessons. He is at 
 them often before we are up in the morning, and we 
 leave him working at them when we go to bed. He does 
 no running around at night at all. The one thing he is 
 centered on now is his lessons. My, but we are pleased 
 now when we look over his report card. He seems 
 mighty contented too." 
 
CONSCIOUSNESS OF POWER 141 
 
 At the close of the year in June, Frank graduated, 
 respected and admired by all the school teaching force 
 for what he had accomplished. He carried the heaviest 
 work of any scholar in the high school, and ranked high 
 in his grades. 
 
 With the physical changes of youth accomplished, 
 the mind took on mental vigor unknown before, and like 
 the young child learning to walk, every attempt to do 
 the desired thing brought consciousness of power to do 
 the desired thing. The part the school did was to hold 
 on to the boy until it induced him to make the attempt. 
 
 Sometimes we school people are at a loss to know 
 how to keep a hold on some high school scholars until 
 we can induce them to put forth an effort in the right 
 direction. 
 
 #**###### 
 
 A year or two ago, I heard a dean from one of our 
 great universities say to the students of a large high 
 school that it is a great handicap to a high school boy 
 to be pretty, or good-looking; that the homely-looking 
 high school boys have by far the better opportunity to 
 make something worth while of themselves as they are 
 not drawn away from the serious purposes of the school 
 by the too-great attention that is showered on those who 
 are good-looking. The school laughed heartily. 
 
 I'm inclined to believe there is some truth in the 
 dean's statement. 
 
 I followed Harmon G through the grammar 
 
 grades of the elementary grades on to his graduation 
 from the high school. In the grammar grades he was 
 never a brilliant pupil, far from it, he ranked always as 
 one of the weaker members of his class. But he Was a 
 beautiful boy, always regular in attendance, attentive 
 
142 YOUR PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 to his work; of fine manners, and a very likeable dis- 
 position. He was greatly liked by all his teachers, and 
 by all who knew him. 
 
 He came into the high school at fourteen years of 
 age, and the first year made a record in perfect accord 
 with what he had done in the grammar grades. His 
 teachers were disappointed that he did not do a better 
 grade of work. From his appearance, they expected 
 more. While he was very boyish-looking, he had an ex- 
 ceedingly bright face and fine eyes that caused the 
 teachers at the beginning of his first year in high school, 
 to expect him to show himself one of the better students 
 in his class; but they soon learned that he was one of 
 the weaker ones. 
 
 He was in our high school two years when he left us 
 to live in another city. When he left us at the close of 
 his second year in high school, he was short a semester in 
 each of two studies in which he had failed. He was in 
 the other city high school a year when he returned to 
 us. Now all his boyish look had vanished and he was an 
 unusually handsome youth, one who attracted attention 
 wherever he went, and especially was he a favorite with 
 a certain group of high school girls. But he was still 
 only an ordinary student. His report of credits from 
 the school he had been attending was much the same as 
 the record he had made with us. However, he was with 
 us only a few months, when changes in his plans took 
 him from our school to another before the close of the 
 semester. This broke up his work. At the opening of 
 the next semester, he returned to us. This changing 
 about which could not be avoided, lost him much time. 
 He was somewhat out of heart about ever completing a 
 high school course. Social affairs outside of school had 
 great attraction for him and helped to make him dis- 
 
CONSCIOUSNESS OF POWER 143 
 
 satisfied with the thought of lengthening the time to 
 complete a high school course. 
 
 As the semester moved on, he did not seem to be 
 making much headway with his school work. He was 
 trying to get his father's consent for him to drop out of 
 school and take a job of work in a store. I happened to 
 meet the father one evening about this time. He asked 
 to speak with me about Harmon. 
 
 He said: "I want to ask you one question. It is 
 this : If Harmon were your boy, would you permit him 
 to give up his school and never finish a high school 
 course ? ' ' 
 
 I replied: "No, I would not permit Ifiim to give up 
 his high school. He is too fine a boy not to have a high 
 school education." 
 
 He replied: "That's all I want to know. Harmon 
 will not leave high school until he graduates." 
 
 The following morning Harmon came into my office 
 to talk over his work with me. His father had told him 
 of our conversation, and he knew that he must plan to 
 complete his high school course. But he said he did 
 not believe he was ever going to be able to learn geom- 
 etry, that he could not see through it and would like to 
 give up the study. I knew he could learn geometry for 
 I had followed him in his mathematics sufficiently to 
 know he was not "born short" there. I made this 
 arrangement with him that he should prepare his lesson 
 for the next day and that I would hear him recite it at 
 7 :30 in the morning at my office. I was to try him and 
 see what the trouble was. 
 
 Let no one think for a moment that he would con- 
 sider it as anything unpleasant or in the way of a pun- 
 ishment to recite the lesson to me. We were friends. I 
 
144 YOUR PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 was anxious to help him. He was pleased to come to 
 recite to me. 
 
 He recited the lesson. It was well prepared con- 
 sidering the fact that he had been giving this study so 
 little time in the past that this lesson was for that reason 
 hard for him. He was clear in all his reasoning and in- 
 stead of showing an inability to master geometry, he 
 showed excellent ability providing there was the proper 
 preparation. 
 
 He said he had felt like quitting for he had never 
 been anything but a "tail-ender" all the way through, 
 and that he had gotten tired of forever being the poorest 
 in the class. But since his father's wish was that he 
 should complete his high school course, he would have to 
 do it. Then he added : ' ' I 'm tired, and sick of always 
 being the dummy in the recitation, but I guess it's be- 
 cause I haven't any ability to do good work." 
 
 I replied: "I'm glad you're getting tired of being 
 one of the poorest in your classes. You have good 
 ability, but you don't use it. In the geometry lesson 
 you have recited to me this hour, you show as good 
 ability as I myself have and that is the subject in which 
 I ranked highest as a student in all my high school and 
 university work. 
 
 "The one trouble with you, Harmon, is you do not 
 give time to your lessons. You have never given your 
 high school lessons a fair show. You clerk in the store 
 before school in the morning and after school in the 
 afternoon and on Saturdays ; and you take much time of 
 evenings for your own social pleasure. All of this is all 
 right in its place, but if you are to do creditable work in 
 school, you must find some way to get more time for 
 study. You can, by giving the proper preparation to 
 your work, take your place in the estimation of the 
 
CONSCIOUSNESS OF POWER 145 
 
 teachers and fellow students as one of the best students 
 in your class." 
 
 Before he left my office he said he was going to do 
 everything in his power to be known as a good student 
 rather than a dullard. 
 
 He did improve, and closed the semester with a 
 record in grades far above what he had been making. 
 
 The next year he was permitted to carry some extra 
 work, that he might finish the course in June. He was 
 all school business now. Lessons first, then other things. 
 He was no longer ashamed of his poor recitation stand- 
 ing, for he had become one of the best reciters in all of 
 his classes. Toward the close of the second semester 
 each year, it had long been customary for the senior 
 class to give a play. This year when the dramatic 
 teacher had tested the seniors for their fitness for places 
 in the play, it was found that Harmon had been placed 
 first in her judgment for the leading character; but 
 nothing had been said to him as it was a question 
 whether or not he would be permitted to take the place 
 as he was carrying extra work. But when his case was 
 referred to me with the assurance from all his teachers 
 that he was above question in all his work, I gladly said 
 to give him the place ; that it would do him good. When 
 I met him the next day, I gripped his hand and said: 
 "No longer a tail-ender, Harmon." He looked pleased 
 and asked: "Do you think I can fill the place?" 
 
 He not only filled the place of the leading character, 
 but filled it in a really brilliant manner that captured 
 his audience and called forth rapturous applause. 
 ***#*### 
 
 At the opening of school one September, among the 
 first year scholars was a little, poorly-clad girl, r. 
 
146 YOUR PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 stranger to all of us, as she had come to us from another 
 city where she had completed her eighth grade work. 
 She was so very poorly clad that she drew forth our pity. 
 
 She selected in her elective studies those leading to 
 the business course. The first year and the second 
 passed on with but few words said of our little waif- 
 looking scholar. She was always in her place doing 
 faithfully whatever was assigned her to do, though her 
 work was sometimes below passing. Once or twice I 
 saw her in tears over some failures she had made. The 
 teacher of shorthand said Amelia was a tremendous 
 worker, but did not seem to show much ability. Every- 
 where her work was only ordinary. 
 
 The third year came and found her again in school 
 with some improvement in her appearance, though she 
 still had that uncharitable charity look in clothing. This 
 year she was the same industrious, untiring little person, 
 but at the close of the year, she failed to pass in the 
 second semester of shorthand. She had tried and tried, 
 oh so hard to do the work, but still was below the stand- 
 ard for passing. She was assured, however, that she 
 would be permitted to take up the advance term in 
 shorthand when she returned in September with the 
 privilege of trying to bring up the work in which she 
 had failed, so she could take an examination in it as 
 there would be no class in it until the second semester. 
 
 September found Amelia again in school, but so 
 changed in her dress that she could scarcely be rec- 
 ognized. The shorthand teacher came to me to tell me 
 of Amelia. As soon as school had closed in June, 
 Amelia " hunted" herself a job. " Hunted" is the 
 term, I think. She not only got the job, but she made 
 good in it, and was now again in school clothed in 
 
CONSCIOUSNESS OF POWER 147 
 
 simple, becoming garments that her own efforts had pur- 
 chased. 
 
 And then the shorthand teacher said: "And 
 Amelia says she is going to graduate in June. Poor 
 child! She can't do it, but she says she's got to do it, 
 so I don't know what she may do, but graduation for 
 her this year looks to me like an impossibility. There's 
 last semester's shorthand to be made up, and I doubt 
 if she can carry the shorthand of the present term. But 
 I've promised to give her an examination on last se- 
 mester's work whenever she is ready, though I do not 
 see how she can pass it for she was very poor in it last 
 semester. It is true that she has been doing shorthand 
 work all summer, but of a very simple kind. Still, it 
 would help her some. Poor child, I wish I could help 
 her. She is so gritty and determined.'* 
 
 The principal told me of Amelia. How she had come 
 to him with her plans for graduating and how he had 
 tried to help her to see it was an impossibility for her to 
 graduate the coming June; how she refused to see it as 
 an impossibility and replied : "It's got to be done. I've 
 got to do it. This is my last year in high school. Please 
 let me try to do the work as I have planned and I'll do 
 it. It's got to be done. I've got to do it." 
 
 He could not refuse opportunity to so earnest a little 
 body, so opened the way for her to do all that she might 
 prove able to do, with the assurance of graduation if she 
 did the work. He felt confident that she could not do the 
 work required to complete the course, so cautioned her 
 not to take it too seriously if she found herself unable to 
 do all she had planned. 
 
 But she was not thinking of failing, and replied: 
 "I'm going to do all the work. It's got to be done." 
 
148 YOUR PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 Long before the close of the second semester all 
 knew that Amelia would graduate. Amelia had known 
 it all the time, but the rest of us came to know it long 
 before commencement time. 
 
 How happy Amelia was all the latter part of the 
 year, how her face beamed! And her hair, that was a 
 somewhat tously, krinkly mass, when she entered high 
 school, was now an adornment, shimmery, silky, well- 
 kept, naturally wavy hair, tastefully, loosely, wound 
 about her head in school-girl fashion. All the social 
 functions that marked the close of school were a joy to 
 her. 
 
 As she stepped forward to receive her diploma com- 
 mencement night, the large audience did not know, but 
 the superintendent, principal and teachers knew, that 
 she who stood at that moment taking her diploma into 
 her hand, had done the greatest amount of work, work 
 of fine quality, of any student in the high school that 
 year. 
 
 Amelia said: "It's got to be done. I've got to do 
 it." When in behalf of the Board of Education, the 
 diploma was given her, by that act we said: "You've 
 done it, Amelia." 
 
 Amelia is today a successful typist, holding a good 
 position. 
 
 Amelia awakened, but I do not know how she came to 
 a consciousness of increased power. The school gave 
 her every opportunity for the accomplishment of all 
 that "had to be done." What if the school had not 
 given her opportunity? 
 
 I would not have anyone think that we permitted 
 every scholar that wished to "load up" with a heavier 
 program of studies than is regularly provided for in the 
 course of study, to do it, for we did not permit any such 
 
CONSCIOUSNESS OF POWER 149 
 
 thing. The greatest care was exercised by the principal 
 in making out the program of studies for each scholar. 
 Once in a while a scholar was permitted to take fewer 
 than the regular number of studies for reasons that the 
 principal considered justified the lighter work. Many 
 scholars who were regularly employed earning their 
 living had the privilege of coming to the high 
 school for one lesson, two lessons or more, being present 
 for recitations only. But light work was never per- 
 mitted to be made an excuse for wasting time. The 
 whole thought was to make the school meet the needs of 
 all the scholars. 
 
 Sometimes it seemed wise to give very heavy work in 
 order to secure undivided attention to school work. 
 There are those who do their best work when the work 
 presses heavily to the exclusion of other things. Ordi- 
 narily, where a student failed to pass in some one of his 
 four studies, the regular number for one semester, he was 
 not permitted to try to carry five to even up what he had 
 lost until he had made a good record in the regular num- 
 ber of studies for one semester ; but now and then there 
 were cases where it seemed best to assign an extra study 
 even where there had been failure to pass in some one 
 study the preceding semester. This, however, was never 
 done without due consideration. Too light work is some- 
 times the cause of failures to do good work; too heavy 
 work may cause failure. Assignments of subjects for a 
 term or semester should be made with as complete a 
 knowledge as possible of the scholar's ability and of 
 the probability, sometimes of the possibility of his using 
 his ability for the accomplishment of the work. 
 
CHAPTER XIII 
 
 ON THE WAY TO AND FROM SCHOOL- 
 GATHERINGS UNDER SCHOOL NAMES 
 
 At one of our school board meetings one evening, one 
 member of our board who was at that time a judge of 
 one of the courts, asked me what authority I claimed 
 over the conduct of school children on the way to and 
 from school; and at other times than during school 
 hours. 
 
 I replied that I knew no law that stated my author- 
 ity on the way to and from school; but that I had 
 always claimed the right to demand conduct on the way 
 to and from school that would in no way interfere with 
 the interests of the school; and that I held it my right 
 to correct, even to administering punishment, for con- 
 duct on the way that interfered with the best interests 
 of the school ; that after pupils had reported at home, I 
 claimed no responsibility for their conduct until they 
 started again on the way to school, unless after re- 
 porting to their homes they came into the street to in- 
 terfere in some way with other school children who were 
 on their way to or from school; that sometimes a boy 
 hoping to escape school control for his acts, would hurry 
 home and report, then go out into the street and fight 
 some other boy on his way home from school ; that when 
 this happened, I always claimed the right to demand of 
 the parents that they see to it that their boy or their 
 children did not interfere with school children on the 
 way to and from school. In other words, I claimed the 
 right to hold the parents responsible for their children's 
 conduct after their children had reported at home, in- 
 sofar as it affected the schools. 
 
 150 
 
AWAY FROM SCHOOL 151 
 
 The judge replied that any court would sustain my 
 stand in the matter, that my line of action was per- 
 fectly safe. 
 
 As to the second part of his question, "When not at 
 school?" I made another reply. I answered that when 
 scholars, more especially high school scholars, but ap- 
 plying the term scholars to both elementary and high 
 school members, were gathered together under school 
 class names, or school society names, or school club 
 names, or simply as bodies or groups of school pupils 
 or scholars, since their activities were considered as 
 functions of the school, as superintendent of the schools 
 it was my right and duty to require all of these various 
 groups of young people using the name of some school 
 organization, to conduct themselves in accordance with 
 the wishes of the school authorities, the same as if they 
 were in school during the six hours of the school day. 
 This also was said to be a fair, safe position to hold. 
 
 I never had a parent to object to my assuming 
 authority over the conduct on the way to and from 
 school as stated. In accordance with these views of the 
 school's rights, the conduct was always regulated. 
 
 This gives the school a restraining power that has a 
 wonderful influence on the conduct on the way to and 
 from school; and that keeps the rowdy element from 
 gaining the ascendency in the gatherings held under 
 various organizations of the school. 
 
 A number of years ago I made a mistake in punish- 
 ing a boy for an offense when the boy was wholly re- 
 sponsible to his parents under my own statement of re- 
 sponsibility. The case was as follows: One morning, 
 the principal of one of our elementary schools phoned 
 
 me that Alfred G had unmercifully beaten up 
 
 one of the boys on the way home from school the after- 
 
152 YOUR PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 noon before, saying she would like my help in straight- 
 ening up the affair. 
 
 I replied that I would be at her building as soon as 
 I could leave my office, for her to do nothing until I 
 came. 
 
 A little later, when I called at the school, the prin- 
 cipal brought the two boys into the office and in their 
 presence told me of the "fight" giving all the informa- 
 tion about it she had been able to gather. This prin- 
 cipal had always been very careful in looking into any 
 trouble that might come up, and very trustworthy in 
 her statements about any happening, so on this occasion 
 I received her statement of the case as about correct; 
 but to get the facts as near as possible at first-hand, 
 each boy was given the opportunity to tell his story, to 
 give his version of the affair. 
 
 In the main, the three stories or accounts of the fight 
 agreed. One boy said that for several days he had been 
 trying to keep out of the way of the other boy but, said 
 he: "Yesterday, goin' home, he caught me and pounded 
 me awful." 
 
 Anyone looking at this boy would believe every word 
 he said for he was a "well-pounded up" specimen. 
 
 The other boy said that he had been waiting for a 
 chance to "lick" the first boy, and said he: "I caught 
 him goin' home yesterday after school, and surely I 
 licked him a plenty." 
 
 The principal said "going home from school," the 
 boys both said "goin' home" so there seemed no dis- 
 agreement on this point. 
 
 The boy who had done the "licking" was a sort of 
 a bully, a fighter feared by many boys of his neighbor- 
 hood, and had given not a little trouble by fighting on 
 the way home from school. Everything had been done 
 
AWAY FROM SCHOOL 153 
 
 to keep down his fighting except to administer corporal 
 punishment. So I did not waste much time, but said 
 to him that as he still continued to fight after he had 
 been corrected, time and again for it, I was going to 
 give him a strapping, and that he should remember after 
 this that every time he fought some boy on the way to or 
 from school, he would have to meet me and that the pun- 
 ishment, whatever it might be, would not be light. 
 
 I then gave him a stinging strapping, one that no boy 
 could laugh at or would care to have repeated. 
 
 This boy as I have said, was a sort of bully. He 
 was in the sixth grade, but was large, and stronger than 
 many boys in the higher grades. On former occasions, 
 we had been in touch with his home people and had 
 found them helpless when it came to controlling the 
 boy, so this time, I took charge of him without notifying 
 them. 
 
 After the boy had washed his face, and straightened 
 himself up, the principal returned him to his room. 
 
 I thought then that the affair was settled, and that I 
 should hear no more about it; but that evening I was 
 called to the phone, and a voice said, "This is Mrs. 
 
 Q 1 an d I want to know why you whipped my 
 
 boy today. " I explained what had been done by her 
 boy, and told her just why I had "whipped" him. 
 
 She replied : ' ' But my boy was not on the way home 
 from school, he had been home and had put on his old 
 clothes and was out playing when the other boy came 
 along and my boy licked him. The other boy had been 
 home too, and had been sent over to the grocery, and 
 was going home from there when he got licked." 
 
 Now I knew the woman and had no occasion to doubt 
 her words. So I replied that both boys had spoken of 
 being on the way home, and had said that it was after 
 
154 YOUE PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 school; that neither one had said he had been home; 
 that had I known they had been home, I would not have 
 had anything to do with their fighting; that I had all 
 I cared to look after without mixing up in fights that 
 were none of my business. 
 
 She listened to what I had to say, and then replied : 
 "Mr. Stableton, that's all right. It won't do him any 
 harm, the licking won't. So it's all right," And hung 
 up the 'phone. 
 
 The fact is, she was really pleased that he had been 
 punished for his street fighting, even though she seemed 
 at first to resent my doing it. 
 
 Her statement of the case was correct. The boys 
 had both been home. It was not my business, and I 
 should never have made it my business had I been suffi- 
 ciently careful in the first place in getting the facts. 
 However, it taught me a lesson, the importance of being 
 certain of all the facts in such cases before assuming 
 authority to administer punishment. 
 
 The boy continued in school, but his fighting was a 
 thing of the past. It was good for the boy that I pun- 
 ished him ; but it was bad for me to be so careless as to 
 punish a boy when his offense was none of my business. 
 
 There is no other authority that can so well control 
 fighting, gang attacks, bad language, and many other 
 offenses on the way to and from school as can the school. 
 The vigilance of the teacher and the principal, together 
 with the certain support of the superintendent in 
 bringing all offenders to account, holds these offenses at 
 the minimum. The very certainty that the principal 
 "will get on to it" as the boys say, causes many a 
 "would-be offense "to be put off until Saturday and by 
 that time it is forgotten. 
 
AWAY FROM SCHOOL 155 
 
 Policemen usually regard schoolboy fights and most 
 of the offenses of which we are taking notice, beneath 
 their dignity, as too trivial; but school teachers know 
 that the lives of some school children would be made 
 miserable through fear of some individual boy, some- 
 times girl, or gang, on the way to and from school did 
 not the school exercise control. The timid, in some cases, 
 could not in safety go to and from school without some 
 other protection, did not the school protection make safe 
 the way. 
 
 I remember once when speaking of the responsibility 
 for conduct at school gatherings, before a county asso- 
 ciation of teachers, one teacher asked : ' ' Mr. Stableton, 
 if your high school senior class was to give a party some 
 evening at a private home, would you consider it any 
 business of yours whether or not the members of the 
 class conducted themselves in a proper manner?" 
 
 I replied that I most certainly would consider the 
 conduct of the seniors at a party held in the name of 
 the senior class of our school my business as head of the 
 school; that a permit to use the class name would be 
 granted only where there was assurance that the con- 
 duct at the party, the character of the party, would be 
 such as the school would approve; and that no high 
 school teachers would act as chaperones without the 
 sanction of the high school principal or superintendent ; 
 that the sanction of the principal or superintendent 
 would be given only when the party would be of the 
 kind to reflect credit on the school. 
 
 Our high school teachers were asked not to chap- 
 erone parties of high school students or other young 
 people except those that had received the approval of 
 the high school principal or superintendent. This re- 
 quest was first made because some " outside of school" 
 
166 YOUE PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 parties chaperoned by high school teachers had not been 
 properly conducted, and the fact that high school 
 teachers were the chaperones, had caused the high 
 school to be held responsible for them when, in fact, the 
 high school was in no way connected with them except 
 that high school teachers had chaperoned them. 
 
 It is not asking much of high school teachers to ask 
 them to chaperone only approved school parties and it 
 shuts out confusion of responsibility. 
 
 I wish here to give a little history reaching back to 
 my second year in Bloomington, as I think it will make 
 clear the plan under which high school parties and 
 gatherings of all kinds were held. For eighteen years, 
 the plan has worked admirably. 
 
 During my second year in Bloomington we had 
 some unfortunate happenings connected with our high 
 school parties. At that time there was no attempt made 
 to control them, and as a result parties of various kinds 
 were held in the name of some class or other organiza- 
 tion of the school. 
 
 These parties were held in halls or private homes, 
 and while bearing the name of the high school, they 
 were wholly from under the control or direction of the 
 school authorities. Objectionable characters from out- 
 side the school for whose conduct the school had no 
 right to assume responsibility, but for whose conduct 
 the school was held responsible by an uninformed 
 public, were often present. The whole situation was 
 most unfortunate for the school. 
 
 Finally a party was held at the home of one of the 
 junior girls, what I would call an old-time "class 
 fight," that caused the members of the board of ed- 
 ucation to say when consulted, that the board would 
 stand as a rock back of any effort we should make to 
 
AWAY FROM SCHOOL 157 
 
 bring the social affairs of classes or organizations bear- 
 ing the name of the high school under our control. At 
 the party mentioned, a number of the senior class, 
 backed by the rabble of the street, and I might say, at 
 the invitation of the high school girl, a junior, at whose 
 home the junior party was held, for she had said to 
 some of the seniors the day before that she did not care 
 if they tore the house down, caused serious trouble. The 
 fact was she wanted "a big time," and they most cer- 
 tainly had it. Some of the windows of the house were 
 broken, the cellar was despoiled of a quantity of canned 
 grape-juice, and the whole affair was rowdy in the ex- 
 treme. 
 
 First the matter was placed before the board. I 
 took this precaution from the fact that the privilege or, 
 as some put it, the right to hold class parties at private 
 homes, without the consent of the school authorities, 
 had been established by a precedent of so many years 
 standing that in attempting to make a change, I felt 
 that I must first be sure of not undertaking more than 
 the board would grant me the authority to carry out. 
 
 The senior class was called together and with the 
 high school principal present, the superintendent talked 
 over the situation with the class. Nothing unkind or 
 upbraiding was said, in fact the opposite. He stated 
 that it was not flattery to say that the senior class rep- 
 resented the best selected group of young people in the 
 city, and that no better young people could be found 
 in any city; they were those who had been sifted 
 through almost twelve years of school training, and that 
 their very willingness to hold on to the school work, and 
 their determination to complete the high school course, 
 marked them as among those who would in a few years 
 be leaders in the community. 
 
158 YOUR PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 "But today," said he, "we are in trouble, not be- 
 cause any one has so planned, but because the spirit of 
 fun has carried some of us to where our fun has tres- 
 passed on the rights of others. It has become rowdy- 
 ism. Our school, in the eyes of the public, is disgraced, 
 and it is being questioned by some whether or not a 
 high school is worthy the financial support of the com- 
 munity when such things are done in its name." 
 
 After setting forth the situation as clearty as he 
 could, he stated that the woman at whose home the 
 strife had occurred, was going to enter suit if the dam- 
 age to the property was not made good at once. He ad- 
 vised the class to appoint a committee to wait on the 
 woman to arrange to make good the damage. This was 
 done and an adjustment was made on the payment of a 
 few dollars by the senior class. 
 
 When this trouble was fully settled, the high school 
 principal and the superintendent again called the senior 
 class together, and then the junior class, and explained 
 to each class separately, what would be expected of them 
 in the school social affairs in the future, and how an at- 
 tempt would be made to prevent trouble. He read the 
 rules instituted at this time. These rules stated that no 
 school parties, school class parties, or gatherings of any 
 school organizations, could be held except with the con- 
 sent of the high school principal or the superintendent 
 of the schools; and that permission would be granted 
 only when there was assurance that the affair would be 
 conducted in keeping with the best interests of the 
 school, as determined by the high school principal or 
 superintendent. 
 
 After reading these new rules, which made a com- 
 plete change in the control of the social affairs of the 
 school, he explained quite fully the spirit and manner 
 
AWAY FKOM SCHOOL 159 
 
 in which the rules would be administered. He said first 
 that he believed in school parties, class parties, more, 
 rather than less, social life for high school scholars than 
 was then in the school; that he considered the social 
 life of the high school scholars a very important part 
 of their education just as important as algebra, history, 
 or other studies that were recognized as essential parts 
 of a high school education ; that the superintendent, the 
 high school principal, and the high school teachers, 
 would give every possible aid to make the class parties 
 and other parties of the high school the most beautiful, 
 the most enjoyable of any parties in the city; that the 
 intent was to give the social life of the school its proper 
 recognition as a vital part of the school work, and to 
 take it out of the class to which it had so long been con- 
 signed, the class of attendant evils, chronic evils that 
 could be doctored but could not be cured ; to dignify it 
 so that no school program could be planned that did not 
 give to the social life of the school due thought and con- 
 sideration. 
 
 The high school principal spoke along the same lines. 
 
 The superintendent then said that it would greatly 
 please the high school principal and himself if the class 
 would vote as a class to obey the new rules; that there 
 would be no unkind feeling on the part of the principal 
 and superintendent, if, after discussing the rules in a 
 class meeting, the class should not take such action ; but 
 that the rule would be enforced just the same except 
 that the class by taking such action might save some 
 impulsive members from doing things that would be un- 
 fortunate for them; that it was in the class' power to 
 hold back impulsive members, good, likable, bright, but 
 impulsive scholars, from violations of the rules that 
 might for the best interests of the school, cause them to 
 
160 YOUR PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 suffer even to the extent of losing their places in school. 
 
 Then turning to the class president, the superin- 
 tendent asked him to take charge of the class while the 
 superintendent and high school principal withdrew, that 
 the class might discuss the superintendent's proposition. 
 
 In a few minutes, a committee from the class brought 
 the class president's invitation to the superintendent 
 and the high school principal to return to the class 
 meeting. As they entered the meeting, they were greeted 
 with a hearty welcome. The president then said he was 
 pleased to report that the class had voted to obey the 
 new rules and to support them. 
 
 The superintendent and principal thanked the class 
 for the action taken, and again promised that everything 
 possible would be done to make the remaining months 
 of their closing year, socially, the best they had 
 known. 
 
 The senior class meeting was followed by a junior 
 class meeting where the new rules were explained and 
 the same proposition of cooperation put before the class 
 that had been considered by the seniors. The juniors 
 voted to obey the new rules and thus gave the weight of 
 the class' influence in favor of them. 
 
 While we had no class organizations below the junior 
 class, we thought it best that the new rules making some- 
 what radical changes in the social affairs of the school, 
 should be presented and explained to the entire body of 
 scholars. This was done, but the scholars other than 
 seniors and juniors were not given opportunity to take 
 any action on endorsing them. When seniors and juniors 
 lead, the scholars of lower class rank readily follow. 
 
 Now it was our part to make good in helping with 
 the social affairs as never before. This senior class that 
 had set the example of voting to support the high school 
 
AWAY FROM SCHOOL 161 
 
 rules, was given the most beautiful Senior-Junior Party 
 that had ever been given a class. It was important that 
 the new order of things should make a great impression 
 as something worth while, then the following of it up 
 year after year would fix it as a habit of the school. 
 The Junior-Senior Party was made a striking affair, but 
 the Senior-Junior Party was the party of the year. All 
 other school social affairs were given their share of at- 
 tention, so that at the close of the year the scholars felt 
 that the change had brought them enlarged pleasures. 
 
 The following September, the senior class, after 
 hearing the rules read and an explanation given, voted 
 to obey the rules. The junior class then took the same 
 action. 
 
 This presenting the rules to the senior and junior 
 classes and asking them as classes to pledge to obey and 
 support the rules, asking, I say, but in no way offering 
 any compulsion, became a regular custom, so that each 
 September from then till now, it has been done. Never 
 once has a class failed to give its pledge, and never once 
 has a class broken its pledge or even wavered in holding 
 to it. Only in a very few instances have individuals 
 broken the class pledge, but in these cases the classes 
 have given the offenders no support, no sympathy. 
 
 Once when two or three scholars in our school had 
 committed an offense that was a violation of their class 
 pledge, a schoolman from another city asked: "If two 
 or three members of one of the classes that has pledged 
 itself to support the rules, have broken them, what does 
 the class pledge amount to anyway?" 
 
 I replied: "While it is true that two or three indi- 
 vidual members have broken the class pledge, the fact 
 that their class gives them no support, no sympathy, but 
 looks on them as having proved false to the class, makes 
 
162 YOUR PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 their offense a very simple thing to deal with. Not to be 
 recognized by their class for wrongdoing takes away all 
 glory and adds bitterness to the punishment of the 
 offenders. Oh, with us the class pledge has amounted to 
 everything." Nor did I overstate the facts. 
 
 When this spirit moves the seniors and juniors it is 
 contagious and the other scholars follow in the lead. 
 With this spirit in the high school, the social and other 
 affairs that rightly come under the jurisdiction of the 
 school can be managed in a very satisfactory manner, 
 and with but little worry so far as the conduct of the 
 scholars is concerned if the responsibility for such affairs 
 is held largely in the hands of the principal and the 
 superintendent. But it is necessary for the principal 
 and superintendent from time to time to make clear to 
 the teachers what is expected of them in order that they 
 may not unintentionally complicate what otherwise are 
 very simple matters of administration. 
 
CHAPTER XIV 
 ATTRACTION OF THE OPPOSITE SEX 
 
 Youth is the time of life too when the attraction of 
 the opposite sex comes to many boys and girls with the 
 strong pull of a mighty magnet. I think it was 
 Samantha Allen who said that she always knew that 
 when love came to Sweet Cicely it would go hard with 
 her ; and it did. So it is with many boys and girls, ' ' it 
 goes hard with them. " It is perfectly normal that it is 
 so. We are told today by some physicians that it is not 
 necessary that all children should have measles, and a 
 number of other childhood diseases that in the past we 
 thought all children were heir to; but no psychologist 
 has ever yet told us that there is any way to prevent the 
 attraction between the opposite sexes at this time in life. 
 
 The other day a young man hailed me as I was 
 leaving high school and offered me a ride home in his 
 auto. As we started on the way home, he said to me: 
 "My little boy will be six years old next July, so will 
 be ready for school in September/' 
 
 This was not a startling announcement, but it caused 
 me to think back not a great many years before when the 
 father of this young man, then one of the leading busi- 
 ness men of the city, spoke to me as I was passing his 
 place of business and said: "Mr. Stableton, I don't 
 know whether or not high schools are good things. I'm 
 sure the ward schools are all right, but I'm not so sure 
 that high schools are worth while." I listened very at- 
 tentively to what further he had to say. "Now there is 
 my boy, ' ' said he, * ' He did fine work in ward school, and 
 tended to business; but as soon as he entered the high 
 school, he wanted long pants, to run with the girls, and 
 
 163 
 
164 YOUR PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 to go to parties, so I don't know whether high schools 
 are good things or not." 
 
 All I could say was that he must remember boys 
 cease to be boys and begin to be men at about a certain 
 age, whether in high school or not. 
 
 As I sat with the boy in his car and heard of his 
 boy's being almost ready for entering school, I could 
 but think that the father's concern over the very 
 natural, normal characteristics of the development of 
 youth, had not in any way stayed the boy's onward 
 movement from boyhood to youth, from youth to early 
 manhood, and to fatherhood. 
 
 Those of us who live in the school with boys and 
 girls of this time of life, must understand that all these 
 outcroppings of a strong instinct are not evil, however 
 silly and foolish they may sometimes appear; and that 
 it is ours to guard and nurse them through the first 
 attack. As a rule, if there is a second attack a little 
 later common sense plays a part. 
 
 How prone fathers and mothers are to forget, was 
 brought to my mind one day when a father and mother 
 called to talk about their boy. He was in the throes of 
 his first "love-sickness." There was nothing at school 
 in his conduct that was giving the school any concern 
 except that his grades, while not failures, were lower 
 than they should be. But his parents knew his whole 
 thought was centered on a girl. The "phone" calls 
 back and forth on their home phone had revealed the 
 situation to them. The father was very indignant and 
 out of patience with him, and said the boy had no right 
 to be thinking of girls at this time in life; that he had 
 more important work at hand. The father, indeed, was 
 much stirred up ; but the mother remembered, and 
 smiled and said: "Papa, you needn't say anything, 
 
SEX ATTRACTION 165 
 
 when you were no older than our boy is and I was only 
 fifteen you were just as silly about me as our boy is 
 about this girl, and you wrote me notes all the time." 
 The discussion or conference soon ended. 
 
 Here is an unusual case, call it what you will : 
 The boy was a member of our high school, about 
 seventeen years of age, apparently finely-developed 
 physically, mentally and morally, a fine athlete and of 
 fine carriage and bearing; the pride of his home and 
 admired by all who knew him; and as might be ex- 
 pected, a great favorite with the girls. To put it in 
 common phrase, he fell desperately in love with one of 
 the high school girls ; she was equally smitten with him ; 
 but, as there was nothing in their relations at school 
 that could be criticised, I took no interest in the affair, 
 supposing it was one of those infatuations that, like 
 some childhood disease would run its course in a 
 few weeks and that all it needed was to give nature time 
 to apply the proper restorative; but not so with his 
 people. They believed it best to oppose his fancy; not 
 by unkindness, for he was the idol of his home, but by 
 talking with him, they tried to break the infatuation; 
 but this seemed only to add fuel to the flame until the 
 flood of emotions was too great, and he was, apparently, 
 "beside himself. " 
 
 One morning, I missed the young man and his two 
 sisters from school. The work of the morning had 
 scarcely begun when I was called into the corridor and 
 informed that the young man had run away from home ; 
 that his love affair was the cause of it ; that he had gone 
 west over the II. P. railroad, riding on the blind end of 
 a baggage car; and that he had left a note, written in 
 his girl friend's handwriting, telling why he had gone. 
 It was the middle of January and the thermometer reg- 
 
106 YOUR PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 istered twenty-five degrees below zero. His parents 
 feared he would be frozen, and had wired the different 
 stations west on the road but had received no word. 
 They said they knew the girl would hear from him, and 
 asked me to find out, if possible, from her where he was. 
 
 The second morning, when she came in, I asked her 
 if she had received any word from him. She replied 
 that she had, that he was in a western town and all 
 right. She was very nervous and excited, so much so 
 that I thought she had not given me a correct report. 
 That forenoon our county supervisor of the poor re- 
 ceived a telegram from the supervisor of a county farm 
 farther west, saying that a young man from our county, 
 with both feet badly frozen, had been taken to the 
 county poor-house in that county, and asking what 
 should be done with him. It was immediately inferred 
 that he was the boy who had run away. His father 
 came to the school and asked me to interview the girl 
 again and find out if possible what she knew. I called 
 her into the hall, said to her that word had come that 
 made the boy's people think he was in a bad condition 
 from frozen feet and in a county house farther west; 
 that I believed she had word from him that she had not 
 given me; and that she ought to let me know in order 
 that his people might go to him if he needed them. 
 
 She burst out crying, and, snatching a letter from 
 her bosom, said, "Here it is; here it is/' and handed 
 me the letter. I read it. In it, he told her that he had 
 stayed on the baggage car until both his feet were 
 frozen solid; that he feared he might lose them; that 
 he was then in the county house ; that no difference what 
 happened, he would never come back home. The re- 
 mainder, and far the greater part of the letter, was 
 taken up with his avowals of undying love for his 
 
SEX ATTRACTION 167 
 
 darling, his own. It was a boy wailing at the feet of his 
 idol. It poured forth such a volume of endearing terms 
 that I hesitated to read it, but read it that the father 
 might know. 
 
 The father went for him on the first train and 
 brought him home. Both feet were badly frozen, and 
 in a short time it became necessary to operate on both 
 of them so that he was left somewhat of a cripple for 
 life. 
 
 I asked the girl why she had helped him to run 
 away in such cold weather. "Oh, Mr. Stableton," she 
 replied, "I did not know what to do; he got so I was 
 almost afraid of him ; he threatened to kill himself, and 
 even did try to kill himself with laudanum, so when he 
 said to me he was going away, I could not keep from 
 helping him. ' ' A few nights before he ran away he had 
 taken a heavy dose of laudanum and gone to the girl's 
 home to die, but she and her people worked with him 
 and prevented the drug's being fatal. 
 
 The boy had said he couldn't stand the way he was 
 being treated at home any longer; yet, except that his 
 people objected to his paying so much attention to this 
 girl and spending so much of his time at her home, he 
 was the pet of his own home. 
 
 The boy was confined to his home for a few weeks; 
 but as soon as he was able to be about on crutches, he 
 returned to school. By this time the infatuation had 
 lost its hold on him. He and the girl finally graduated 
 from the high school in the same class; but they were 
 never again anything to one another. He, more than 
 once, talked the whole affair over with me and always 
 said that he was willing to go limping through life, if 
 it were necessary to escape marrying the girl in whom 
 he had ceased to have any interest. He afterwards 
 
168 YOUR PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 graduated from one of our leading medical colleges. 
 Both he and the girl found other life partners. 
 
 Love affairs are just as natural to boys and girls as 
 is hunger. Now and then a boy or girl seems to be im- 
 mune, but later on even this one is affected. 
 
 It is the racial propagation instinct that unfolds at 
 this time, and with some for a while, it is all-absorbing, 
 all-overpowering. When it is strong before the judg- 
 ment is developed, indiscretion and what we sometimes 
 call silliness, are characteristics of the individual. Then 
 great care should be exercised by parents and teachers ; 
 not that these boys and girls are evil in any sense; but 
 they are wholly under the sway of their feelings; their 
 judgment has not yet come to them, so the good judg- 
 ment, we sometimes call it common sense, of parents and 
 teachers must be in place of their own which will come 
 later. And how tactfully this judgment must be prof- 
 fered them, else the helper will fail in his mission. I 
 remember, a number of years ago, when I was teaching 
 in a western college and living in the college boarding- 
 hall, the case of a young couple that possibly brings 
 out the point I would make clear. 
 
 The girl and the boy were both students in the col- 
 lege preparatory classes; the girl roomed in the board- 
 ing-hall, the boy, in a private home. The preceptress 
 kept in close sympathy with the girl and held her con- 
 fidence. The girl was quick and impulsive, moved 
 almost wholly by her feelings, and as the young man was 
 her first (young man) friend, he filled a large part of 
 her horizon. They were not crossed by the principal or 
 preceptress, but every care was taken that they should 
 meet as young people worthy of the confidence of their 
 school guardians; they felt themselves worthy of every 
 confidence for they were conscious of the fact that all 
 
SEX ATTRACTION 169 
 
 their intentions were pure and good, and knew not that 
 their judgment was still a somewhat minus quantity; 
 but they met under conditions that reduced, to a min- 
 imum, the opportunity for any indiscretion that would 
 call forth unfavorable comments. The girl felt free to 
 talk with the preceptress confidentially about the young 
 man. The preceptress was a woman of mature years, 
 whose experience enabled her to be helpful. Finally 
 the boy's father, having heard of the affair, wrote him a 
 letter, taking exception to his paying attention to the 
 girl, and said the affair must stop. This angered the 
 boy and troubled the girl. She went immediately to the 
 preceptress and told her what had taken place, and all 
 in tears, said she knew she could never love another as 
 she loved this young man ; and then asked her friend the 
 preceptress if she had ever felt that way. The pre- 
 ceptress, with a good, comforting smile, said, "Yes, 
 dear, a dozen times. " 
 
 But the preceptress was wise in that she caused the 
 girl to know that she was not opposed to the friendship 
 and would do nothing to break it off. No opposition 
 from her school friend, but only a word of friendly ad- 
 vice to be really womanly and not to worry because the 
 young man's father did not seem to approve the friend- 
 ship. 
 
 The preceptress well knew the way to accomplish 
 the thing the father desired, was not to intensify the in- 
 terest by opposing it, but to treat the young people with 
 every consideration and hold their confidence, thus, 
 without making too much of the affair, giving time for 
 nature to effect a cure, which it did. 
 
 A few years ago, two young people of our high school 
 were so taken up with each other that some of the 
 teachers and the principal feared they would make 
 
170 YOUR PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 themselves the laughing-stock of the school. As I knew 
 the boy, and had known him intimately for a number of 
 years, I called him into my office one day and asked him 
 if I might, as his friend, guard him on a matter that he, 
 possibly, might think none of my business. He blushed, 
 and replied that certainly I might, he would be glad to 
 have me do so. I then said that I had noticed that he 
 and one of the girls had become quite good friends, that 
 I had not one word to say against the friendship, for I 
 respected them both; but, that as a young man who 
 cared for the respect in which his girl friend was held, 
 he ought to watch himself and not permit himself to 
 meet her accidentally too often, as they went to and 
 from school ; and as I knew her people did not object to 
 his going to her home, I advised him to visit her at her 
 home and not to be walking the streets with her after 
 school hours; that people were making remarks that 
 were doing her injury; and that I knew he, as her 
 friend, would do everything in his power to protect her 
 from gossip. In this manner, we talked over their re- 
 lations and the points that he should consider, for Tier 
 sake especially, and also for his own. I talked to him 
 as a young man, my friend, and he responded as I 
 wished. He thanked me for my words of interest, and 
 what was more, while the friendship did not die out at 
 once, their relations in and about the school and on the 
 street assumed a more dignified form that could be but 
 little criticised. 
 
 Most all of these little affairs between boys and girls 
 of this age, so far as their conduct relates to the school, 
 can be handled most satisfactorily by rightly appreciat- 
 ing the spirit, and while not condemning that which is 
 but the outcropping of the instinct for the preservation 
 of the species, still directing, until fully-developed 
 
SEX ATTRACTION 171 
 
 powers enable the youth to act with some judgment, even 
 in these things. 
 
 When I speak of properly guarding the interests of 
 grammar grade pupils and high school scholars, I mean 
 that we should make all the conditions and surroundings 
 at school, as conducive as possible to the free, whole- 
 some mingling of the two sexes. We must always re- 
 member that the public schools have representatives 
 from the homes of "all sorts and conditions of men," 
 and that in the advanced grammar grades and the high 
 schools, we have them at the period of life when in- 
 herited tendencies crop out, and the sex instinct is up- 
 permost, at least for a part of this period; that many 
 have little or no judgment, but are moved almost 
 wholly by their emotions. 
 
 In the one-room school in the rural district, the 
 teacher should always be at the school first in the morn- 
 ing to welcome the pupils as they come ; and at noon, as 
 many of the scholars eat their noon lunch at the school, 
 so should the teacher ; at the close of school in the after- 
 noon, the teacher should be the last to leave the building 
 and see that it is properly closed. The teacher's pres- 
 ence all the day long suggests the right conduct on the 
 part of the members of the school, and gives no op- 
 portunity for any improprieties that might bring crit- 
 icism on members of the school or the school itself. Yet 
 the school has enjoyed the teacher if of the right type, 
 from the early "Good-morning" to the afternoon 
 closing, "Good Night." 
 
 Not long ago, I was riding with a friend in the 
 country. It had rained a part of the afternoon, and 
 was still drizzling when we approached a one-room 
 school that had just closed its work for the day. We 
 met the teacher, a young man protected by a raincoat, 
 
172 YOUR PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 a short distance from the school, going to his home. A 
 number of the younger boys and girls passed us on their 
 way home ; but when we came near the school-house, we 
 saw several of the older ones standing inside the school- 
 room door, apparently waiting for the rain to cease 
 drizzling. The teacher had evidently put on his rain- 
 coat and gone home, leaving a few of his grammar grade 
 pupils alone in possession of the school-house, a school- 
 house with no dwelling house in sight. Later on, I came 
 to know that this young man was counted one of the best 
 young teachers in his county, and was held in high es- 
 teem by the patrons of his school; but he failed to 
 realize the whole responsibility that was his or he would 
 never have gone home at the close of the school day 
 leaving a handful of advanced grammar grade pupils 
 in the school building out of the sight of human habita- 
 tion, to wait for the shower to pass by. 
 
 In the small town school, the same care as in the 
 strictly rural school should be exercised. When in the 
 town or city school the principal has planned the move- 
 ment of pupils or scholars about the school so that they 
 are almost continuously under the observation of some 
 teacher, from the time of entering the building to the 
 time of leaving it, under the eye of some teacher who is 
 interested to be helpful, not one who is continually on 
 the look-out for some offense to report to the principal, 
 there is not apt to be anything serious to be corrected or 
 even criticised. Usually, where the proper care is ex- 
 ercised by the principal and his assistants, and the right 
 spirit prevails in the school, if little indiscretions are 
 seen, a word of friendly counsel, kindly given in private, 
 is all that is necessary to hold the conduct of all above 
 criticism. 
 
SEX ATTRACTION 173 
 
 Our principals were always first on hand at the 
 buildings, and they always saw that all pupils and schol- 
 ars were out of the buildings at the proper time in the 
 afternoon. The noon hours where pupils ate their lunch 
 at the school were provided for in a way not to make it 
 a burden on any one teacher. 
 
 In our elementary schools, our principals were 
 women of rare qualifications for the positions. They 
 so ably managed their buildings that the life of the 
 school was about as helpful to grammar grade pupils as 
 it could be made. There was oversight of them in their 
 mingling together, but it was a sympathetic oversight, 
 and not a nagging, spying on them. Boys and girls 
 know the difference in these, even if they cannot ex- 
 press it in words. 
 
 Sometimes a principal would ask: "Mr. Stableton, 
 have you noticed Henry's or John's (as the case might 
 be) hair, and necktie?" 
 
 As I would look in the direction indicated, I would 
 see a transformed head of hair, and a flaming new neck- 
 tie. 
 
 " It is all because he has taken a fancy to that tastily- 
 dressed girl in the corner to your right, Jane Smith, and 
 he is trying to appear well in her eyes. Why, even his 
 finger-nails are cleaned up. We teachers think his 'first 
 fancy' is having a fine effect on him. We can see by 
 many little things that he thinks Jane is about perfect, 
 but there is nothing in his conduct to criticise. He has 
 always been so careless that we are glad to see some- 
 thing so completely change him for the better." After 
 the principal had thus called my attention to the trans- 
 formation and its cause, she would pass on to other 
 things. 
 
174 YOUR PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 Boys and girls at the time of their "budding 
 fancies" are safe in the hands of able principals who 
 have an appreciative understanding of them, principals 
 who, unknown to the boys and girls, protect them and 
 thus avoid the impossibility of correcting them. 
 
 In our high school, the principal planned the man- 
 agement of his building with greatest care to give ample 
 opportunity for the democratic mingling of all the schol- 
 ars with the least possible opportunity for indiscretions 
 that could be criticised. Possibly if you will permit my 
 using the term so well understood by all, yet a word not 
 found in the choicest diction, I would say with the 
 least possible opportunity for acting "spoony." 
 
 The principal well knew that where a number of 
 scholars are mingling openly, and especially if there is 
 a teacher whom they hold in high esteem present with 
 them, there is found little or no objectionable conduct ; 
 and with this in view, he planned the movements of the 
 scholars in and about the school, and wherever gathered 
 together under school names. 
 
 All rooms and parts of the building when not in use 
 were locked. The principal and his secretary, as well as 
 the assistant principal, were in the office of the principal 
 each morning a few minutes before the time for the ad- 
 mission of scholars. Shortly after the arrival of the 
 principal and assistant, the teachers called at the prin- 
 cipal's office for the keys to their rooms, passed to their 
 rooms, or to those parts of the building of which they 
 had oversight for the period before class work began. 
 All parts of the building, the class-rooms for first-hour 
 classes with teachers in charge, the study-halls with a 
 teacher in each, the - laboratories, a teacher present, the 
 corridors or halls with teachers here and there, each 
 with a definite part of the hall to look after, were thrown 
 
SEX ATTRACTION 175 
 
 open to scholars. From the time of opening these parts 
 of the building to them, to within fifteen minutes of the 
 set time beginning first recitations, they were free to 
 move about, visit or chat as they pleased. All that was 
 expected of them was that the boys be manly and the 
 girls womanly in their conduct. It was a rare thing 
 for anyone to forget self-control so far as to be spoken 
 to. 
 
 Fifteen minutes before first hour recitations, the hall 
 clocks gave the signal for all to leave the corridors and 
 pass into their first hour recitations, or to their seats 
 for the first hour in the study-halls. 
 
 At the close of each recitation hour, there was the 
 same free mingling as the scholars changed from class- 
 room to classroom. Here and there about the halls were 
 teachers speaking pleasantly to passing scholars, seem- 
 ingly a part of the very happy throng, suggesting by 
 their presence the right conduct on the part of the schol- 
 ars. And so on through the day, freedom of movement, 
 but always under conditions of safety. 
 
 Teachers were given a certain time after the closing 
 of school at 3 :30 o 'clock p. m. for conference and 
 1 i make-up ' ' work with the scholars. At the close of this 
 " make-up" hour the clocks sounded the signal for 
 teachers to dismiss and send from the building all schol- 
 ars. 
 
 The principal aimed to have the building free from 
 scholars before the shades of evening darkened the 
 building. The mid-winter make-up and conference hour 
 was much shorter than that of the fall and spring 
 months, as with us, it was sometimes almost dark at 
 4:00 p. m. in January. 
 
 Before the teachers left the building, they returned 
 their keys to the secretary in the principal's office. 
 
176 YOUR PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 Of later years, there was a great increase in the 
 number of students from rural schools attending our 
 high school. The principal found in enrolling them for 
 school, that some who came in of a morning and re- 
 turned home after the close of school each day on an in- 
 terurban car, must either come on a car arriving soon 
 after seven o 'clock a. m. or one that arrived after 9 :00 
 a. m. In some cases, he could and did arrange the pro- 
 grams of recitations for the scholars to come on the 
 later car. In other cases, this could not be done. The 
 question at once came up as to how those arriving at the 
 school about 7 :30 a. m. could be cared for until the time 
 for the principal to be in his office. But two places in 
 the city were open at that hour for boys, the Y. M. C. A. 
 and the poolrooms ; for the girls, no place at all. As the 
 superintendent's office was in the high school building, 
 and he was always in his office at 7 :30 a. m., he offered 
 the use of his outer office for the accommodation of these 
 early-arriving scholars. His office was open to the pub- 
 lic at this hour, and had its own entrance which made 
 it unnecessary to open any other part of the building. 
 These scholars came immediately from the car to the 
 superintendent's outer office, where they studied until 
 the principal arrived and admitted them to his outer 
 office. 
 
 The high school building was much used of evenings 
 for parties, and other gatherings of the school. On these 
 occasions all parts of the building not used for the 
 party gatherings were locked up. 
 
 But, says some teacher: "It looks to me as if you 
 did not trust them at all, and that the scholars would 
 get very tired of always having teachers around." 
 
 I would say in reply to this statement that it is be- 
 cause we did trust them, intelligently trust them, and 
 
SEX ATTRACTION 177 
 
 had faith in their goodness that they were given, at the 
 habit-fixing time of life, every opportunity to practice 
 the right conduct until it tended to fix itself as a habit of 
 right conduct; that as far as their tiring of having 
 teachers around, that depends entirely on the teacher or 
 teachers ; there are teachers who would make themselves 
 so offensive to the scholars as to ruin all ; but on the other 
 hand, there are teachers, many teachers, who intelli- 
 gently make themselves so acceptable to the scholars that 
 their presence is always, at any party, or gathering of 
 high school scholars, hailed with delight. In the pres- 
 ence of these teachers, the scholars always measure up 
 to their best. The scholars know that these teachers 
 would not be satisfied with poor class work, nor with 
 anything short of the best conduct ; and they also know 
 that a party never lags in interest with these teachers 
 present to help in entertaining. It all depends on the 
 teachers whether or not the scholars tire ' ' of having them 
 around/' 
 
CHAPTER XV 
 WHAT WOULD YOU DO WITH THEM? 
 
 John King in the fifth grade was a good reader and 
 and an unusually good thinker for that grade, but could 
 not write sentences at all. On through the eighth grade, 
 it was the same, an intelligent reader, excellent in arith- 
 metic, except in written form, finely posted in geogra- 
 phy and U. S. History, and the leader of his class in 
 civics, but wholly unable to put anything into written 
 form. He would try when written lessons were given 
 to write out what he could recite well orally, but all that 
 he put down was a mere jumble of misspelled words, not 
 sentences. He was not promoted to the high school but 
 was permitted to enter the high school to get all he could 
 out of it. 
 
 It seemed impossible for him to "think out" through 
 his fingers, if I may so state it. All the efforts of his 
 teachers to develop this power in him had so far been 
 fruitless. Some very expert teachers had tried to teach 
 him to write sentences, but they finally gave up the task 
 as hopeless. It seemed that while he was trying to write, 
 only a word now and then could get out from his think- 
 ing center by way of his fingers, and be recorded or 
 written down, that these single words dropping out at 
 odd times had no connection, and as a result, he never 
 wrote in sentences. 
 
 Once a number of years ago in talking with Mr. 
 George P. Brown, who was at that time a well-known 
 and distinguished writer on education, he said to me 
 that it was so much easier for him to write out his 
 thoughts than for him to speak them. "I think," said 
 he, "That the bridge of nerve fibers that connects the 
 
 178 
 
WHAT WOULD You Do 179 
 
 thinking center in my brain with the motor center that 
 controls my fingers is much more perfect and contains 
 a larger number of nerve fibers than the bridge of nerve 
 fibers that connects the thinking in my brain with the 
 motor center that controls my tongue. At least, my 
 thoughts flow out very rapidly through my fingers, and 
 very slowly through my tongue, so slowly that it makes 
 me very deliberate in speaking; but my fingers give in- 
 stant expression to my thoughts. Or it may be, there 
 is a better connection between the center that controls 
 my fingers and the muscles of my fingers, than there is 
 between the motor center that controls my tongue and 
 the muscles of my tongue. ' ' 
 
 I am not passing on the correctness or incorrectness 
 of Mr. Brown's thoughts concerning himself, but refer 
 to his talk because his talk with me led me years after to 
 try to think out some possible cause for this boy's not 
 being able to write out his thoughts. But before giving 
 my thoughts as to the possibility of the cause of his 
 difficulty, I will tell something of his high school history. 
 
 John King was greatly interested in athletics, and as 
 a grammar pupil had made a fine record in football and 
 basketball. In the high school, no scholar was eligible 
 to play on any athletic team unless he were carrying 
 three of his four studies above a passing grade. John 
 King's heart was set on making the football team. He 
 gave close attention to his lessons and was above in three 
 studies so that he played on the football team the first 
 semester. In English, he was marked low. 
 
 His English teacher called on me to talk with me 
 about him. She said he recited the oral parts of the 
 lessons well, that he knew the stories so well that he 
 could answer any questions or give the stories complete. 
 "But, Mr. Btableton," said she, "In all the time he has 
 
180 YOUR PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 been in my class, in all the written work I have called 
 for, I have never been able to get a single English sen- 
 tence from him. He always writes but there is nothing 
 but poorly-spelled, non-related words, in what he writes. 
 He called to see me about his mark and felt very badly 
 because it was so low. I told him that his written work 
 had not been up to standard and that it was the cause 
 of his low mark. ' ' 
 
 She then asked to know about him and how he came 
 to be in the high school with no power at all to write 
 English. She was troubled to know what to do and was 
 looking for help. 
 
 I gave her a full history of the boy's case. She was 
 greatly interested, anH said she would do her best to 
 help him, but did not know what she might be able to 
 accomplish. 
 
 She was a teacher who never failed to do her best by 
 every scholar that came under her instruction. She was 
 an unusually talented teacher of English, able to a de- 
 gree seldom attained by teachers of high school English. 
 
 The second year he was in the high school, another 
 teacher of English, hearing of his case, said to me that 
 she would like the privilege of teaching him, that she 
 was sure she could bring up his English written work. 
 This teacher was also a very strong teacher. I was 
 pleased to have her interested in the boy's case to the 
 extent that she would like to see what she could do in 
 teaching him to put his thoughts down in writing. I 
 spoke to the principal and he transferred John King to 
 this teacher's class. She left nothing undone that she 
 knew to do to teach him to write sentences and express 
 his thought in written words. She was very enthusi- 
 astic when she began the work, but at the end of six 
 weeks hard work with him she said to me: "I've taught 
 
WHAT WOULD You Do 181 
 
 him nothing. He has put forth every effort he can in 
 trying, but he is not any better off than when he came 
 to me. He simply cannot connect up his thinking with 
 his writing, and I've come to believe that he cannot be 
 taught to do it. ' ' He continued in the high school three 
 years and did fine oral work in Geography, History, 
 Civics, some parts of English, in fact, in all oral work, 
 but never developed the power to express himself through 
 the medium of writing. While this lack of ability to 
 write out his thoughts handicapped him more or less, 
 still he gained great good from his three years in the 
 high school. The three years were well spent. 
 
 All this time, I had been thinking a great deal of his 
 case. The last year he was in school, in thinking of this 
 case, I recalled to mind what Mr. George P. Brown had 
 said to me some years before of his powers of expressing 
 himself. I wondered if the boy's shortage of power to 
 express himself in written form were not due to a lack 
 of some kind in the nerve fiber connections from his 
 thought center to his motor centers controlling his 
 fingers, or out from the motor center to the muscles that 
 move the fingers; while the fact that he could express 
 himself by means of spoken words would seem to in- 
 dicate a better nerve fiber communication from his 
 thought center to his motor center controlling the organs 
 of speech and out from this motor center to the muscles 
 moving the organs of speech. If this were true, no 
 teaching and no effort on his part could help him. No 
 new nerve fibers could be caused to grow to give a better 
 outlet through his fingers. 
 
 I have already mentioned that he was a fine athlete, 
 fine in both football and basketball. He was skillful in- 
 deed in putting the ball into the basket. His control of 
 the larger muscles of his arms and hands, and to some 
 
182 YOUR PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 extent the large muscles of his whole body, but especially 
 those of his arms, and hands, was very perfect. 
 
 It occurred to me that as he thought so accurately 
 through these larger muscles in ball games, might it not 
 be possible for him to learn to write wholly with the arm 
 movement and thus be able to express himself in written 
 form? With this thought in mind, I called him in one 
 day and talked with him about trying to train the 
 larger muscles for this purpose. But the close of the 
 year was near and, as he did not return to school 
 the next year, I think he never tried to use the larger 
 muscles for this purpose. 
 
 Jane Moore was a member of an eighth grade grad- 
 uating class, in all her studies but two, at one of the 
 elementary school buildings. Her principal, who was 
 also her teacher, and I, were arranging a list of those 
 who would be graduated. When we came to Jane's 
 name, the principal asked what I would recommend in 
 her case. Jane had come to us from a rural school three 
 years before as a seventh grade pupil short in arithmetic. 
 Later on, we found that it would be necessary for her 
 to give three years to the work of the seventh and the 
 eighth grades other than Arithmetic. Now that the 
 three years were almost past, the question of what should 
 be done for her came up again. When she came to us, 
 she knew no arithmetic more than addition, subtraction, 
 multiplication and division of whole numbers; and in 
 the three years we had been able to add but little to her 
 knowledge of this subject. She was a fine penman, good 
 in her eighth grade English, an excellent speller, only 
 fair in U. S. History, and short in civics. 
 
WHAT WOULD You Do 183 
 
 I replied that the only question in deciding what we 
 should do for her was the question of which would be 
 better for her, another year in the eighth grade repeat- 
 ing the work, or to be placed in the high school, not pro- 
 moted to it, where there was more work that would in- 
 terest her, and that she could do, such as English, Art, 
 Domestic Art, History, and other subjects ; that I was in 
 favor of placing her in the high school ; that she was a 
 girl past sixteen years of age, so should be associated 
 with scholars older than the incoming eighth grade 
 students if she were to gain anything from her school 
 associations. 
 
 The principal was pleased with my decision. She 
 said the girl had gotten all she could get from the grade 
 work and needed a change; that the new interests in 
 the high school would appeal to her strongly, and that 
 she would get great good from the high school. 
 
 She said further that Jane had been a very unhappy 
 girl all the year because of the faultfinding of her home 
 people; that Jane's people were very wealthy and had 
 moved into the city to educate their children ; that Jane 's 
 not being able to keep up in school work with the neigh- 
 bor girls had made her mother very bitter. 
 
 I called at Jane's home on my way back to my office 
 and told her mother what we thought best to do if it 
 met her approval. 
 
 She thanked me for the interest taken, and said she 
 would be pleased to have Jane take advantage of our 
 offer. 
 
 After giving me this reply, she told me how disap- 
 pointed they were that their children were not capable 
 of taking an education ; that they had moved to the city 
 to educate their children and had found that their child- 
 ren could not learn as other children did. 
 
184 YOUR PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 Jane spent three very profitable years in the high 
 school, selecting the studies that appealed to her in the 
 lines where she was capable of doing good work. She 
 did work that commanded the respect of both teachers 
 and classmates. 
 
 ********* 
 
 Julius Clark was a member of a June 8-A class in 
 one of our eighth grade buildings. He was a youth of 
 fine physique; honest, bright of face; big brown eyes 
 that looked straight at you, and sparkled when pleased, 
 but painfully slow at learning. 
 
 He was sixteen years of age, repeating a part of his 
 work, and still below passing. He was not feeble-minded, 
 but was unquestionably slow at learning from books. 
 
 He was the finest athlete in his school, and bore him- 
 self so well toward the other boys that he was their un- 
 questioned leader. His teacher remarked to me one day 
 that Julius would never know how greatly she was in- 
 debted to him for the easy discipline of her room; that 
 what Julius did was always right in sight of the boys, 
 and that Julius always did right; that while she had a 
 large school and many of them boys, with Julius there 
 she never felt a care so far as good order was concerned. 
 Yet with all this strength of personality, Julius could 
 not be marked as passing in his 8-A studies. 
 
 After talking with his teacher and principal, I called 
 Julius into the principal's office and told him that we 
 thought it best for him to be placed in the high school 
 the coming semester; that while he was below passing 
 in his studies and for this reason we could not give him 
 an eighth grade certificate, still he could enter the high 
 school in September ; that we believed it would be better 
 for him than to continue longer in the eighth grade. 
 
WHAT WOULD You Do 185 
 
 He was pleased to know he would be permitted to 
 enter the high school, and asked if his not being up with 
 his eighth grade work would keep him out of athletics 
 the first semester in high school. 
 
 I replied that his eighth grade work would not count 
 against him in athletics, but that he must be carrying 
 three out of his four high school studies to be on an ath- 
 letic team. 
 
 Julius entered high school in September, and was out 
 on first call for a football practice game, hoping later to 
 win a place on the high school team. He proved one of 
 the finest of the new boys out for football, and in the 
 final tryout, won a place on the team. 
 
 It was now up to him to keep above passing in at 
 least three of his four studies or give up his place on the 
 team. He kept his place on the team and he kept it by 
 devoting all his powers to but two things, his studies, 
 and his athletic team work. 
 
 The first year he passed in three of his four studies 
 and had his full part in the high school athletics. His 
 grades were not high but they were well above passing ; 
 and they were not won without earnest effort. 
 ********* 
 
 A number of years ago when I entered upon the sup- 
 erintendency of the schools in a certain town, I found a 
 peculiar condition existing in the 8th grades. The classes 
 in these grades were so large that they were unwieldy ; 
 and in one of these classes, I found a number of big boys 
 and girls from 15 to 17 years of age, with no interest 
 whatever in the school work. I looked at them. They 
 made me think of wild animals confined in a cage. I 
 knew that something must be done and done quickly or 
 a number of them would leave school. I studied the 
 
186 YOUE PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 problem. For nine and in some cases ten years, they had 
 been fed on a mental diet of reading, spelling, arith- 
 metic, grammar, and a little history; from 6 years to 
 17 this had been their diet. It struck me that the only 
 way to put life into them would be to change their food. 
 I called their parents together and laid the case before 
 them. Here was a number of young people who for 
 nine or ten years had been fed on the same diet until it 
 had become so distasteful to them that they refused to 
 take it ; what should I do ? Let them starve mentally, or 
 give them a change of diet and bring about vigorous 
 mental activity ? I admitted that there were many prob- 
 lems in the arithmetic that they could not solve, and 
 many constructions in the grammar that they could not 
 dispose of; but what should we do, hold them longer to 
 these studies and drive them out of school, or give them 
 the first year studies of the high school and thus save 
 them to four years of school training? I said to the 
 parents that admitting the shortage in their work, still 
 I believed the only thing to be done was to give them the 
 new work ; but that I wished the parents to speak freely 
 and say whether or not they approved of the plan. 
 
 One gentleman, who for a number of years previous 
 had been on the Board of Education, and whose two 
 sons were among the number we were considering said : 
 "I am ready for you to try anything with my boys. I 
 am all out of heart about them. For years I was a mem- 
 ber of the Board of Education, I blamed the teachers, 
 then I blamed the books, then the superintendent be- 
 cause my boys got along so slowly ; then I blamed myself. 
 Last year I asked the superintendent to examine them 
 closely and tell me what he thought about them. So the 
 superintendent took them to his office, talked with them 
 and questioned them, and then told me that the fact was 
 
WHAT WOULD You Do 187 
 
 the boys were dull and could not learn much, so I have 
 come to the conclusion that he is right, and that they are 
 dummies. If you can do anything to interest them and 
 keep them in school, I '11 be only too glad, but I 've about 
 given up hope. ' ' These two boys were given a change of 
 diet and immediately began to thrive, and finally grad- 
 uated from the high school. 
 
 Another one of this same class : My first introduction 
 to this boy was one day, when an old woman who lived 
 near the school called at my office and laid complaint 
 against him for tearing down a part of her fence. I 
 spoke to his teacher about him and requested her to send 
 him to me at noon after the other pupils had passed out. 
 In speaking of him, she said he was the worst boy in her 
 room and that she dreaded him more than all the others 
 put together. At noon I met him, and told him what 
 complaint had been made. He confessed that he had 
 committed the offense, and said that he would do noth- 
 ing of the kind again. He was a regular Hercules, six- 
 teen years of age and in the grammar grade. The thought 
 came to me that he needed more work, and that he too 
 had ceased to be interested in the things he had studied 
 for ten years. I put him into the first year in the high 
 school and he worked like a steam engine and made a 
 splendid record in his studies. Hard work in the things 
 that interested him was his salvation; the day that his 
 work was lightened up he was hard to control, but by 
 working him so that he had no time for anything else he 
 did high grade work and was happy and bothered no one. 
 He could do, and did, more work than the regular course 
 called for ; he had to be loaded to keep peace ; work, hard 
 work, was his only salvation; but not the work of the 
 grammar grades. This boy finally graduated from that 
 High School. The four years' training and study im- 
 
188 YOUE PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 proved him an hundredfold. Did it pay to put this boy 
 on the mental food suited to his needs, or would it have 
 been better to try for more thoroughness in the gram- 
 mar studies which did not appeal to him at all? 
 
 I would not decry thoroughness in the common 
 branches, but there comes a time when the mind demands 
 a change, a time when mental food of a very different 
 character can be assimilated, and if the mind is deprived 
 of this food it fails to develop as it otherwise would. 
 ********* 
 
 Often a school has pupils coming from other schools, 
 schools in the same state or other states. Sometimes 
 these pupils fit nicely into the grades, sometimes they do 
 not. When they fit easily into the grades there is no loss 
 of time, and when they do not fit regularly into the 
 grades there should be no loss of time. For a number of 
 years, we followed the plan of assigning irregularly 
 graded pupils, part work in one grade and part work 
 in another. In this way, we prevented loss of the pupil's 
 time, and additional expense to the school district. 
 Whenever a pupil repeats a study simply for convenience 
 in classifying the pupil and not because of his own need 
 of it, his progressive movement in his education is in- 
 terfered with, his interest is lessened, and unnecessary 
 expense placed on the school district. 
 
 A school is not less orderly where some pupil recites 
 a part of his lesson in the sixth grade and a part in the 
 fifth, or some other grade, than the school where the 
 pupils are required to recite all lessons in the same 
 grade; the school it not less orderly, but it has a new 
 kind of orderliness not based on the mechanical move- 
 ment of the school, but on the highest interests of the 
 pupils. It is a higher type of orderliness. 
 
WHAT WOULD You Do 189 
 
 We not only extended this time-saving opportunity 
 to those coming to us from other schools, but also to our 
 own pupils. However, this is true that with our semi- 
 annual promotion, we were able to bring together in 
 each half-year grade or working section, (a grade is 
 nothing more than a convenient working section of a 
 school), those whose attainments and rate of move- 
 ment were so nearly the same that need of placing pupils 
 partly in one section and partly in another was not so 
 great as it is in some schools. 
 
 Our schools were made still more adjustable to needs 
 of individual scholars by special promotions at any time 
 during the semester. Our whole plan, semi-annual pro- 
 motions, with special promotions at any time during the 
 term, together with assigning a part of the work of some 
 pupils in one grade and a part in another, was in reality 
 a system of promotion by subjects rather than by grades 
 or classes. 
 
 With us, it was no uncommon thing for scholars to 
 take a part of their work in the eighth grade at their 
 eighth" grade building, and the other part consisting of 
 high school studies in the high school. In most of these 
 cases, the classes were so adjusted that these scholars 
 could spend the first hours of the forenoon at the eighth 
 grade building, and the remainder of the day at the 
 high school. It was no inconvenience to anyone. The 
 relations between the elementary schools and the high 
 school should be close. They are but parts of one school 
 system. 
 
CHAPTER XVI 
 ATHLETICS 
 
 To appreciate fully the great value of athletics to the 
 scholars of a school, we must not fail to see that athletics 
 and gymnasium work are but two parts of physical cul- 
 ture, each with its own distinctive aims, and that in 
 many respects the one part can never fully take over the 
 work of the other. 
 
 All students in a high school must take the gym- 
 nasium work just as they must take other required sub- 
 jects. Its object is to develop a healthy body and a 
 healthy mind, correcting, as far as possible, any physical 
 defects, and giving all grace and beauty of movement 
 and form. 
 
 Athletics have different aims, and in these aims touch 
 every student just as surely as does the gymnasium work. 
 Athletics give opportunity for team games or contests 
 that are instinctive at this time in life ; they give oppor- 
 tunity for hero worship that so delights the heart of 
 youth. Athletics are a great safety-valve for the hilar- 
 iousness of youth, giving free outlet with least possible 
 danger of harm; here nationality, religion, wealth, and 
 social position, sink out of sight as in no other activity of 
 the school. In the flaming heat of enthusiasm for our 
 team, our school, the heterogeneous body of scholars is 
 welded into a homogeneous democracy that can scarcely 
 be equalled. 
 
 That boy who just now made that touchdown lives 
 in a little home on the border of the slum district ; that 
 boy who just made that fine run is from the wealthiest 
 home in the most pretentious part of the city; but the 
 
 190 
 
ATHLETICS 191 
 
 scholars care naught for these things. The boys are of 
 "our team," of "our school," they are "ours." 
 
 Hear that yelling ? How it rends the air ! See that 
 high school crowd as they lean forward with fists 
 clenched yelling, "Go it!" "Go it!" as the baU nears 
 their goal. As it passes their goal, see them rise, hats in 
 air, arms gesticulating, as they frantically follow their 
 yell leader in vociferously giving the high school * ' yell. ' ' 
 
 Do you think no one gets anything out of the game 
 but the members of the team? Don't you think such a 
 thing. What of the little yell leader, whose gyrations 
 would do credit to a circus contortionist ? What of those 
 high school boys and girls whose enthusiastic yells fur- 
 nish the inspiration that stirs their team to victory ? Do 
 they not work? Try it and see. Do they not get anything 
 out of it? What gymnasium teacher ever led them in 
 such an exercise of inhaling and exhaling God's free, 
 out-door air? What gymnasium exercise ever caused 
 the newly-vitalized blood to course so rapidly through 
 the body from mere joy? Never one. Yet joy is whole- 
 some for young life. 
 
 The high school football game is a place where every- 
 body works, even "father." I have seen "father" on 
 the bleachers, hat off, arms gesticulating, yelling with 
 perfect abandon, trying to push his boy's team to vic- 
 tory. 
 
 Football, basketball and other forms of team games 
 are with us to stay. There was a time when I feared 
 the dishonesty so often practiced by some high school 
 scholars, by some teachers, by some principals, and even 
 by some superintendents, might long delay their proper 
 recognition; but of late there has been vigorous action 
 taken that has greatly cleaned up high school athletics, 
 and at present all indications point in the right direction. 
 
192 YOUR PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 During the early adolescent years the gang spirit is 
 an instinct. It is this instinct that binds together the 
 members of a class, or other school organization, and in a 
 still greater body the scholars of the whole school. 
 Loyalty to one's school, or class, or other organization, 
 has a mystical sacredness about it that seems to charm 
 and hold the members. And woe is it for him who by 
 proving himself false, violates its sacredness. 
 
 One evening, a few years ago, at a contest basketball 
 game between a team from a neighboring school and our 
 high school team, one of our team who had been muck 
 honored for his fine athletic work, probably too much 
 honored, was accused of playing to the galleries, of mak- 
 ing spectacular plays for his own glory when he should 
 have been doing team work for the school. 
 
 The school never forgave him. There was no eruption 
 of feeling against him, but the scholars ceased to do him 
 honor. One of the girls was heard to say to another, the 
 next morning, "He's a mean thing. He played for him- 
 self instead of helping the team play for the school. He's 
 a mean thing." To put self above his team and school, 
 was unpardonable. 
 
 No high school athletic team ever plays for the team, 
 it plays for the school. And the school, when the team 
 comes home from some great victory with the ''bloody 
 scalp" of some formidable rival school dangling at its 
 belt, feels it must give expression to its high appreciation 
 of the distinguished honor conferred on it by the defeat 
 of its rival on the athletic field, and so calls a meeting 
 of all the scholars and the faculty that they may hear 
 the report of the victorious team, and receive it with 
 shouts of joy and gladness, with songs of praise and 
 oratorical flights of appreciation. 
 
ATHLETICS 193 
 
 Once when our basketball team won the State Champ- 
 ionship, a meeting such as had never been known in the 
 athletic history of the school was held. It was a meeting 
 of rapid action from 9:00 a. m. until 12:00 m., when 
 with worn-out voices and tired lungs, all were ready to 
 go to their homes for the noon lunch. 
 
 As soon as the high school principal and I received 
 word that the State Championship in basketball had been 
 won by our team, we began planning a great reception 
 for the team, and an athletic rally. We knew the school 
 would be at high pitch and would expect a "big time" 
 as the school would call it, so we began at once to plan 
 a great, big program that would provide outlets for all 
 the boisterous, highly-wrought-up emotional life that we 
 knew would be present, outlets that would lead the great 
 flood of emotions into channels where it could pass off 
 with perfect safety to all. We well knew that by pre- 
 paring proper channels for carrying off the cloudburst 
 of youthful emotion before it came, it could come in 
 mighty volume and do no harm. 
 
 First, we decided the meeting should begin at 9 a. m. 
 and continue until noon. The long session would give 
 time for the flood of emotions to run off through the 
 channels of safety. With a short meeting, it would be 
 necessary to dam up, at least a part of the floodwaters of 
 emotion and they might break through unexpectedly and 
 do harm; but by giving time for them to drain off 
 through the channels provided, there would be nothing 
 to fear. 
 
 We then invited and pledged to be present the mayor 
 of the city, all the leading athletic men of the city, the 
 Y. M. C. A. secretary and physical director, three or 
 four of the leading ministers, the members of the Board 
 of Education, reporters from each of the daily papers, 
 
194 YOUR PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 the fathers of the members of the team, and many others. 
 
 The leaders of the scholars were asked for further 
 suggestions, but said more had been planned than they 
 could have thought of, that they could add nothing. 
 These leaders quickly spread the word among the schol- 
 ars that there was going to be a "big time," that it was 
 all planned and would be great. 
 
 At 9 :00 a. m. the several hundred scholars were in 
 their places. All the prominent citizens who had been 
 pledged to be present, and many others, were there. 
 
 The principal was in charge of the meeting. In a 
 few words, he stated the purpose of the coming-together ; 
 and with great pride gave the high scholastic standing of 
 each member of the team, and fine type of moral char- 
 acters represented by each team member. Cheer after 
 cheer, followed these announcements. Everybody cheered, 
 for it is not often that every individual member of an 
 athletic team represents the very best elements of a 
 school as the members of this team did. It was, indeed, 
 a great thing that each had a record in his studies and 
 in school standing that he was pleased to have placed 
 before that whole body of scholars and the many dis- 
 tinguished visitors. 
 
 No time was lost. The team was heard from; the 
 school orators welcomed them and crowned each with 
 glory; the visitors, the Board of Education, the school 
 faculty, all furnished speakers. The speaking was in- 
 terspersed with school songs, and punctuated with school 
 cheers and yells. 
 
 There was nothing to be repressed. No one felt that 
 he did not have a fine part in the great meeting. 
 
 It was nearing twelve o'clock noon when I quietly 
 asked the members of the Board of Education present 
 to give the school the afternoon for a holiday, and meet- 
 
ATHLETICS 195 
 
 ing with favorable reply, I waited a moment for an op- 
 portunity and then announced that the Board of Ed- 
 ucation, in honor of the team's winning the State Cham- 
 pionship, had authorized me to announce the afternoon 
 a holiday. 
 
 Again the cheering, and yells rent the air. And then 
 the principal quietly dismissed the gathering. 
 
 Thus closed a forenoon that would be a pleasant 
 memory for a lifetime to everyone present; and to many, 
 at the impressionable time of life, it was an inspiration 
 whose fruitage the coming years would garner. 
 
 Someone has said that to win an athletic honor for a 
 class or school often makes a hero of one who would other- 
 wise be almost unknown, while he who wins many ath- 
 letic honors, becomes an object of adoration, the whole 
 school bowing to him, and his particular satellites cir- 
 cling around him, happy to reflect the light of his glory. 
 
 A few years ago, one of our football boys, after 
 having played a splendid part in a winning game, came 
 out of the game with a broken collarbone. He was con- 
 veyed home by an admiring crowd of fellow high school 
 boys who were proud even to be near him. After taking 
 him into the home, one of the boys said to his mother, 
 "Aren't you proud of him?" The mother replied: 
 "Proud of him? I don't see anything to be proud of. 
 This only means another doctor bill to pay. ' ' 
 
 Another mother one day, in talking to me of her boy, 
 a strong, physically healthy boy of our high school, said 
 that she had told him that morning at breakfast that they 
 were getting tired of hearing the praises of one par- 
 ticular high school boy sung at the table three times a 
 day, and would like to have a change ; and that the boy, 
 very much offended, had replied that it didn't seem she 
 could appreciate what great things his friend had done. 
 
196 YOUE PEOBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 I smiled, but said to the mother that she ought to be 
 thankful that her boy had chosen as his hero an athlete 
 of clean morals and high ideals, whose influence over 
 younger boys such as hers, could be none other than 
 wholesome. 
 
 ********* 
 
 I have said that athletics are a great safety-valve to 
 let out the hilariousness of youth with but little possible 
 harm. This is true, but there are evils attendant on 
 athletics that need to be guarded against or serious con- 
 sequences sometimes follow. Yet of late years, as I have 
 said, these attendant evils are being reduced toward the 
 minimum. The scholarship requirements now shut out 
 the class that once came into high schools for the football 
 season, a class whose presence was a great handicap to 
 the work of the school. Principals and superintending 
 officers are more careful than ever before to see that boys 
 are up with all the requirements of the rules under 
 which the game is to be played before certifying to their 
 eligibility. However, there are still to be found some 
 school principals and superintendents who, to say the 
 least, are very careless in this respect and thereby do 
 great harm. 
 
 Once before I became superintendent at Blooming- 
 ton, when our high school boys played a high school 
 team from another town, the principal from the other 
 school came with the boys and signed for them certify- 
 ing they were bona fide high scholars of that school, up 
 with their work, and in every way eligible to play under 
 the requirements of the rules under which the game was 
 to be played. Everything seemed all right. 
 
 The visiting team won the game, and everything 
 passed off pleasantly. However, it was but a few days 
 
ATHLETICS 197 
 
 till we learned positively that two boys to whom the 
 principal had certified, had not been in the high school 
 that year, in fact, were not high school boys at all. 
 
 One year when our Bloomington High School foot- 
 ball team was weak, after our manager and team had 
 gone to another city to play a game and had seen the 
 strong team that our team was ''up against," our man- 
 ager deliberately signed up false certificates of eligi- 
 bility for some of our boys who had accompanied the 
 team but were not eligible to play, and put them in the 
 places of some of the weaker men on our team. 
 
 It is sufficient to say that this teacher never had an- 
 other opportunity to commit a like offense. He ceased to 
 function as manager of our team. 
 
 The matter of a coach has been a serious problem to 
 principals and superintendents. The one who coaches 
 must be trained for his work. He should be a member 
 of the school teaching force, sustaining the same relation 
 to the principal, superintendent, and board of education 
 that the other teachers do. This makes him directly re- 
 sponsible to the principal and superintendent. This 
 places the responsibility for properly conducted ath- 
 letics in the hands of the principal and superintendent, 
 and at the same time gives them absolute control. They 
 select the coach, and on their recommendation, the board 
 employs him. Their ideals of fair play, of honesty, of 
 decency, are to mark all athletics of the school. A coach 
 is selected with like ideals. This arrangement is the best 
 possible. The coach inspires his athletics by putting the 
 same ideals before them, not only by what he says, but 
 also by his living up to his ideals in all he has to do with 
 the boys. Only those in close touch know the wonderful 
 influence a coach has over the boys who are under his 
 training. 
 
198 YOUR PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 But where coaches are not employed as members of 
 the teaching corps, where some young man about the 
 city or town is picked up (picked up is the proper term) 
 by the principal or superintendent, because he knows the 
 games and can be secured for a mere pittance, as he 
 makes it a side line to his regular business, the situation 
 is fraught with danger first of all to the boys, then to 
 the school, and to the whole community. In many of the 
 smaller towns, this is the only plan that has been possible 
 and the heads of the schools must make the best of the 
 situation. 
 
 Under this second plan, the coach often plays for 
 favor with the boys and fails to hold up to the ideals of 
 the school. Sometimes he puts wild notions into the 
 boys, notions that could not be carried out with the 
 sanction of the school, so he brings a grouchy feeling 
 against the school on the part of the athletes. I have 
 seen good schools in small towns rent to pieces in their 
 work by the unfortunate feelings brought about by 
 badly-conducted athletics. The situation that sometimes 
 arises where athletics seem "to run" the school makes 
 me think of the old saying about the dog and his tail: 
 "It is all right when the dog wags his tail, but the dog 
 is in danger when the tail wags the dog." It is ail 
 right for the school when the school controls athletics, 
 but the school is in danger when athletics control the 
 school. 
 
 Sometimes the sporting element in a community be- 
 comes deeply interested in high school athletics, and 
 even goes so far as to try to control the school athletics. 
 When this happens in some of the smaller towns, con- 
 fusion often comes into the school, interfering greatly 
 with the efficiency of the high school. With the better 
 organization of the larger high school, and a coach who 
 
ATHLETICS 199 
 
 is a member of the high school faculty, this outside in- 
 fluence has but little effect. 
 
 Honest play should be the rule in all athletic games. 
 
 But is it always the rule ? Mr. J. M had a college 
 
 record in athletics when he came from the university to 
 teach in our high school so was deeply interested in our 
 high school athletics, and because of his interest spent 
 much time assisting the coach. In fact, he made himself 
 in many ways very helpful. But we soon learned his 
 ideals of fair play, of honest play, were far below the 
 ideals of our school. 
 
 Our team was to play a return game with a neigh- 
 boring team that was very strong, much stronger than 
 
 our own. Mr. J. M was very anxious to see our 
 
 team win the game. He had studied the neighboring 
 team well. He knew that the best player on that team 
 had a badly-injured knee and that the team with this 
 one man off was about an equal chance with our team. 
 So he said to our team boys: "Get after the crack 
 player on the other team and put him out of business 
 by doing up his injured knee. With him out of the way, 
 you stand a good show to win the game, so do up that 
 knee ; do it one way if you can't another. You can do it 
 in a way not to be called down for it; but be sure the 
 first thing you really try to do is to put him out of con- 
 dition. That's your winning card." 
 
 I was surprised and disappointed in this teacher's 
 ideal of honesty in athletics, for I had had occasion to 
 know of his high ideal of honesty in some other dealings. 
 But this was dangerous to our boys all the more, be- 
 cause this teacher had been a star athlete in university 
 athletics. 
 
 These are only a few of the many attendant evils 
 that must be guarded against. 
 
200 YOUR PROBLEMS AXD MINE 
 
 Another danger comes from handling the money side 
 of athletics. In handling the money that comes from 
 high school athletics, I think too often teachers, prin- 
 cipals, or superintendents, as happens to be, tempt boys 
 to be dishonest when they think they are trusting them. 
 I have already spoken of my great faith in high school 
 scholars and how, in some things, I would trust them 
 far. It is no lack of faith in their honesty that leads 
 me to say what I am about to say concerning the hand- 
 ling of the athletic money or other school funds: but 
 rather it is my desire to help them keep their own faith 
 in their own honesty strong by making conditions under 
 which they handle the money of the school such as to 
 reduce to the minimum the possibility of their being 
 dishonest. There was a time when by permitting the 
 loose handling of athletic and other school funds, I 
 placed temptation in the way of many, and to my sor- 
 row, some few yielded to the temptation. 
 
 What would be a temptation to some young people 
 of high school age would be no temptation at all to them 
 when they are a little older. The school should help to 
 tide them over this period of uncertainty and thus in- 
 crease the probability of their being honest men and 
 women. 
 
 Where the high school is sufficiently large to em- 
 ploy a number of teachers, without offense to any 
 scholar, a high school teacher can be appointed to take 
 charge of the money, one known to have ability in or- 
 ganizing and keeping track of things. He should keep 
 a record of all tickets printed; tickets given out to be 
 sold to whom and how many, and the return of all 
 tickets not sold as well as the money for those sold. 
 He can call other teachers to assist him, and he can 
 make use of scholars to help him in places where there 
 
ATHLETICS 201 
 
 would be no possibility of their slipping out money for 
 their own use. 
 
 Where the school is small and the principal has only 
 school boys to help him with managing the games, it is 
 better for all for him to give other parts of the manage- 
 ment to the boys to look after, and he himself keep his 
 hands on the money. 
 
 I could give case after case, some coming up in my 
 own work, where boys were permitted to handle money 
 in a careless way and so used for themselves money that 
 should have been accounted for, and some cases given 
 me by other school-men, that would be strong evidence 
 of the need of more care than is often exercised in hand- 
 ling the athletic funds. 
 
 The conduct of the members of a team when on a 
 trip to another city or town to play a game can usually 
 be taken care of with but little difficulty, if the coach 
 and manager are of the proper type; but where the 
 coach plays into the hands of the boys of the team trying 
 to win their favor and be popular, hoping thus to hold 
 his job for another year, and the manager is either weak 
 or indifferent, the conduct of the team while on the trip 
 depends altogether on the character of the members of 
 the team. I learned by experience that a principal or 
 superintendent cannot look up too carefully the char- 
 acter of a coach before engaging him for his school. 
 Sometimes it happens that their college or university 
 training for the work of high school coaching wholly 
 unfits them for the work they have been trained to do. 
 
 One year we employed a young man for high school 
 athletic coach who had made a great record in college 
 athletics, and had taken high school athletic coaching 
 under a noted college coach who taught a class in high 
 school coaching. He came to us highly recommended, 
 
202 YOUB PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 but he failed to make good. He had been with us but a 
 short time when the principal learned that in trying to 
 get work out of the boys on the training field he was 
 continually cursing them, hurling one oath after an- 
 other at them. The boys resented such language. 
 
 The principal had an interview with him and spoke 
 of his language. He admitted that he had been cursing 
 the boys on the training field; but said that he had 
 never thought anything about it, that it was the same 
 language that the coach at the college had used when 
 training the class for high school coaches, and that he 
 was only following his college coach when he cursed his 
 high school boys in coaching them. He said he would 
 give up the cursing and use language satisfactory to the 
 school ; but his ideals of athletics in general were too far 
 below the ideals of the school, both of scholars and of 
 faculty, so the close of the year terminated his stay with 
 us. 
 
 A good coach, dependable to the limit, efficient in his 
 coaching, high-minded, enthusiastic and inspiring, is a 
 joy to the principal and superintendent; but a coach 
 that is untrustworthy, unreliable, a coach with low 
 ideals, and of improper language, even though an ex- 
 pert in coaching, is a thorn in the flesh to both principal 
 and superintendent, and the sooner he is removed the 
 better for all. 
 
CHAPTER XVII 
 
 SOME CONSIDERATIONS FOR THE HEALTH OF 
 
 GIRLS OF THE GRAMMAR GRADES 
 
 AND HIGH SCHOOL 
 
 The first few years of a boy's adolescent period from 
 some points do not need the same kind of hygenic con- 
 sideration that should be given girls. Any undue ex- 
 posure or nervous strain with girls of this age is liable to 
 irregularities that may be far-reaching in their evil 
 after-effects. Wet clothing or wet feet from coming to 
 school in rain, or snow, or a chill from any cause, may 
 have serious consequences. It is far better for girls 
 of this age whose clothing has become damp or wet to 
 send them home for the remainder of the day than to 
 take the risk of injuring their health by having them sit 
 in school with damp clothing. A broken attendance 
 record is better than .broken health. We sometimes 
 put so great stress on regularity of attendance, and it 
 is of great importance, that we forget to remember that 
 there are other things that may greatly outweigh reg- 
 ularity of attendance. Health should always be first 
 considered. 
 
 It is not an uncommon thing for a mother to insist 
 on great pressure being put on her daughter when the 
 girl is in a nervous condition that demands rest. And 
 again teachers sometimes fail to appreciate that the 
 highly-nervous girl, otherwise in apparently the best of 
 health, may not be in a condition to bear great mental 
 strain without injury. But if the words of those who 
 have given careful attention to the study of the laws of 
 the human body are of value, teachers cannot study too 
 carefully the physical condition that needs careful at- 
 
 203 
 
204 YOUE PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 tent ion at this age. In general, with proper care on the 
 part of parents and intelligent thoughtfulness on the 
 part of teachers, the girls during this period can do a 
 good qualitjr of school work and their full share of it 
 without injury of any kind. But without an intelligent 
 understanding of these natural conditions to be met, 
 these girls are sometimes taxed both at home and at 
 school, and as a result, pay the penalty of the violation 
 of the laws of their physical being, laws violated un- 
 consciously by parents and teachers. 
 
 I would not be misunderstood, I do not wish anyone 
 for a moment to believe that I am in favor of accept- 
 ing inferior work or short work from girls of this age, 
 for I am not; but I have learned from years of ob- 
 servation that some girls at this period of their lives are 
 unduly pressed, by both the home and the school, on 
 days when they should be quietly resting at home. Again 
 it often requires an effort on the part of both teacher 
 and parents to hold back highly-sensitive girls, ambitious 
 to stand at the front in their classes. The very fact that 
 they are in classes with others, has in these cases an 
 undue stimulating effect ; and so it remains for the par- 
 ents and teacher to guard this in whatever way seems 
 best. These cases, however, are the exception and not 
 the rule. The following is a statement of how two cases 
 of this kind were managed by the parents and teacher. 
 
 The first girl had always led her class with little 
 effort and as the first indications of approaching woman- 
 hood came to her, she became very sensitive and nervous. 
 She was in the seventh grade. Instead of being easy 
 and contented in her school-work, she was anxious about 
 it both at home and at school. Not a moment of time 
 was to be wasted either at school or at home. One day's 
 work was scarcely completed until she was worrying 
 
HEALTH OF GIRLS 205 
 
 over the work of the coming day ; she was sure she was 
 going to fail in the lessons on the morrow. The teacher 
 grew concerned about the girl; said she was perfect in 
 her work, but was painfully nervous. At home, her 
 parents, intelligent persons, fully posted as to her 
 physical condition, tried to take her mind off her school 
 work, but all to no purpose, as she felt sure others would 
 outrank her if she did not devote all of her time to the 
 preparation of her lessons. The parents finally, after 
 an interview with her teacher and her principal, on their 
 advice and the recommendation of their family physi- 
 cian, took her out of school for the remainder of the 
 school year. As long as she was in school, the incentive 
 of standing at the head of her class was to her a stim- 
 ulus that neither parents nor teacher, nor the two com- 
 bined, could control. After being out of school a year, 
 spending much of that time in the open air, with quieted 
 nerves and renewed vigor, she re-entered school, content 
 to do her best, day by day, without worrying over the 
 failures that might possibly come on the morrow. 
 
 One day I was in the office of one of our elementary 
 school principals when she was holding a conference 
 with a mother of one of our eighth grade girls. The 
 principal knew the condition of the girl's health and 
 very kindly advised the mother to take her out of school 
 for the semester or the remainder of the year; she said 
 to the mother that her daughter was a fine girl, but was 
 not able to do her work, that she was not at all well ; 
 that her falling short in her work was due to her not 
 being well ; that the wise thing for the mother to do was 
 to let the girl drop out of school for the semester or 
 until she had regained her usual health. She also ad- 
 vised the mother to go with her daughter to their family 
 
203 YOUE PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 physician and consult him as to what would be wisest 
 to do. 
 
 The mother was very grateful for the kindly interest 
 of the principal, but said that she could hardly give up 
 the thought of her daughter's completing the work 
 of the eighth grade that year. However, she acted on 
 the principal's advice, and permitted her daughter to 
 rest the remainder of the year. It is not at all prob- 
 able that the girl's state of health was due to school 
 work, but rather to the lack of proper attention at home, 
 still it was well for the girl that the principal's intelli- 
 gence directed the mother to the proper source for help, 
 the family physician. 
 
 Girls of this age even more than any other, should 
 be in the hands of teachers of strong, even, winning, 
 commanding personalities; anything of the nagging or 
 the faultfinding type of teacher is wholly out of place 
 with girls at this period of life. These qualities in a 
 teacher are out of place anywhere, but with delicate 
 girls at this time of life, they are really harmful. 
 
 Since all girls do not pass through these earlier 
 changes before entering high school, the same care in 
 many cases is necessary to be exercised in the high 
 school. A knowledge of the physical conditions as af- 
 fecting the health of the girls, is of highest importance 
 to all high school teachers. They should know that ex- 
 posure of any kind, nagging, sarcasm, scolding, and 
 anger on the part of the teacher, may produce very un- 
 fortunate results on the physical and mental health of 
 some of the girls. In some cases, the nervous strain 
 during a recitation where the girl sits in fear of the 
 cutting words and look of the sarcastic teacher is so 
 great that an attack of hysteria follows the recitation 
 period. 
 
HEALTH OF GIRLS 207 
 
 A few years ago, a mother called to talk with me 
 about her daughter, who was at that time in our high 
 school. The girl had come into the high school a mere 
 child, and was just entering upon the changes incident 
 to her age of life. 
 
 In the high school, she recited to one teacher of whose 
 severe manner and sharp words she stood in constant 
 fear. While he did not have occasion to speak severely 
 to her, she was always expecting him to do so. This 
 recitation came the last hour before noon each day. As 
 soon as the recitation was over, she would go home and 
 for the next half -hour or more sit and cry in a hysterical 
 condition, from the effects of the class strain. Nor was 
 this the only one affected in this manner by this teacher. 
 One morning at the close of one of this same teacher's 
 recitations, one of the girls was so very sick that one 
 of the woman teachers took charge of her in the 
 teachers' private room. When the teacher kindly asked 
 her why she had come to school that morning when she 
 was so unwell, the girl replied that she would suffer 
 anything rather than be absent from that teacher's reci- 
 tation as she was deathly afraid of him and especially 
 if she missed a recitation which she would have to make 
 up to him. 
 
 The teacher was talked with in regard to his sar- 
 castic manner and its injurious effects on delicate, ner- 
 vous girls; but all to no purpose. He did not believe 
 that their being afraid to be called down, as he put it, 
 for poor work or irregular attendance was injurious in 
 any way; but said that he was sure of one thing he 
 could make them afraid not to work. As he could not 
 see that his manner was injurious to those under his in- 
 struction, it was necessary to dispense with his services 
 as a teacher. 
 
208 YOUR PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 These same girls under other teachers did excellent 
 work, were not unduly nervous, nor in any way un- 
 favorably affected by their work. They were of the 
 highest class of students. 
 
 School work secured at so great a sacrifice of the 
 nervous system of young girls is a curse. The evil 
 effects, possibly, can never be measured. Yet some 
 teachers permit themselves to fall into the habit of using 
 sarcasm, of exacting in a severe manner lesson prep- 
 aration instead of inspiring it, and so lose their use- 
 fulness. 
 
 We should study to know ourselves, to see if we are 
 growing as true teachers, leaders, inspirers of those 
 under our instruction; or if we are degenerating into 
 mere whipcrackers, " lesson exacters," disagreeable 
 class-room drivers. Teachers of this latter type too 
 often think that they are the only ones who secure good 
 work of the scholars; they often look upon the teacher 
 whose strong, gracious manner is a masterful force in 
 the class-room as in some way or other a sham, simply 
 because they have so lost themselves to the higher forms 
 of teaching that they cannot understand that the 
 mightiest compelling force in the preparation of lessons 
 is the thoroughly aroused desire and will on the part of 
 the scholar; that that teacher is an artist of high order 
 who arouses in the scholar the desire and the witt to 
 prepare the lessons in the most perfect manner so that 
 the scholar enters upon the most difficult preparation 
 with joy, and from day to day looks forward not only 
 to the preparation and the recitation, but to all the 
 work of the school with pleasure. All real teachers 
 possess this power of inspiration to a greater or less de- 
 gree. These teachers reveal to the scholars the ' ' blessed- 
 ness of drudgery," so that while girls of this age do hard 
 
HEALTH OF GIRLS 209 
 
 work for these teachers, work not in itself interesting, 
 and labor with greatest care to be thoroughly prepared 
 for the recitation, yet through it all, the joy of work 
 takes away the nerve-wearing strain that breaks down 
 the nervous system. 
 
 There is another type of girl whose health at this 
 time needs attention. It is the nervous, giggling, 
 simpering, smiling, boy-struck girl, sometimes possessing 
 wonderful attraction for her boy friends. She has lost 
 all power of concentration on her school work; all her 
 force seems to dissipate itself through her smiles and her 
 giggles, until there is nothing left for the serious pur- 
 poses of school. But the step from her giggles and 
 smiles to her tears is not of a span's breadth, and from 
 her tears to hysteric sobs is so short that it cannot be 
 measured. 
 
 Teachers may call her silly, they may call her weak, 
 but she is theirs to care for; and she is not responsible 
 for her condition. The real cause of these things that 
 so break into her school work for a greater or less time, 
 may be due partly to her inheritance, physical and 
 mental; and partly to conditions surrounding her. Her 
 nervous sensibility is so acute that if teachers fail to 
 appreciate her as she is, and attempt the impossible, of 
 making her what she cannot be, they may do her harm. 
 Quiet, private talks with her, with a full appreciation 
 of her helplessness to be other than she is, gives 
 teachers their greatest influence with her, and enables 
 them to tide her over the period of greatest instability. 
 
 If teachers realize that in these cases their work is 
 to help the helpless, not to correct offenders, this mental 
 attitude on the part of teachers makes possible a treat- 
 ment of these girls that at least does not unduly in- 
 
210 YOUR PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 tensify the extreme nervousness to which for the time 
 being they are subject. 
 
 Of course, these girls do not master their work, nor 
 do they receive credit for it; but the time comes later in 
 most of these cases when they again set themselves to 
 their lessons with a will that accomplishes things. 
 
 Winifred Douglas was one of these nervous, giggly, 
 simpering, smiling, boy-struck, boy-charming girls when 
 she entered the high school. She had passed out of the 
 eighth grade with marks that were only slightly above 
 the passing; but now that she was in the high school, 
 she was in a more excited state than ever, so giggly, so 
 smiling, that it seemed all the mental power she had 
 ever had was dissipated in smiles and giggles. 
 
 She was in the high school almost two years when 
 her father, the business head of their home, died, leav- 
 ing his business in a condition that did not promise well 
 for the interests of the family. But Winifred, the 
 smiling, giggling girl, stepped into her father's place, 
 took the reins of his business into her own hands; 
 straightened out the business of the office; made col- 
 lections, paid bills, solicited and secured new business, 
 and pushed the work with so much energy and business 
 insight, that able business men who knew her work, re- 
 ferred to her as a young woman of fine business ability. 
 
 In her high school work, she was not much of a 
 success; but in business, she succeeded where some of 
 her ablest high school teachers would have failed. 
 
 I do not know what she got out of her high school; 
 but I do know that she received right consideration and 
 kind treatment from her teachers. 
 
CHAPTER XVIII 
 
 A PERIOD OF RAPID GROWTH; A PERIOD OF 
 
 LOWERED INTELLECTUAL POWER; 
 
 A PERIOD OF STIMULATED 
 
 INTELLECTUAL POWER 
 
 An Open Way to Those Quick at Learning 
 Give Time to the Slow Scholar 
 
 One Friday afternoon, the week of our mid-year ex- 
 amination, I passed from my office into one of the 
 nearby recitation rooms to speak with the teacher, and 
 on entering the room saw Morton Black sitting in a 
 seat waiting his turn to receive the teacher's attention. 
 He looked so woe-begone, so distressed, that I said, 
 4 'Well, Morton, how is everything?" 
 
 "Not very good," he replied, "I've failed in almost 
 all my studies." 
 
 I looked at him. It seemed to me in the half year 
 he had stretched out a foot in height. His long, lank 
 body instantly suggested to me the cause of his failure, 
 so I replied : ' ' That 's too bad, but next semester things 
 will come out better." 
 
 He had once been a good student, but his vital forces 
 for a time had been occupied with building up the bony 
 frame of his body to the neglect of his brain; later his 
 brain would receive due attention. But the boy did not 
 understand this, so was distressed. 
 
 A little later that afternoon, the principal came into 
 my office. I called his attention to Morton, and asked 
 him if he had thought of the cause of his failure. He 
 said that he had not. I then said that I believed it was 
 due to his rapid growth; that for the few months just 
 
 211 
 
212 YOUR PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 past he had been running up like a weed; that his vital 
 forces had been so occupied with this work of building 
 up a big body that there was probably little force left 
 for brain work. 
 
 The principal replied : ' ' I know you are right. He 
 has been making a tremendous growth, and it has left 
 him listless, and somewhat helpless to do mental work. ' ' 
 
 I said further: "Be sure to speak to his teachers 
 about him that they may not say anything that would 
 make him think they were scolding him for failing. Of 
 course, he must repeat the studies in which he has 
 failed ; but he is very sensitive and must not be made to 
 feel that he is being found fault with for having failed. 
 He will soon be himself again and do as good work as in 
 the past." 
 
 The principal agreed fully with me concerning 
 Morton, and felt that care must be taken not to lose him 
 while he was in this unsettled, and to himself, unsatis- 
 factory condition. 
 
 Saturday evening, about five o'clock, Morton and his 
 father called at the principal's office, but as he was not 
 in, they came to my office to inquire for him. As they 
 came into my office, the father looked like a thunder- 
 cloud, and Morton as though he had lost his last friend. 
 
 The father asked for the principal. I replied that he 
 had started for his home a few minutes before ; that he 
 would be pleased to have them call at his home. As the 
 principal lived but a short distance from the high school, 
 they decided to call on him at his home. 
 
 When they called at the principal's home, the father 
 said that he had not come to find fault with the school, 
 principal, or teachers, but that he was all out of humor 
 with the boy. "Here," said he, "Morton has been in 
 school regularly all the semester and now at the close is 
 
CHANGES IN INTELLECTUAL POWER 213 
 
 a failure in almost everything." Before he could say 
 more, the principal said: "I wish I could talk with 
 you privately some time." 
 
 Immediately the father turned to Morton, handed 
 him a street-car ticket, and said: "You go home, I'll 
 be there soon." Then giving his attention to the prin- 
 cipal he asked : ' ' Now what is it you wish to say ? ' ' 
 
 The principal then related to him the conversation 
 we had had concerning the boy. The father listened 
 attentively. Then he replied: "I know you are right. 
 Morton came to my office every afternoon at the close of 
 school and gave his time to his lessons in my presence, 
 and seemed to be interested in his studies and trying to 
 do his work. I know you are right, but I ought not to 
 have to come to you schoolmen to learn the condition of 
 my boy at this time of his life." 
 
 Morton repeated the work in which he had failed, 
 and before he graduated from the high school he had 
 come back to his former power to do school work. 
 
 Since graduating from the high school, he has grad- 
 uated from college and from a professional school and 
 is now a young professional man of good standing. 
 *####**** 
 
 "William Mathews was a fine student in the grammar 
 grades. In his eighth grade work he was the leader of 
 his class. He was thirteen, and a half, years of age 
 when he entered the high school, still in knee-pants, and 
 still more boy than youth. 
 
 The first year in high school he did good work, but 
 not brilliant. During this first year he was making 
 great changes physically. The second year brought still 
 greater changes to him; and by the end of his second 
 year, he was one of the tall boys of the school, six feet 
 
214 YOUR PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 in height. The last week in June of this his second year 
 in high school, he told me he was not going to be in 
 school the next year; that he was not going to school 
 any more. 
 
 I was surprised, and asked what was the cause of 
 his dropping out of school, of, as he said, ' ' Quitting for 
 good." 
 
 He then said that he had got so he couldn't learn 
 as he used to learn, and so thought the best thing for 
 him to do was to go to work. He said that he didn't 
 know what was the matter with him, for he tried hard 
 but couldn't learn. 
 
 I smiled and replied: "I'll tell you what is the 
 matter with you ; you are all right, but you have grown 
 so fast the past year that all your vitality has gone to 
 build up your body and nothing has been left you for 
 brain power to do school work. As soon as you quit 
 growing so rapidly, you will be able to do as fine school 
 work as you ever did. There is nothing wrong with you 
 at all but your rapid growth. You will be in better 
 shape next September." 
 
 He returned to school in September, and in time was 
 back to his former high standing in his work. He grad- 
 uated from the high school, and later on from one of our 
 great universities. 
 
 ********* 
 
 Rufus Darby passed into the high school at twelve 
 years of age. He was a very fragile child of brilliant 
 intellect. When the changes of pubescence came to him, 
 he grew tall very rapidly ; tall, slim, and so stooped over, 
 and pale, that he looked unfit to be in school or to do 
 work of any kind ; but the taller he grew, and the more 
 stooped over and pale-faced he became, the more active 
 was his intellect and the more brilliant his work. 
 
CHANGES IN INTELLECTUAL POWER 215 
 
 I sometimes wondered if the hidden fire of some dis- 
 ease had anything to do with his unusual mental power 
 at this time of his life ; I followed him for a number of 
 years, through the university to graduation, and on into 
 business life, and saw him develop into a young man of 
 good physique and fine intellect. 
 
 In an earlier chapter where I spoke of growth in 
 height and its usual effect, I said nothing of this very 
 common temporary lack of intellectual power that man- 
 ifests itself at this period of life in many. The first two 
 of the boys presented here bring this common occurrence 
 into full view. 
 
 In the first two cases, for a time during the period 
 of rapid growth, intellectual power was low; in the 
 third case, the period of rapid growth seemed to stim- 
 ulate intellectual power. 
 
 ********* 
 
 Winston Durrell finished the eighth grade at twelve 
 years of age, a mere child in everything but his ability 
 to do school work. Physically not at all developed be- 
 yond his age, and while he was somewhat under-sized 
 for a boy of twelve years, he was in fine physical health. 
 
 After he had completed his eighth grade work, I had 
 a talk with his father as to the advisability of the boy's 
 taking up high school work at his age. The father, a 
 man of intelligence, said that he himself had developed 
 very young, and that he thought it best to keep Winston 
 moving on in his school work while he was in the mind 
 to do school work, that the time might come when he 
 would not be so willing to hold himself to school duties. 
 He said further that the boy was in excellent physical 
 condition and that his eighth grade school work had not 
 taxed him at all, that he had given no time outside of 
 
216 YOUR PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 school to his work; that if Winston suffered any injury 
 from doing high school work at his age, the school would 
 not be considered responsible, that all responsibility 
 would rest on the father. 
 
 Winston completed his high school course in four 
 years, afterwards completed a university course, and 
 later on a course in a professional college. He is today 
 a young professional man of high standing. 
 
 The father chose wisely for his boy. 
 ********* 
 
 The youngest pupil I ever promoted to the high 
 school was but ten years of age. He entered school at 
 six years of age, completed the work of the eight grades 
 in four years, standing at the head of his class. He 
 could easily have shortened the four years to three, but 
 was held four years. He never studied at home. Once 
 going over a lesson made him master of it. 
 
 When he began his high school work, I wondered if 
 he would be able to do it ; but there was no need of fear 
 on this line. He continued with us to the close of his 
 junior year, making a fine record all the way. While 
 he did not shorten the years of his high school course as 
 he had done in the elementary grades, he was known 
 everywhere as one who never failed to measure up well 
 in his work. 
 
 This boy was the only one in a family of four child- 
 ren that showed superior mental power. An older sister 
 of his could scarcely learn at all, while the other children 
 were only ordinary. 
 
 The school tried to give him the opportunity to move 
 at what seemed to be his natural rate of speed. In this 
 case as in others, the school gave an open road. Both 
 of the boys just described moved on at their natural 
 rates of speed. 
 
CHANGES IN INTELLECTUAL POWER 217 
 
 I should say before leaving this last case, that Jesse 
 was not in the least in his physical development beyond 
 those of his own age when at ten years of age he en- 
 tered the high school. In all his play and in every- 
 thing but his great power to acquire knowledge and to 
 do good, clear thinking, he was a boy of ten years. 
 
 *##****## 
 
 Wesley Baldwin entered the first primary at six 
 years of age and graduated from the eighth grade at 
 sixteen, a well-developed youth physically for a boy of 
 sixteen, but of very slow power for doing school work. 
 He was always regularly in school, but so slow at learn- 
 ing that his elementary school life was lengthened two 
 years. 
 
 The same rate of movement marked him in his high 
 school work so that he was six years instead of four 
 completing his high school course. He was never absent 
 from school, faithful in applying himself to his work, 
 but slow at learning. 
 
 One of the high school teachers, in speaking of Wes- 
 ley one day said she thought it a waste of time for him 
 to take so many years to graduate from the high school, 
 that he should be out of school at work. He was always 
 one of the finest of the boys in school. He was in his 
 twenty-second year when he graduated from the high 
 school. After spending two years in college, he went 
 into business, and from the very start has made a won- 
 derful success of his business. He has proved one of the 
 most successful graduates of that school. The very 
 knowledge that he gathered so slowly has been the 
 foundation of his success. He has made use of it all in 
 a very practical way. 
 
218 YOUR PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 Keep open the way for the scholar who is quick at 
 learning that he may move at his own rate of progress ; 
 at the same time remember the slow scholar. 
 
 I once visited a greenhouse where the glass was low 
 down over the beds. Many plants of the same kind were 
 growing in these beds ; the seeds of all had been planted 
 at the same time; but some had outgrown others and 
 were pressing against the glass and being ruined for 
 want of growing space. These should have been trans- 
 planted to other beds where the glass was high above 
 that they might have had room to reach upward. Just so 
 with boys and girls in school, not only must they each 
 be carefully tended, but at the proper time for each in- 
 dividual scholar, he must be transplanted that his de- 
 velopment may not be retarded and that he may not 
 lose interest in the work of the grades above him. The 
 plant that presses too long against the pane is distorted 
 and loses its value. Is not the same true of the boys and 
 girls in school? 
 
 Give the slow scholar time without upbraiding him ; 
 keep close to him that he may not lose faith in himself. 
 Do not lose him because he is not developing just as you 
 think he should; give him time, hold on to him. A 
 teacher once said to me in speaking of pupils in the 
 eighth grade, "We get rid of all those of mediocre 
 ability by working them out and thus save a class of 
 fine intellects for the high school. ' ' When boys and girls 
 are just entering the adolescent period of life, it would 
 take an all- wise teacher to tell who are and who are not 
 pupils of mediocre ability, so we should not attempt this 
 impossible classification of what the future alone can re- 
 veal, but should hold on to all of them. 
 
CHAPTER XIX 
 RURAL SCHOOL CONTRASTS 
 
 In one town where I was superintendent for several 
 years, we received into our high school more scholars 
 from one rural school than from a large number of other 
 rural schools that were just as near us. The contrast in 
 the number sent from this one school with the number 
 from the other schools was so great that I was interested 
 in knowing who in this district furnished the inspira- 
 tion that led so many to seek a high school education. 
 Other districts were just as wealthy and had in some 
 cases larger schools, but their boys and girls were not in- 
 terested in high school. 
 
 I soon learned that into the district that furnished so 
 large a number of well-equipped scholars for the high 
 school, there had come to live a few years before, a man 
 and his wife with the hope that the free, open air of the 
 country would restore the man to health. The woman 
 had been an able teacher before her marriage, and in 
 order to help with the finances of the home, now be- 
 came teacher of the rural school near their home. 
 
 She was the inspirer of that entire neighborhood. 
 Her school touched every home with a desire for some- 
 thing better than the past had given the boys and girls. 
 From her school radiated an influence that made that 
 rural school the most marked one in the whole country. 
 
 All the boys and girls of that district were in school. 
 The school was a magnet that drew them in and held 
 them when they were once in. 
 
 I came to know this teacher and then I saw the 
 source of her power. She knew every individual in her 
 
 219 
 
220 YOUR PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 school ; she knew the homes from which they came. She 
 studied to know the possibilities of each one and by her 
 enthusiasm and tactful handling of the boys and girls 
 from twelve years to twenty, she had everyone inspired 
 to do his best. She was uncommonly wise in her leader- 
 ship of these older scholars, and as a result, their in- 
 dustry, interest, and spirit shaped the spirit and move 
 ment of the entire school. 
 
 She was not an unusual woman in her native endow- 
 ment, but somew r here she had learned that while youth- 
 ful life and energy cannot well be shut off, it can be 
 directed into right channels and so controlled; and that 
 to do this successfully, she must know the individuals. 
 
 I well remember one day, when she was inquiring of 
 me about the high school work of some of her former 
 pupils, I said that while a certain scholar was not fail- 
 ing, his work did not compare at all favorably with the 
 work of another mentioned. ''Why," she said, with 
 apparent surprise that I should expect it to compare 
 with the work of the other, "You ought to know his 
 home. It is fine for one coming from where he does." 
 
 She knew him as we had not known him up to that 
 time, and she knew how rightly to appreciate his efforts. 
 
 The debating or literary society carried on in her 
 school was one of the best social centers I have ever 
 known. So great was the interest that farmers with 
 their families came for miles around to enjoy the social 
 hour and the program of this rural literary society. 
 
 I often contrast this school in my mind with another 
 that I knew quite intimately. In this latter school, the 
 teacher was a young man, in scholarship finely-equipped, 
 but in good sense and thoughtful interest, sadly lacking. 
 His evenings were given to the parties that that year 
 in that school district ran almost continuously from 
 
RURAL SCHOOL CONTRASTS 221 
 
 week-end to week-end. He soon lost interest in his 
 school work, was listless and almost sleepy during his 
 school hours. In fact, all his physical and intellectual 
 energy that should have been given to his school, were 
 sapped by his unrestrained social dissipation, so that 
 long before the close of the term, his usefulness was at 
 an end. However, as no one of the district would take 
 action against him, he was permitted to hold his position 
 and draw his pay to the end. The year was worse than 
 lost to the scholars of the district. A great wrong had 
 been done them. 
 
 Not far from this school, was another, presided over 
 by a bright, happy-hearted, purposeful girl. She too 
 had an interest in the social life of her district, but how 
 different an interest! From time to time she arranged 
 for an evening social at the school house. On these 
 occasions, the scholars were in part, entertainers, and 
 much of the school work was placed before the visitors. 
 The youth of the district were gathered into her school, 
 and all the nobility within them was aroused. 
 
 When her school term came to a close and she went 
 to another state to make her home, she went with the 
 community's blessing. 
 
 The great fact of her work was that she established 
 the right leadership with the youth of her school, and 
 through them inspired not only the entire school, but 
 the whole community. 
 
 I have given these rural contrasts for they taught 
 me the possibilities of a teacher's work even in the one- 
 room rural school. 
 
CHAPTER XX 
 
 SOME OUTSIDE CONDITIONS THAT AFFECT 
 SCHOOL WORK 
 
 The school work of adolescents is often greatly in- 
 terfered with by outside conditions, many of them be- 
 yond the reach of school authorities or direct school in- 
 fluence. This is truer in the larger towns and the 
 smaller cities than in the small towns. I judge it is 
 just as true in the larger cities, though I can speak from 
 experience only in the cases of the smaller cities and 
 larger towns. With the opening of school in the fall of 
 the year, begins the round of social events in the homes 
 and at the clubs that mark the school year. Not the 
 social affairs of the school, but the social events of the 
 homes and the clubs. Mrs. Smith gives a reception 
 Thursday afternoon and evening. Lucy Smith is absent 
 Thursday afternoon and comes to school Friday morn- 
 ing with a note from her mother asking that Lucy's ab- 
 sence be excused as she was necessarily detained at 
 home by her mother. Now, whether this be accepted as 
 a legitimate excuse or not, the fact remains that Lucy's 
 work has been interrupted ; often mothers will claim ill- 
 ness. (?) And there are many evening social affairs in 
 the homes, sometimes parties for young people including 
 those who are beyond high school years as well as those 
 who are still in school, social affairs, over which the 
 school has no control, that affect the work of many high 
 school scholars. All of these take the time and energy 
 that should be given to the preparation of lessons, and 
 so lower the school-standing of those who take part in 
 them; and, to some extent, unfavorably affect the class 
 work of the whole school. Not that the scholars who 
 
 222 
 
EFFECT OF OUTSIDE CONDITIONS 223 
 
 attend these social functions are always failures, for 
 often they do good school work, in other cases they 
 strive only for a passing mark; but it not infrequently 
 happens that they are among the most capable in school, 
 and could, under different home conditions, rank high in 
 scholarship. The trouble too often is, the social pleas- 
 ures lower their aim in school work so that instead of 
 their asking themselves, "What is the greatest possible 
 good I can get out of this study or that," they, not in 
 words, but in actions, ask: "What must I do to get a 
 passing mark?" With any large number of this class 
 of scholars in a high school, it requires great inspiration 
 on the part of the teachers to inspire and maintain in 
 the school, as a school, a high ideal of scholarship. 
 
 Sometimes teachers, seeing the great loss that comes 
 to scholars from this life of the home, say that if they 
 were the board of education, they would not permit 
 this interference with school work by the home; that it 
 is all wrong, and that either this class of students ought 
 to be excluded from school, or else the parents ought to 
 be compelled to change the home conditions. The 
 teachers are sure that present conditions of social life 
 outside of school are all wrong and should be righted; 
 they are disgusted with parents for not having better 
 judgment; and so, fretting over the shortages of our 
 present social system, if they are not careful, they enter 
 the ranks of the hopeless faultfinders, and thus unfit 
 themselves for the position of teachers. The pessimistic 
 teacher has no place in teaching adolescents. Conditions 
 are not ideal; this is not Utopia, but a highly complex 
 civilization, where conflicting interests cannot always 
 be straightened out to the entire satisfaction of every- 
 one. The teacher's part is to meet things as they are, 
 in a bright, hopeful spirit, recognizing the limitations 
 
224 YOUR PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 of the work that is his, but leaving nothing undone that 
 will add to the efficiency of his work in the field that is 
 his. It is a great piece of wisdom to know the bounds of 
 his rightful territory and within these bounds to see to 
 it that the field is under a high state of cultivation. I 
 am not so sure that those who fret because the present 
 state of society is what it is, if they had their way, could 
 improve on present conditions. The very work that 
 teachers do, too often forbids their taking anything 
 more than a one-sided view of the education of these 
 young people. They see only the school side, often the 
 poorest. They too often fail to appreciate fully the 
 polished manners, the grace and ease that come to many 
 of these young people as a result of their social 
 mingling. 
 
 Many, very many, teachers, in both the high schools 
 and the grammar grades, would be at a much higher 
 market value had they, at the turn of life (during adol- 
 escence), had the opportunity of mingling freely in 
 polite, social life. These polished manners are an asset, 
 an asset that parents desire for their girls and boys, 
 and for which they are often willing to sacrifice high 
 percents in school markings. There is an education 
 here that teachers cannot afford to ignore, even if par- 
 ents do sometimes put it above its just value. 
 
 Then again, many outside social affairs are not of 
 the type already described, but are almost wholly de- 
 moralizing. Take the high school boy who at school is 
 a gentleman, but is poor in his work, carrying, above 
 the passing mark only a part of his studies ; yet he is a 
 boy of good ability, well able to do above the average. 
 His life at home and away from school is wild and 
 "swelly," he is of the "fast set." So long as he is 
 doing work that would pass in a boy of good home 
 
EFFECT OF OUTSIDE CONDITIONS 225 
 
 habits, and his conduct is passable at school, and his 
 influence cannot be shown to be injurious to the school, 
 he has a right to be in the school, and the school is in no 
 way directly responsible for his home conduct. It once 
 in a while happens, when a boy reaches this stage, and 
 the home is troubled and knows not what to do with 
 him, that the home says, ' ' See what my son or daughter 
 has become since entering the high school," when the 
 fact is that the high school has been the only restraining 
 force for good that has touched the life of the boy since 
 entering upon the period of adolescence. His home fur- 
 nishes no stay and the boy is permitted by the home to 
 be swayed by associations that sometimes entrap the 
 more carefully guarded. 
 
 The safe plan on the part of the teachers is to rec- 
 ognize that the school has both privileges and duties in 
 its relation to the scholars of this age as well as the 
 younger ones ; to consider that while the teacher may not 
 order the home in all its appointments, that by coming 
 into as close touch as possible with the heads of the home, 
 he may advise with the parents and win their assistance 
 in reducing to the minimum the outside social demands 
 that break into the school work; that the school, in its 
 relation to the home, in all the things of the home that 
 detract from the school work whether they be with the 
 consent of the home or not, holds only an advisory re- 
 lation and that it does not presume to do more. This 
 position always appeals to parents as fair and just. 
 
 Not only the parties and social affairs of like kind, 
 but evening entertainments, theaters, moving pictures, 
 and church services all take from the study time and 
 the nerve force that must be given outside of school 
 hours if the scholar's standing in the high school is to 
 be above the ordinary. I know of nothing that more com 
 
226 YOUR PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 pletely absorbs the attention of the scholars of a high 
 school age than a warmly-contested political campaign, 
 with its evening speeches and the pyrotechnics that go 
 to arouse and hold the attention of the people and to call 
 them together that the orators of the opposing political 
 parties may have an opportunity to present the issues 
 of the day. These are stirring occasions, and few are 
 the boys and girls of high school age who have will- 
 power enough to compel themselves to sit at home to 
 prepare lessons while these attractions that stir the 
 blood are calling them to come. 
 
 After a campaign evening, nerve force for school 
 work the following morning is low, and restlessness, in- 
 attention, and grinning, seem to be at the flood. To the 
 teacher, the day is often a trying one ; but there is only 
 one thing for the teacher to do, keep himself well under 
 control. The teacher's self needs more attention on such 
 a day than the scholars. Hold steadily to the work and 
 keep in mind that another day will bring changed con- 
 ditions. 
 
 But has nothing of value come to offset this loss in 
 school work? Many have counted it one of the privi- 
 leges of their lives that in their youth they heard Lincoln 
 speak on some of the burning questions of his day. Was 
 there ever a day in school that gave them the equivalent 
 of one hour in the presence of that one of the world's 
 greatest men? In the political campaigns of today, 
 many of our ablest public men come to be known almost 
 from one end of our country to the other through their 
 campaign speeches, and the inspiration and education, 
 not only concerning the issues of the day, but also in 
 patriotism, that come to our youth in this way, are im- 
 measurably great and good. History learned from the 
 lips of our greatest living statesman is the key that un- 
 
EFFECT OF OUTSIDE CONDITIONS 227 
 
 locks interest in much of the history contained in books. 
 Political campaigns are not without value in the educa- 
 tion of the youth. They do demoralize the classroom 
 work to a greater or less degree, but they also do a work 
 that school teachers cannot do. 
 
 Religious instruction is left to the home and to the 
 church. Our public schools are made up of children 
 from homes representing all creeds. It is not within 
 the right of the public school teacher to teach in any 
 way any particular creed. Religious instruction belongs 
 to the home and the church. 
 
 When some of the churches in the city were giving 
 special religious instructions to classes of their boys and 
 girls preparing them for confirmation, I was always 
 pleased to grant their instructors the privilege of send- 
 ing these boys and girls a half-hour or hour late to 
 school. This privilege was not always asked, but when 
 it was, it was granted. To many, very many, parents, 
 it is the most important of all instruction. 
 
 With some churches, it is customary to hold series of 
 special religious services. In some churches, these spe- 
 cial services take the form of revival meetings. Some- 
 times the Protestant churches hold a series of union 
 revival services, employing an evangelist to conduct the 
 services. It frequently happens that all Protestant 
 Christian people of a community, for several weeks at 
 a time, center their interests in one united effort of 
 this kind. The community is deeply moved religiously. 
 High school scholars are just at the age when religious 
 teachings are most likely to impress them. As has al- 
 ready been stated, at no other time in life is there so 
 great an opportunity for pressing home religious truths. 
 It is the time when the mind first seeks to know the 
 deeper meaning of life, the time when, if the right 
 
228 YOUR PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 trend be given to the religious thinking, little need be 
 the fears for the future religious life; but the boy or 
 girl set adrift in his religious thinking at this period, 
 may ever after be hopelessly castabout. Parents know 
 that this is the opportune time for a determined re- 
 ligious stand on the part of girls and boys. They 
 may, or may not, know how deep-seated physiologically 
 and psychologically, the reason is for the youth's de- 
 ciding now the question of his religious life; but the 
 parents do know from observation and experience, that 
 deep religious convictions at this period are apt to 
 give trend to the whole after religious life, and hence, 
 are very solicitous that their boys and girls be regu- 
 lar attendants on these services, and actively engaged 
 in the religious work of the meetings. As a result, the 
 nerve strain on scholars of the high school and of the 
 grammar grades is often very great, and the school 
 work cannot fail to be, to some extent, affected. High 
 schools feel the effect more than grammar schools. Be- 
 cause of shorter hours of high school sessions and the 
 character of the work, high school scholars must or- 
 dinarily do more studying at home and of evenings 
 than grammar grade scholars, so when their evenings 
 are given to attending religious services, the lessons 
 suffer ; nor is this all the lowered nervous vitality pre- 
 vents the accomplishment of what is the usual work 
 during the regular study hours in school. It is true 
 also that the depleted nerves of some of those most 
 actively engaged in the evening services make them so 
 restless and inattentive that they constitute a real an- 
 noyance in school. This sometimes happens with those 
 who have been the most reliable and trustworthy high 
 school scholars. What can the teachers do under these 
 conditions ? Must they permit the work of the school to 
 
EFFECT OF OUTSIDE CONDITIONS 229 
 
 be broken into by these religious meetings? Have the 
 schools no right to be considered? There is one thing 
 teachers can do and should do, they should hold them- 
 selves from fretting, and plan to meet the conditions 
 that they cannot change. Help the scholars to so re- 
 arrange their study hours that the hours immediately 
 following the close of school in the afternoon and before 
 school in the morning may be devoted to the lesson that 
 heretofore has been prepared in the evening. Much can 
 be done in this way, and by following it up from day to 
 day to see that the new arrangement is carried out by 
 the scholars, a great deal can be done. But, even this 
 planning with the scholars must be done in no fault- 
 finding spirit or manner, or the teacher will defeat the 
 very object he is trying to attain. A consultation with 
 the parents, in some cases, wins their assistance in se- 
 curing attention to the new study hours. But this and 
 all other arrangements for study hours that can be 
 made, do not make up for the deficient nerve-force left 
 for school work. This can be met only in one way and 
 that is, by not attempting to do more than can be well 
 done. Careful testing soon reveals to the teacher about 
 what amount of work can be done, and well done. This 
 should be the measure for the time being, even if it does 
 fall somewhat short of the usual requirements. It is far 
 better to move a little more slowly for a time and keep 
 up the quality of the work than to keep up the quantity 
 at the expense of quality. 
 
 But I wish I could tell you how much, in the times of 
 greatest outside distractions, depends on the teacher. 
 The highly efficient teacher, the inspirer of girls and 
 boys, at these times, arouses a determination in his 
 scholars not to let their school work fall short because 
 of their interest in the religious services, but to more 
 
230 YOUR PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 carefully systematize their time, and to give themselves 
 more completely to the two things for the time and to 
 the two things only. This teacher makes no complaint 
 of shiftlessness in the preparation of the work; loses no 
 nervous energy in grumbling about the unfortunate con- 
 ditions that hamper his work ; but, with steady nerves, a 
 happy face, and a vigorous spirit says, "The conditions 
 will require extra effort on the part of all, and I know 
 we will make the effort. " The scholars leave his room 
 with the set purpose of doing as he has planned. They 
 must do it, he expects it; and they in a large measure, 
 do do it. True it is, he measures the assignments so as 
 not to ask the impossible, but an assignment that meas- 
 ures up to the full of what he believes they can do under 
 existing conditions. 
 
 In this teacher's classes there is no visible break in 
 the work; recitations move on with their accustomed 
 ready response, and bright interest. Contrast this work 
 with that in the case of the poor teacher, the one who 
 complains that outside distractions have ruined his 
 work; step into this complaining teacher's recitation 
 room and the very deadness of it reflects, not so much 
 the influence of outside conditions, as the lack of power 
 in the teacher. 
 
 However, the fact still remains that these outside 
 conditions do affect, unfavorably, the classroom work of 
 the scholars. The first of these two teachers spends an 
 unusual amount of nerve-force to hold his classes to 
 good preparation of their work. The second teacher 
 spends possibly an equal or greater amount of nerve- 
 force fretting over outside conditions that he cannot 
 change. One is wise, the other, foolish. Just in pro- 
 portion as the teachers of a high school or grammar 
 school belong to one or the other of these two classes, is 
 
EFFECT OF OUTSIDE CONDITIONS 231 
 
 the character of the school work affected, to a greater 
 or less degree, by outside conditions. 
 
 The great arousing of the religious sentiment of a 
 community so that for weeks the whole thought is cen- 
 tered on the higher things of life, on better living, on 
 man's trying to measure up more fully to his right re- 
 lation to his fellowman and to his God, is a wonderful 
 force in the character-forming of the adolescent mind. 
 Is it a loss of time, in the broad education of the youth, 
 that his school work moves at a somewhat slower pace 
 while this part of his education is being emphasized? 
 
CHAPTER XXI 
 SOME COMMENTS 
 
 In the preceding chapters, I have stated the best- 
 known facts of the physical and mental changes of adol- 
 escence, and have indicated the peculiar characteristics 
 of the young people with whom we have to deal in the 
 high school, and to a large extent in the grammar grades. 
 Whenever we expect these young people to be other than 
 they are, we are doomed to disappointment; but when 
 we studj 7 to know them as they do not know themselves, 
 physically, mentally, morally, and to some extent in 
 their inheritance and in their environment, we put our- 
 selves in a position to wield a great influence over them. 
 It is our knowledge of them individually and also in the 
 gang or mob form, that makes possible a sympathetic 
 attitude in us who are teachers toward them that de- 
 termines in them the right attitude toward the school 
 and all its interests. When these adjustments are as 
 they should be, the school is in a position to work out 
 its problems along right lines and in the right spirit 
 even though the work be but imperfectly done. 
 
 President Hadley said in his baccalaureate address a 
 few years ago: "No matter how high the ideals for 
 which we stand, we cannot expect others to follow us 
 unless we have confidence in them that they will follow 
 us. We cannot expect devotion if we return it with 
 mistrust." Nowhere is this more true than in school 
 work with adolescent boys and girls; yet it must be an 
 intelligent confidence that we give them, a confidence 
 based on as full a knowledge as possible of their condi- 
 tion of life; a confidence that is not full of impossible 
 expectations. 
 
 232 
 
SOME COMMENTS 233 
 
 The one thing that must never fail those of us who 
 work with these young people, is that self-control that 
 holds us to the right point of view. The young people 
 may be swayed from their moorings by some passing 
 emotion or mental whirlwind, but we, those of us in con- 
 trol, must not fail to see clearly the difference between 
 the deed and the doer; the responsibility of the in- 
 dividual acting alone, and the responsibility of the in- 
 dividual acting under the impulse of the gang or crowd, 
 or what in other terms might be called the mob influence. 
 If we lose this point of view, we fail to distinguish be- 
 tween the doer and the deed; if we lose this point of 
 view, we may hold for individual responsibility where 
 it does not exist. This confusion in the minds of those 
 in authority always does violence to the highest form of 
 discipline. 
 
 If those in authority have the right self-control, they 
 can condemn the deed, and yet have the kindliest feeling 
 for the doer. Wrongdoing is always wrong, but wrong- 
 doers are not always bad. That which is done under the 
 gang or mob influence may be very wrong, and yet the 
 individual scarcely understands how he became a party 
 to the deed, what the influence that led him on. 
 
 If the spirit of authority is intelligently just, there 
 will be no condemnation of a spirit in the doer that is 
 not there, or in other words, the authority will not im- 
 pute wrong motives to the doers of the evil deeds, but 
 while strongly condemning the deed, and requiring that 
 every wrong be made right by those who did the wrong, 
 will be in the kindliest attitude toward the doers of the 
 wrong. 
 
 When this is the case, the scholars may not, at first, 
 appreciate the justice of their paying the penalty for 
 the wrong-doing, but when the penalty comes not in the 
 
234 YOUR PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 spirit of retaliation or of getting even, but rather as the 
 natural result of violated law, the natural result of the 
 wrong done; while they may not at first see clearly, nor 
 feel that it is just, yet in the end their feelings and in- 
 tellects as well, will clear up and the lesson that wrong 
 brings its own reward, and that too, whether the wrong 
 is intentional or only the result of some sudden impulse, 
 will be learned. I say feelings and intellect as well, 
 placing feelings first, for it is true that the steady, 
 kindly, unruffled feelings of those in authority first 
 touch the boys and girls, and beget in them a responsive 
 feeling that soon brings about the right mental attitude ; 
 and then the justice of all that has been done is rec- 
 ognized; and the great need of self-control more deeply 
 impressed on all. 
 
 Sometimes it is necessary for the principal or super- 
 intendent, or both, to meet the whole body of scholars 
 and hold them to a strong support of what is best for 
 the school when some whirl of excitement might turn 
 their sympathy to the side of the offenders. 
 
 Once in a while the principal, or superintendent, or 
 both, must act quickly and with no uncertainty in ward- 
 ing off what might cause serious trouble to the school. 
 
 Ordinarily all matters of discipline and all school 
 troubles can be taken care of privately, and the school 
 know nothing of them ; but once in a great while an act 
 is committed which if not headed off might stir up the 
 whole school as in the case of the rules and regulations 
 for freshmen and sophomores; and when an act of this 
 kind has been committed, if the school can be quickly 
 "lined up" strong on the side of right, against the 
 whole affair, the offense is easily adjusted, and, the 
 offenders failing to make themselves objects of interest, 
 have no influence whatever on the school. Then their 
 
SOME COMMENTS 235 
 
 discipline if they are members of the school becomes a 
 very simple affair. 
 
 #*#*#**** 
 
 When I was first beginning as a teacher, I thought 
 the day would come when I knew just how to conduct 
 a school, that it would never be necessary to correct 
 scholars or talk with them about their duties and their 
 conduct ; that when once everything was gotten into the 
 right condition, the schools, the scholars, would run 
 themselves. It was years before it fully dawned on me 
 that if it were so, the best teachers would soon be out of 
 jobs ; that the work of training the young is a continuous 
 process; that as the finished (?) product leaves our 
 factory at one door, the raw material is coming in at the 
 other. Not long ago, I heard a lecturer say that in talk- 
 ing with a manufacturer of shaving soap, he had asked 
 the soap-man if he did not waste a great deal of money 
 advertising. He said to the soap man: ''Everybody 
 knows of your soap, and it seems a great waste to keep 
 on advertising.'* But the soap man replied: "If it 
 is true that everybody knows of my soap today, there is 
 a new crowd coming on tomorrow, and tomorrow, and 
 tomorrow, and for their sakes it pays all the time to 
 keep on advertising." 
 
 When the right spirit reigns in a school, it should 
 continue from year to year; but that right spirit year 
 after year must exert its formative influence on this 
 boy and that boy, this girl and that girl, this class and 
 that class, as they pass up through the grades of the 
 school, as they pass through the various physical and 
 mental stages of their development. So long as boys 
 and girls grow from childhood to youth, from youth to 
 early manhood and womanhood, so long will the teach- 
 
236 YOUR PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 ing and the training of youth furnish the problems that 
 grammar grade and high school teachers must try to 
 solve. 
 
 My boyhood home was on the banks of the Ohio 
 River. Year after year I watched the pilots on the tow- 
 boats guide the great fleets of coal past the danger 
 points in the river. Each new fleet was guided just as 
 carefully as though no other fleet had been guided past 
 the same dangers. So each oncoming class of youth 
 must be guided just as carefully as though no others 
 had been before them. 
 
 Whatever the conditions the future may bring forth 
 as to high school teachers, for the present and for the 
 immediate future, conditions will change but little as to 
 the preparedness or fitness of high school teachers for 
 their work. Many every year go into the high school 
 as teachers fresh from colleges and universities, young 
 in years, and with little training pedagogically for their 
 work. Bright, scholarly young- people, yet unbeknown 
 (?) to themselves, ignorant of the work they are to do. 
 Many of them in their experience socially are not so wise 
 as many girls and boys whom they are to teach. In fact, 
 it not infrequently happens that the high school teacher 
 has had no social life before he takes up the work of a 
 teacher, so that the social attention shown him by school 
 scholars, is more than he with his lack of experience, is 
 able to stand, and as a result, his indiscreetness greatly 
 interferes with his doing his best work, and hence with 
 the best interest of the school. This is not only true of 
 young men, but of young women also. Sometimes prom- 
 ising young teachers lose their opportunities in a school 
 by a lack of judgment that a little experience in social 
 life would have given them. I have in mind, an ex- 
 cellent young woman, scholarly, and with ability to in- 
 
SOME COMMENTS 237 
 
 struct, who by keeping company with some of the boys 
 of the high school in the social life of the community 
 outside of the school, so lost her influence as a teacher 
 in the school that she was, in the end, in that school, a 
 failure. She was a good woman but she lacked judg- 
 ment as to the fitness of things. The social affairs of 
 those of high school age appealed to her strongly, for as 
 a girl previous to her teaching, she had had no social 
 life. 
 
 In taking into a corps of high school teachers, young 
 men and young women, college or university graduates, 
 with no experience in the work of teaching, it is un- 
 pardonable in the principal or superintendent not to 
 talk these things over with them so as to guard them or 
 at least to make them aware of some of the dangers that 
 they if forewarned, can all the more easily guard 
 against. In my own work of later years, I made it a 
 point always to talk very frankly with inexperienced 
 young teachers coming into our school. In fact, before 
 engaging them, I have talked of these things and have 
 always had it understood that if they came to work 
 with us they must expect the high school principal and 
 the superintendent to advise or talk with them as freely 
 about their work as they would with a high school 
 scholar ; that it would be their work to train them in the 
 things that make for the best of high school teachers; 
 that whatever criticism might be offered, whatever sug- 
 gestion might be given, all would be done in the kind- 
 liest spirit of helpfulness, for their interest and the 
 school's interests would be one. It is a blessing to the 
 young candidate and to the principal and superintend- 
 ent as well, to have a clear understanding on these 
 things before any engagement is entered into, as it 
 makes possible a way of helpfulness on the part of the 
 
238 YOUR PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 supervising officers, and brings about a close relation 
 that means strength to the young teacher. Supervising 
 officers owe this to the young teacher. 
 
 In talking over what would be expected of young 
 men teachers among many things, their attention was 
 called to the fact that they would come to know many 
 beautiful, attractive high school girls, but that there 
 must be no keeping company with them; that while we 
 did not wish to interfere with their social life, we knew 
 the effect on the school of young men teachers' paying 
 special attention to girls of the high school, so would 
 ask them to keep free from any entanglement of this 
 kind; that their usefulness and the school's best in- 
 terests could be best served by their remembering this 
 and conducting themselves accordingly. 
 
 Another request that was made of them, one that 
 many might think uncalled-for, but that we knew from 
 experience meant the good of all, was this, each young 
 man teacher was asked not to detain any one of the 
 high school girls alone for make-up work or for any pur- 
 pose after the close of school, but in cases where some 
 one of the girls had work to do, or where assistance was 
 to be given her, to arrange to have someone else remain 
 in the room until the girl was excused, or to ask her to 
 pass with him to another recitation room where there 
 was another teacher, or to the library. 
 
 In making this request of a young man, we said to 
 him that it was not because we mistrusted him for if we 
 mistrusted him he would not be considered for a teacher, 
 nor was it because we lacked faith in the character of 
 our high school girls; but that it reflected on no one to 
 make all safe from the possibility of gossip so far as 
 could be done. 
 
SOME COMMENTS 239 
 
 This calls to mind the case of a young friend of mine. 
 He entered high school work when but little more than 
 a boy, still in the adolescent period. He lived the first 
 year very closely in sympathy with his superintendent, in 
 whom he confided, and whose advice he always followed, 
 and he made a record of which all were proud. The fol- 
 lowing year he was under another superintendent with 
 whom the relation was not so close, and who was slow 
 to offer his help to the younger teachers. This second 
 year mistakes were made that were very humiliating to 
 this young teacher. 
 
 Some months later, he was visiting his first superin- 
 tendent, and told him of the mistakes he had made, and 
 when the superintendent, not in a condemning or fault- 
 finding manner, asked, "Why did you do it?" the young 
 man replied: "I did it because you were not there to 
 help me." He was a splendid young man, and with a 
 little guidance on the part of the principal and super- 
 intendent, an able, inspiring, high school teacher. 
 
 The time may come when the training given 
 candidates for high school positions will enable them to 
 understand, at least to a considerable extent, high school 
 problems; but as I have already said, at the present 
 time and for some time to come, principals and super- 
 intendents must do a large part of this training. 
 
 High-school principals and superintendents of 
 schools must be careful in their selection of teachers 
 that they may not bring into their corps young people 
 whose ideals have been lowered by having come in con- 
 tact with teachers of the wrong type in higher schools. 
 It is of great importance to the principal and superin- 
 tendent to know that the young man or woman who 
 would enter the ranks of their school teachers has been 
 under the inspiration of a really great teacher. I re- 
 
240 YOUR PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 member well a young man who was an applicant for a 
 position as teacher in our high school. He and I called 
 upon one of the members of the board of education who 
 knew well the faculty of the school from which the 
 young man came, and who knew, too, that in that 
 faculty there was one man pre-eminent as a teacher and 
 inspirer of youth. When this teacher's name was men- 
 tioned, the young man's face glowed with admiration. 
 After the young man had passed out, the board mem- 
 ber said, "I'm in favor of that young man, he has been 
 inspired by a really great teacher." The years follow- 
 ing proved that that great teacher's ideals implanted in 
 the young man, made him a blessing to our school. 
 ********* 
 
 The teacher of grammar grade and of high school 
 scholars should be able to read many of these ordinarily 
 fleeting peculiarities of youth and know how, without 
 calling attention to them, to meet them as worthy only 
 a passing notice, until they cease to appear. There is 
 always great danger that the boy or girl may be greatly 
 injured by having his attention directed to his own pe- 
 culiarities, sometimes so injured that what otherwise 
 might be of a fleeting character, is fixed as a lifelong 
 trait, possibly by his own brooding over it and bring- 
 ing it too strongly into his consciousness. To greatly 
 humiliate an adolescent over the fact that he is not as 
 many others at his age is a great wrong. 
 
 Miss M was teacher of a class in Algebra. It 
 
 was not a beginning class. It was a class that had been 
 
 poorly taught the year before. Miss M was 
 
 studying the work of each member of the class very care- 
 fully to discover the weak points of each that she might 
 help each one just at the point where he most needed 
 
SOME COMMENTS 241 
 
 help. She was an inspiring, able teacher. She was 
 given this poorly prepared class because the principal 
 knew she was the most able of all his faculty to even up 
 and lead forward such a class. She was succeeding 
 splendidly and holding her class at a high point of in- 
 terest. All but one large boy were responding to every 
 effort. But Mack Vaney sat in the class making but 
 little attempt to do the work. He said he never could 
 "do Algebra" and there was no use in his trying. The 
 teacher felt she must show him that he could "do Al- 
 gebra," and that it was time for her to act, 
 
 One day, as they were taking up a new process in 
 Algebra that required considerable practice to fix it so 
 it could be used automatically, she invited all of the 
 class who would like to go through the process with her 
 after school to remain. To Mack she quietly gave a 
 special invitation. A large part of the class at the close 
 
 of school passed to Miss M 's room, stepped to the 
 
 blackboard, and under her guidance, solved problem 
 after problem by the new process. In fact, some of 
 them worked every problem of the next morning's 
 lesson before leaving. But Mack sat looking like a 
 thundercloud, until all but one or two others had left 
 
 the room. Then Miss M asked him to try a 
 
 problem on the blackboard where she could follow his 
 work, step by step. He replied again that there was no 
 use in his trying, that he could not do it. His eyes 
 filled and the tears flowed freely. Mad, or angered? 
 Yes, but not at the teacher, for he thought her ideal; 
 but he had so thoroughly convinced himself that he 
 could not "do Algebra," that he was just in an ugly 
 spirit at himself, and was unwilling to try. The teacher 
 felt it was then or never with him and was determined 
 to prove to him that he could do the work. She in- 
 
242 YOUR PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 sisted that he try. He made the effort, still in the same 
 mood. Step by step, she held him to the process, prob- 
 lem after problem, not speaking many words. Finally, 
 he reached the point where all she said was : ' ' Correct, 
 take the next one." Every problem in the next day's 
 lesson was correctly solved before Mack was permitted 
 to leave the blackboard. Then, when excused, he 
 quietly said, "Good-night!" and passed out on his way 
 home. 
 
 From that day on, he was a leader in his class in 
 Mathematics. I knew him through Geometry and Trig- 
 onometry. He never after that day called or accepted 
 help from anyone, but led in all the work. No other 
 teacher in that school could have done what Miss 
 
 M did, for while he was a fine boy he was, if 
 
 stirred a little, very stubborn, and no other teacher had 
 that quiet, poised manner, that masterful power, that 
 compelled action without irritation that Miss M 
 
 Miss Martha Pollard was a graduate of a high school 
 and of a state normal school, but had had no teaching 
 experience other than the practice work in the normal 
 school, when she was employed to teach in our city 
 schools. She had made a record far above the ordinary 
 in scholarship in both the schools; not only had she 
 been well-trained for the work of a teacher, but she 
 seemed possessed of qualities of heart and mind that 
 gave promise of a fine teacher. 
 
 She was first given a fourth grade room. The pupils 
 had been finely taught and the government had been 
 almost ideal in the third grade room from which they 
 were promoted. They, in fact, had never been in a room 
 
SOME COMMENTS 243 
 
 where there was anything but the best of order, so knew 
 nothing else. The fourth grade room was an ideal room 
 for a young teacher. A room that gave her every op- 
 portunity to make a good beginning. But her work the 
 first semester was very poor, so poor that our primary 
 supervisor gave her much attention and help, hoping 
 Miss Pollard would, after becoming accustomed to the 
 school, be able to put into the work of teaching the 
 power she seemed to possess. 
 
 During this first semester, she made some improve- 
 ment, but it was not marked. The second semester, she 
 had a class in fifth grade work, and did much better 
 teaching than she had done in the fourth grade. Her 
 teaching was much improved and her grip on the room 
 was stronger. She was still far from the teacher we 
 had hoped she would be, but as she had made some im- 
 provement, especially the second semester, and had 
 always manifested a fine spirit, she was retained for the 
 second year. 
 
 The second year, she was given fifth grade pupils, a 
 fine class, but her work fell below what it had been the 
 latter half of the first year. The supervisor, the prin- 
 cipal, the superintendent, put forth every effort to help 
 her, but she still failed to measure up. The second half 
 of the year, the superintendent followed her work very 
 closely and talked with her very frankly about it. He 
 studied her, too, to learn her weakness, to see if it were 
 possible to give her aid, to help her grow in power. 
 
 He finally decided she was afraid to assert herself, 
 to make herself felt as head of her school. Her in- 
 struction was good, the lessons were well-planned, and 
 while he was in the room the order was good, but when 
 he was out of the room for a day, the school became dis- 
 orderly, and the teacher stood helpless before the school. 
 
244 YOUE PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 At this time, in a private interview with the teacher, 
 he told her that she must make a decided improvement 
 in her work or she must drop out of the school at the 
 close of the semester; that it was a great wrong to the 
 pupils and a wrong to herself for her to continue in the 
 work if she could do no better work as a teacher than 
 she was then doing ; that her room was the poorest taught 
 school in the city ; that it was for her to decide whether 
 or not she would lose her place in the school. 
 
 She took this plain talk very much to heart, and 
 began to cry. But the superintendent said there was no 
 need to cry, that he was her friend and anxious to see 
 her succeed, but that no one could teach her room for 
 her, no one could make her room an orderly, studious 
 room for her, she must do it herself; that she was well- 
 trained and of good scholarship; but that it seemed to 
 him she simply would not put forth the determined 
 effort to control her room; that instead of standing up 
 before that room with an air of authority about her, 
 she stood looking as though she feared every one of the 
 pupils ; that instead of crying, she ought to ' ' get busy, ' ' 
 determined to make a success, to have an orderly, 
 studious room, a room in which she and the pupils too 
 would be happy. "But," said he, "if you will not 
 exert yourself to be master of your school, I will not 
 recommend you for a place for the coming year. You 
 have the ability, the power to make a good teacher, if 
 you will not do it this semester, your opportunity here 
 ends. I hope you do what I know you can do if you but 
 will do it," 
 
 It was now a case of sink or swim with her, and she 
 swam. She put forth the effort of her life that se- 
 mester and made great improvement. At the close of 
 the semester, the superintendent said to her that she had 
 
SOME COMMENTS JJ45 
 
 improved so much that she would be continued in the 
 same position for the coming year; that while she had 
 made great improvement, her school was far from the 
 school he expected her to make it if she continued to 
 teach. "You have the ability, but are only beginning 
 to use it. Next year there must be still greater im- 
 provement. ' ' 
 
 She was pleased, but knew her work was still below 
 what it must be to hold a permanent place in the school. 
 She asked if she could not be given a room in some other 
 building. The superintendent replied that she would 
 not be transferred to any other building but must bring 
 her work up where she was, that there was no easier 
 place in the city schools. Then he added: "Go home, 
 take your vacation free from thoughts of school. Don't 
 think of school, but have a good time, then you will re- 
 turn with renewed nerve force and be able to put snap 
 and vim into your work. ' ' 
 
 The superintendent saw no more of her until one 
 day in midsummer she called at his office to talk with 
 him. She said she had been worrying all summer about 
 having that room and again asked for a change. The 
 superintendent said that he would relieve the room of 
 one boy for her, but would make no other change; that 
 she must bring that room up to the standard of the best 
 schools ; that she had showed her ability to do it and that 
 she must do it. Again he said to her to go home and 
 quit worrying. 
 
 In September, she was in her place with a different 
 look on her face. Nothing was said to her about her 
 room, but a week had not passed before all knew that a 
 complete change had come to the teacher and as a re- 
 sult the room was in good condition. The principal 
 asked the superintendent if he had noted the change in 
 
246 YOUR PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 the room, saying, she is doing finely. The supervisors 
 put the same question to the superintendent each one 
 commenting on the fine room. The superintendent re- 
 plied to each questioner that he had noted the change. 
 
 Shortly after the close of the first month of the se- 
 mester, Miss Pollard said to the superintendent that she 
 believed she was doing the kind of work that he had 
 said she must do, and that she greatly enjoyed her 
 school. 
 
 "Yes," the superintendent replied, "you are doing 
 good work. I knew all the time that you could do it, but 
 I sometimes feared you might never be willing to put 
 forth the effort to do it. I'm greatly pleased with what 
 you are doing. Of course, you enjoy it." 
 
 In this case, it took time and effort on the part of 
 supervising officers to make this young woman the good 
 teacher that she finally became. The fine spirit in which 
 she received all criticisms saved her to final success. 
 No fault could be found with her training both in the 
 normal school and in the high school. She was under 
 excellent teachers. 
 
 Here is another beginning teacher. She too is a 
 high school graduate and a normal school graduate. 
 A young woman of fine character but just a little mis- 
 trustful of herself. This was the one thing that, at first, 
 made me hesitate to give her a place as a primary 
 teacher; but she was by far the best that could be se- 
 cured at that time for the school and for this reason 
 was taken into our corps of teachers. 
 
 But I need not have had any fears. When the first 
 day she stood before the school, a bright smile lighting 
 up her face, a face full of faith and trust in the boys 
 and girls, coupled with a something that suggested ab- 
 solute obedience to her wishes, and when I saw her 
 
SOME COMMENTS 247 
 
 definite manner as she moved about her work, I knew 
 that a young teacher of unusual worth had come among 
 us, and that all we could do for her would be to give 
 her opportunity to grow. And she grew and she grew 
 to far better things as a teacher. 
 
 *=#####*# 
 
 At the opening of one fall term, we had a new man in 
 the manual training shop to teach the seventh and the 
 eighth grade boys who came from all the grammar 
 schools to this center for shop-work. This new teacher 
 had had some experience in teaching small boys, and had 
 had a fine course in one of our best Mechanical Engi- 
 neering schools, but he had had but little pedagogical 
 training. We knew he was short in his pedagogical train- 
 ing although he had taken a ' ' course of lectures " ( ? ) 
 on teaching manual training. However, he was the best- 
 prepared man available for the place that we could se- 
 cure for the money that could be paid that year. 
 
 I watched his work very closely and kept in close 
 touch with him. He was a fine mechanic and his ability 
 and equipment in mechanical drawing were of high 
 order; but he was just as mechanical in handling 
 seventh and eighth grade boys as he was skillful in 
 handling mechanical drawing tools. I hoped he would 
 improve in this part of the work, but with all my assis- 
 tance, for quite a while, I almost despaired of his ever 
 rising to an appreciation of what it means to be a 
 teacher. 
 
 The principals who sent boys to him finally began to 
 say that there must be something wrong with the 
 teacher, as the boys did not care for their manual train- 
 ing as they had before this teacher came. I knew that 
 the boys were tired of the dead mechanics of his work, 
 
248 YOUR PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 and that in some way I must get him to a higher plane 
 of teaching, or he could not continue in the work with 
 us, as the loss to the boys would be too great. One day, 
 I was at a grammar building talking with the principal 
 about the manual training work when she said that the 
 feeling on the part of the boys against the manual train- 
 ing seemed to be growing worse all the time. I asked 
 her to call to the office one class of the boys for me to 
 talk with them. 
 
 When they came into the office, I greeted them, and 
 said that I wished to talk with them about their manual 
 training. I then said that I would like them to tell me 
 just why they did not care for their manual training as 
 they had cared for it the last year ; that they should tell 
 me anything they wished ; that I knew the teacher was 
 trying hard to help them and was willing to do anything 
 to help them ; but that I also knew they did not like to 
 work under him; that I was anxious to find out the 
 trouble so I could adjust it if possible, and everyone be 
 happy again in the work. 
 
 At first, no one felt like speaking, but with a little 
 more encouragement on my part, one of the boys said in 
 a gentlemanly manner, "Mr. Stableton, we don't think 
 he treats us right." "Well," I replied, "I'm sure he 
 wishes to treat you right, and I'd like to know in just 
 what way he does not treat you right. " Then one of the 
 boys said: "Mr. Stableton, do you think it was right 
 for him to make me stay and clean up a part of the floor 
 as a punishment?" I smiled and replied, "Why, John, 
 you would clean up the whole room and never complain, 
 if I were to ask you to do it." "Yes," he replied, "but 
 you wouldn't ask me the way he does." I saw the 
 trouble. The work was not interesting, and as a result, 
 he was ruffling their feelings. It was more a matter of 
 
SOME COMMENTS 249 
 
 their feelings than anything else. The teacher was 
 calling forth the wrong response from the boys. My 
 part was to bring about a different method of approach 
 on the part of the teacher, and to help him to do away 
 with the dead monotony of the work. 
 
 I next had a talk with the teacher. I explained that 
 the boys were asking to be permitted to give up manual 
 training, and finally told him of what I had learned of 
 how they felt. He was very sorry, for he was honestly 
 trying to do his part. I said further that the boys had 
 the notion that he did not like them. 
 
 "But, Mr. Stableton," he replied, "I do like them 
 and am trying so hard to be helpful/' 
 
 "I believe every word you say," I answered, for I 
 did, "but you and I together must bring about a better 
 understanding so they will feel that you are interested 
 in them as I know you are." It means everything to 
 you to make a success with these boys and there is no 
 reason why you cannot do it." 
 
 He said again that he was trying hard and that he 
 thought he had pretty good order and attention to work, 
 but that sometimes little things happened that he had 
 to correct. John, he said had been somewhat inattentive, 
 so he had told him to remain after school, and required 
 him to clean up a part of the shop as a punishment. 
 "And don't you think that was a good way to punish 
 him? I've been trying to think out ways of punishing 
 boys who are inattentive or do not do their work, and 
 it seems to me to keep John in and require him to do 
 that work was a good thing. What do you think?" 
 
 I replied that I feared he had hold of the wrong end 
 of the situation ; that I had studied how to interest and 
 direct energy rather than how to punish offenders; and 
 that I was sure we had found the source of his trouble. 
 
250 YOUR PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 * ' Why, ' ' said he, "I 'd like to have you read my notes 
 on the lectures on school discipline given us at the uni- 
 versity. They tell us just how to try to plan out certain 
 punishments for certain offenses." 
 
 I kindly said, "Look here, my dear sir, you burn up 
 those notes and come here determined to live with these 
 boys and to think how to interest them, how to direct 
 their energy and at the same time make them feel that 
 yours is a sincere interest in them, and the problem of 
 punishment will largely cease to bother you. When- 
 ever you have the right relation between yourself and 
 them, John would be more than willing to clean up the 
 whole room. No, I'd not recommend giving a boy a job 
 of cleaning up a room as a punishment, I'd do nothing 
 that he could feel degrades him. If John had littered 
 up the floor, I'd have him clean it up, not as a punish- 
 ment, but as a matter of right, taking it for granted 
 that he would always wish to do the right thing, or as 
 he might say, give him a square deal." 
 
 "These boys come to you expecting to do the right 
 thing, but when you put a mechanical rein on them and 
 keep a suspicious look-out for someone to brace against 
 it, you suggest to them the very thing you would not 
 have them do. Quit looking for offenses. Expect them 
 to do right. Greet them cordially when they come into 
 the shop and keep the work spinning and keep your 
 mind on what you and they are going to accomplish, and 
 before you know it, you will have a common interest 
 and be pulling together. 
 
 "Then I'd make a little change in the work. I'd 
 give more freedom to individuals and get away from the 
 monotony of trying to hold everyone to work on the 
 same thing at the same time. I think I'd have as many 
 projects as boys, so each one would be following out 
 
SOME COMMENTS 251 
 
 something of interest to him. This, together with your 
 own changed attitude, ought soon to make a very dif- 
 ferent situation from what you now have. There is no 
 reason why you cannot make a successful teacher, your 
 education, your fine mechanical skill, and your willing- 
 ness to work, and work hard, are great assets. Now cul- 
 tivate the spirit of a teacher and you will succeed. I'm 
 sure you will do it. I '11 give you every assistance in my 
 power. You must succeed, you are too good a young 
 man to fail. ' ' 
 
 After this, from time to time, we talked together of 
 his work and it was not long until there was a marked 
 change for the better. There was a pleasant atmosphere 
 in the room, there was just as close attention to busi- 
 ness, but the boys were happy and the teacher was too. 
 
 The latter part of the semester he said to me: "Mr. 
 Stableton, I now know what you meant when you talked 
 to me of getting hold of the boys and directing them in- 
 stead of studying how to punish them." And I re- 
 plied: "You don't need to tell me, I know the change 
 that has come to you, and I 'm wonderfully pleased. ' ' 
 
 He was with us two years, and we were all sorry to 
 lose him, but an opening paying him $700 more than we 
 could possibly pay came to him and called him from us. 
 Two years later I received a letter from him saying that 
 he wished to thank me for the help I had given him when 
 he first came to our school ; that that year 's training had 
 made it possible for him to hold the position he then 
 held in one of our state normal schools. 
 
 ********* 
 
 Young people at this age are very sensitive to the 
 shades of honesty that the teacher manifests from day 
 to day in the conduct of the work in his classroom ; and 
 
252 YOUR PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 the class estimate of the teacher's honesty of character 
 is not far from right. A small minority may hold a 
 different view, but this does not affect the class estimate. 
 
 In a few instances, I have known teachers who 
 counted themselves strictly honest, and prided them- 
 selves on being teachers of morality, but who because of 
 their unkind attitude toward some of their fellow- 
 teachers, were actually teaching their scholars to be dis- 
 honest. These teachers have permitted themselves from 
 day to day to criticize some of their fellow teachers' 
 classroom work. I do not mean that they speak openly 
 unkindly, but they speak disparagingly of the work 
 done in other classrooms, not so much for the purpose 
 of injuring the other teachers, oh no! they would not 
 do aught against fellow teachers, but rather with the 
 intent of making their own work stand out as some- 
 thing superior when compared with that of other 
 teachers. Some otherwise good teachers fall into this 
 selfish habit and so unfit themselves for the work of de- 
 veloping character. 
 
 The scholars recognize this as an unfair blow at fel- 
 low teachers and usually ascribe it to jealousy. Boys 
 and girls of these grades recognize the fact that a 
 teacher to be honest should devote herself during the 
 class periods to the work of teaching and give no un- 
 kind attention to the work done by other teachers. They 
 may in many ways admire this teacher who is given to 
 this unkind work, but when they analyze her character, 
 they always say that she is lacking in honesty, in fair- 
 ness. 
 
 It might be thought that if these scholars so clearly 
 analyze the character of teachers of this class, that they 
 would receive no harm from being under their teaching ; 
 but this is not the case, they do receive harm from these 
 
SOME COMMENTS 253 
 
 teachers. "Vice is a monster of so fearful mien as to be 
 hated needs but to be seen, yet seen too oft, familiar 
 with her face, we first endure, then pity, then embrace. ' ' 
 Nowhere is this more true than in the case of adolescent 
 boys and girls under a teacher of this type. The 
 teacher's weakness becomes unto them an excuse for 
 their own weaknesses; whereas the character of the 
 teacher should be a constant inspiration to higher 
 ideals on the part of scholars. Teachers who permit 
 themselves to do these things, are, unconsciously it may 
 be, teachers of dishonesty. 
 
 ********* 
 
 A short time ago, in conversation with a friend of 
 mine, a principal of a large elementary school in one of 
 our great cities, he remarked that he had been greatly 
 depressed for the past week; in fact, he said that their 
 whole corps of city teachers had been somewhat under a 
 depressing cloud of feeling ever since Professor X had 
 lectured to them the week before on the Immorality of 
 Grammar Grade and High School Scholars. 
 
 And then he continued: "If the situation is as he 
 depicted it to us, it is appalling, but I cannot bring 
 myself to believe his words, still I have been greatly dis- 
 turbed and depressed." 
 
 I felt quite a little provoked with my friend that he 
 should even be disturbed by Prof. X's talk. I said that 
 even if the data the Professor had collected were made 
 up of facts, still his interpretation was at fault. I had 
 lived too many years in close association with boys and 
 girls, scholars in these grades of school, and had given 
 too much thought and study to them, to their physical, 
 and their moral development as well as to their in- 
 tellectual, to be even slightly disturbed by anything 
 
254 YOUR PROBLEMS AND MINE 
 
 Prof. X might say. I knew then and I know now that 
 they constitute the finest body of youth, intellectually 
 and morally, in our land. 
 
 I was pleased to hear the words of Dr. at the 
 
 National Educational Association, July, 1921, when he 
 said that the morals of high school scholars are fully up 
 to the standard of morals of the community in which a 
 high school is located. I would say above the standard 
 of the community of the school. 
 
 Someone has said the intelligent teacher, the one who 
 knows that youth brings the unexpected, the extrava- 
 gant, the contradictory, yet honest, the concealed yet 
 open, the silly, the grinny, and the what not, in all the 
 make-up of the outcroppings of a thousand generations ; 
 the teacher who knows that his work is the living with 
 these, the working with them, and more than all else, the 
 so entering into their feelings and ideals that he can 
 cultivate that within himself which appeals to them in 
 so masterly a way that he, even against their own de- 
 sires, moves them to act, to form new and higher ideals, 
 is a most powerful agent for good in their education. 
 But that teacher who knows not these things, whose soul 
 is not in harmony with youth; who sees only the un- 
 expected, the extravagant, the contradictory, the con- 
 cealed, the silly, the grinny, and the what not that are 
 disagreeable and unreliable in all the outcroppings of a 
 thousand generations ; who knows not that his work is to 
 live with these youth, to work with them, so to enter 
 their lives and feelings that his ideals may become their 
 ideals, that he who knows not these things, calls the 
 good, bad; and the righteous, unrighteous, and does in- 
 jury that none may repair. And, alas! too often not 
 even the teacher himself knows of the great wrong he 
 has done. 
 
SOME COMMENTS 255 
 
 I do not believe the ability to interest, control and 
 inspire adolescent boys and girls is all a gift. Natural 
 aptitude there no doubt is, but he who is skillful in the 
 work has become so by a careful study of boys and girls 
 and by a close training of himself. And there are those 
 both men and women who seem possessed of a power 
 over youth which to an ordinary observer is almost 
 wonderful. Could we secure for grammar grade and 
 for high school teachers those who possess this ability 
 in so marked a degree, one of the most difficult problems 
 of these schools would be solved. 
 
 It is not a difficult thing to come into the confidence 
 of scholars at this period of their life, and it is an en- 
 joyable companionship to live near them. In fact, to 
 know them is but to enjoy them. A number of years 
 ago I heard Edward Everett Hale preach a sermon ; his 
 theme was The Enjoyment of God. He said that the 
 answer to the first question in the old catechism had 
 never been improved upon : ' ' What is the chief end of 
 Man?" Answer "To glorify God and to enjoy him 
 forever," and then he added, "And especially to enjoy 
 Him. ' ' Here is much of the secret of dealing with adoles- 
 cents, it is not only to know them physically, mentally, 
 spiritually, and in their environment; but it is for 
 teachers to cultivate that within themselves which will 
 enable them to enjoy boys and girls of this age. 
 
APPENDIX 
 
APPENDIX 
 
 OBSERVATIONS AND QUESTIONS THAT ARE SUGGESTED IN THE 
 STUDY OF INDIVIDUAL CASES 
 
 On Chapter One 
 
 I have given this story of Ned E. that teachers may see how 
 easy it is to deal with a scholar when the teacher knows him as 
 the scholar does not know himself, physically, mentally and 
 emotionally, morally or spiritually; in his home, and to some 
 extent in his birth inheritance. 
 
 Ten years of observation and study had revealed Ned to me. 
 The ever to be expected unexpected bursting forth of the ferment 
 of youth was plainly to be seen as the cause of his trouble so 
 I cared little for the form in which it manifested itself. 
 
 His attitude when he came into the room made it possible 
 for me to say, "Go and sin no more," but I couched the same 
 thought in somewhat different phraseology. 
 
 A strong sense of regained self control was evident in Ned's 
 attitude when he came into the room. How was that control 
 strengthened by our interview? 
 
 What should be the object in view in the adjustment of all 
 school offenses? 
 
 Why was it important for Ned to see that with us a good 
 record for years outweighed one serious mistake? 
 
 In the second story in this chapter the strong points of the 
 teacher are only indicated. She yet needed to be guided through 
 some experiences to ripen her intellectual grasp into full under- 
 standing. 
 
 Wherein did this teacher fall short? 
 
 Is her weakness a common weakness with young teachers in 
 the grammar grades and high schools? 
 
 Does the reader know of a better way for the superintendent 
 to aid a teacher of this type? 
 
 In the next teacher's similar experience what were the strong 
 points as brought out in her story? 
 
 259 
 
260 APPENDIX 
 
 THE MAN WHO WAS ATTRACTIVE TO YOUTH 
 
 Does the reader believe that some persons are born with dis- 
 positions or personalities that are less attractive to youth than 
 others? 
 
 Does the story imply that this man depended wholly on his 
 natural attractiveness to youth to hold their interest in him, or 
 did he put forth effort to cultivate their acquaintance, to make 
 himself attractive to them? 
 
 If the reader believes he was born with a disposition that is 
 not attractive to boys and girls at the stage of youth, what 
 should he do if he is to be a teacher of youth? 
 
 What should all teachers of youth do if they are to continue 
 to teach boys and girls in the critical, sensitive period of youth? 
 
 SAM AND DICK 
 
 When I was a boy, a neighbor boy took a trip to New Orleans 
 on a steamboat. New Orleans was far, far away in those times. 
 When the boy returned home he told how lonesome he was while 
 in New Orleans, and that one day while wandering about the 
 city he happened to meet a " roust-about, " a freight handler 
 who worked on the deck of an Ohio river steamboat that had 
 just come down to New Orleans. This roust-about was from 
 Manchester but he and the boy did not know each other in Man- 
 chester; they had nothing in common; "but," said the boy, 
 "I was never in my life so glad to see anybody else as I was 
 to see him, and we just felt like we were kin; and my! didn't 
 we talk about Manchester!" 
 
 What common interest or experience brought the superintend- 
 ent near to Sam, and gave something to talk about? 
 
 In what way could this friendly feeling be helpful to Sam? 
 
 What would the reader do with a sixteen year old boy under 
 like conditions of scholarship if the boy were in his school? 
 
 What should the school try to give every boy and every girl? 
 
 Is it better sometimes to make use of corporal punishment 
 to hold a boy to orderly, obedient conduct in school, rather than 
 to set him adrift on the street, or to send him to some state 
 institution for incorrigibles where with all his associates of his 
 own class, or worse, there is little hope for his developing the 
 best things that are in him? 
 
APPENDIX 261 
 
 Why was it necessary for the good of Dick that he be made 
 to recognize authority? 
 
 Why was it not best for the pupils to talk about Dick's af- 
 fair on the playground or on the way to and from school? 
 
 RULES AND REGULATIONS FOR FRESHMEN AND SOPHOMORES 
 
 How could such mistakes as this teacher made be foreseen and 
 avoided by young teachers fresh from colleges and universities? 
 
 Should the influence every active teacher has with scholars 
 be directed in common to support good ends for all student-con- 
 trolled affairs of the school? 
 
 What made it possible to adjust a situation, that could so 
 easily have developed into a rowdy school affair, with no pub- 
 licity? 
 
 Was the manner in which the affair was settled fair to all? 
 Why or why not? 
 
 WAS THIS A CASE OF PREVENTION OR OF CORRECTION? 
 
 What does the football case indicate as to the superintend- 
 ent's faith and trust in the athletic boys that they would do 
 right when the situation was placed before them in a clear light? 
 
 Why was his visual plan of showing the middle of the week 
 a good one? 
 
 Why did he first place the whole situation before each of 
 the two most interested boys? 
 
 Did the superintendent make any demands of the boys when 
 all met together to consider the affair? 
 
 Why would it not have been a better way for the superin- 
 tendent to have said that Jack could not play, and that it would 
 be useless to talk any more about it? 
 
 On Chapter Two 
 
 Teachers of high schools and grammar grades should have at 
 least a fair knowledge of the physical and mental characteristics 
 of youth. How to apply this as working knowledge is the prob- 
 lem upon which help is often needed. 
 
262 APPENDIX 
 
 What is the meaning of the word adolescence, and the word 
 pubescence as used in this book? 
 
 What ordinarily are the years when boys pass through 'the 
 changes of pubescence, and what are the years for the same 
 changes in the girls f 
 
 What are some of the outward evidences that the boy or girl 
 is in the stage of pubescence f 
 
 Which usually grows first, bones or muscles! 
 
 What effect may a great growth of bones before a correspond- 
 ing growth of muscles have on the youth? 
 
 In childhood, how did the bones and the muscles grow? 
 
 What characteristic of many a youth does the case of Theo- 
 dore illustrate? 
 
 Why are not all tall boys awkward at the time of making 
 their rapid growth? 
 
 Why do boys and girls when passing through pubescence lose 
 some of their power to write well, or to read or sing well? 
 
 How should a teacher deal with scholars who, in the stage 
 of pubescence, lose for a time the power to do form work and 
 oral work as well as formerly? 
 
 On Chapter Three 
 
 To gain power for helpfulness to the youth under their charge 
 is the purpose and spirit of teachers in studying the most funda- 
 mental change of this period. 
 
 If there is any retardation in this fundamental change, how 
 does it manifest itself? 
 
 How much do teachers know of the causes of retardation in 
 the fundamental change of this period? 
 
 What can the school do for a boy like the one who was three 
 years in our high school retarded physically and mentally? Can 
 sufficient responsibility for results in social and constructive 
 projects be required in the school to arouse latent physical and 
 mental energies? 
 
 To what specialists must teachers look for light on these 
 physically and mentally retarded cases? 
 
 How do the mental and spiritual transformations compare 
 with the physical? 
 
APPENDIX 263 
 
 How do these changes sometimes affect the emotions! 
 
 What sometimes causes bashfulness or the opposite on the 
 part of boys and girls of this age? 
 
 Does the story of Ben M. illustrate all the teacher and school 
 might do for such a case? 
 
 Does the story of the boy who had a date with the dentist 
 call for further treatment after the principal's quick reprimand 
 had completely changed the situation? 
 
 The case of Daniel is given to show a slow and extremely 
 nervous development that in the end terminated well. 
 
 What does the reader think of the great care exercised by 
 the boy's parents, doctor and school? 
 
 How does a youth differ from a child in play, in physical 
 exercise, in reading, in friendship, in his relations to the oppo- 
 site sex? 
 
 Is it natural that boys and girls "fall in love" as we so 
 often state it! 
 
 At about what time in adolescence is it that the philosophy 
 of things appeals strongly to youth? 
 
 Can we use world wide problems that are yet unsettled to 
 stimulate greatly the study of economic and social problems by 
 high school scholars? How? 
 
 For what purpose is the story of the development of intel- 
 lectual power in the children from the two families given? 
 
 Generally how does the advent of pubescence when normally 
 reached affect the individual? 
 
 On Chapter Four 
 
 Why is youth the most opportune time for religious teaching 
 and training? 
 
 From a faith based on what to a faith on what else does a 
 youth pass in his religious development? 
 
 How lasting are the religious impressions made at this time 
 of life apt to be? 
 
 What is the greatest danger religiously at this time of life? 
 
 What is recommended to lessen this danger? 
 
264 APPENDIX 
 
 In what ways do churches take advantage of this psycholog- 
 ically important time for religious teaching and training? 
 
 Does the reader think the first boy's experience as given in 
 the story is the experience that comes to many although modified 
 in details? 
 
 What did this boy's questioning and seeking after evidence 
 of the firm foundation of his faith do for him? 
 
 The second boy's deeply disturbed religious state was more 
 out of the ordinary. 
 
 For what reason did his parents have cause to be anxious 
 about him? 
 
 What does the reader think of the school's consideration for 
 the boy? 
 
 On Chapter Five 
 
 Two brothers are referred to as illustrations, one to represent 
 the on-coming of the flood-tide of youthful life of the milder 
 type; the other of the deeply emotional, demonstrative type. 
 
 For which type of youth are friends usually most concerned? 
 Why? 
 
 Is either type the more normal? 
 
 I have given but two boy stories of any length in this chap- 
 ter. Both boys under ordinary conditions were of the milder 
 type, but one of whom proved to be quite violent in his demon- 
 strations when moved by great excitement in the dark. The 
 other was always true to his type. 
 
 Someone asks why more severe punishment was not given the 
 boy who was anxious for "lime-light" notice. 
 
 Was it not sufficient that the boy knew that we knew? 
 
 On Chapter Six 
 
 The unwise advice and help of his business friend brought 
 the first boy's dream to a partial realization. Only after a few 
 years did he understand that it was a dream and that its too 
 early realization had blocked his advancement in his chosen work. 
 
 In the case of the second boy whose dreams were "blue" 
 his school friends made him feel that others were interested in 
 
APPENDIX 265 
 
 him and in what he was doing. Is not the teacher bound to urge 
 education as the essential requirement for making real the visions 
 of an active life? 
 
 What should the reading of the stories of the third and 
 fourth boys lead teachers to do? 
 
 What does this dreaming, even listless day-dreaming, indicate? 
 
 On Chapter Seven 
 
 In the first of this chapter I have given the story of a school 
 board member whose zealous interest in the education of the 
 youth of his town and the surrounding rural district, was an 
 inspiration to me at a time when I needed the inspiring touch 
 of a great-souled man. I have told it hoping that even the story 
 simply told may be helpful to some young teacher in widening 
 his vision of his work. Were the boys and girls for whom he 
 so zealously worked, worth being interested in? 
 
 Was the high school principal who was proud of the fact that 
 they ' ' crowded ; ' all scholars of low scholarship out of his school, 
 a wise principal? Why, or why not? 
 
 What should be said of the high school teacher who was 
 happy to be where all the requirements laid on him were to hear 
 recitations, mark the grades; if they made good grades, pass 
 them; if poor grades, fail them; and where, as he said, he did 
 not have to give them any attention outside of the class, not 
 even to know them? 
 
 What should be said of the third teacher? 
 
 With which one of the three teachers does the teacher who 
 reads this chapter class himself? 
 
 How will the teacher who reads this chapter measure the worth 
 of other boys like the ones whose stories are told in this chapter, 
 and what will he do to aid them? 
 
 On Chapter Eight 
 
 What responsibility comes to the coach whom the first boy 
 chose for his confidential friend during the time he was seem- 
 ingly estranged from his father? 
 
 How did this coach measure up to his responsibility? 
 
266 APPENDIX 
 
 In what respect does the boy in the second story differ from 
 the boy in the first! 
 
 What do you think of the third father's dealing with his 
 son! 
 
 Which is better for the boy for the father to be able to say 
 "Do as I once did," or, "Do as I do now," when he talks 
 with his boy about better conduct? 
 
 On Chapter Nine 
 
 I would like to ask a few questions of each teacher who reads 
 this chapter that I would like each one to answer for himself. 
 
 Does the teacher carry a spirit of honesty about him that 
 creates an atmosphere of honesty in his schoolroom f 
 
 Does the teacher tempt his pupil or scholars to be dishonest 
 by refusing to make the conditions of his school conducive to 
 honesty, lest someone may think he is not trusted! 
 
 Or, putting this last question in another form, does the 
 teacher protect the honest pupils or scholars by making the con- 
 ditions under which the school work is done in his school as free 
 from opportunities for cheating as he can make them! 
 
 Does the teacher give his close attention to those engaged 
 in a test in order that he may know just what each one does 
 and just how each one does! 
 
 What things important for a teacher to know can he learn 
 by giving close attention to those writing a test or written 
 lesson! 
 
 In the case of the two college students, were they guilty 
 of dishonesty or was it a good joke, played on a professor who 
 should have more honestly, on his part, examined the students! 
 
 Let each one who reads this chapter, re-read carefully the 
 story of Morris E., the last story in the chapter, and after hav- 
 ing reread it, say to himself whether or not he approves of the 
 disposition made of Morris's case. 
 
 Which prayer in the last paragraph in this chapter would be 
 the reader's to pray! 
 
APPENDIX 267 
 
 On Chapter Ten 
 
 Of what is this chapter really a study? 
 
 Why is it important that teachers in the grammar grades and 
 in the high schools should study this subject? 
 
 When the superintendent wished the business man to give a 
 place in his store to Omar M., why did he tell the business man 
 Omar's one act of dishonesty at school? 
 
 What is the superintendent's view of protecting boys in their 
 honesty as brought out in the three boy stories of this chapter? 
 
 Does making the conditions under which boys handle money 
 safe for all boys reflect on those who need no protection? Why? 
 
 It is possible in the case of Nellie that her unsatisfied craving 
 for beautiful things led her to taking things when but a child, 
 and that this grew into a habit, a habit that held her with a 
 grip at high school age. 
 
 What help can the school give to one of her class? 
 
 How careful should a superintendent, principal, or teacher 
 be in recommending scholars or youth who have been scholars to 
 positions of responsibility and trust? 
 
 Is it possible that the manual training boy who took the 
 drawing board is a moral delinquent because of some physical 
 defect? 
 
 The last three stories need no comment. 
 
 On Chapter Eleven 
 
 Some times it is well for teachers to see that all responsibility 
 for the conduct of pupils or scholars whom they teach is not 
 theirs; that there are parts of each day, some whole days each 
 week, Christmas vacation week, spring vacation week, and the 
 summer vacation of two or three months, when the homes and 
 the town or city government must be held responsible whether 
 or not they assume the burden. 
 
 Who are responsible for the boys and the girls each day 
 after they have arrived home from school at four o'clock until 
 they start on the way to school the next morning? 
 
 Who were responsible for the boys who took the cigars from 
 the stores after eight o'clock p. m.? 
 
268 APPENDIX 
 
 Who are responsible for the teaching and training of children 
 up to six years of age! 
 
 What does the reader think of the wisdom of the principal 
 who refused to assume responsibility for Henry Smith's conduct 
 during Thanksgiving vacation? 
 
 The story of Henry Smith may seem overdrawn but truly it 
 falls short in its coloring. 
 
 How does a teacher exert his greatest influence on the side 
 of right living! 
 
 What are the rightful duties or responsibilities of a town or 
 city superintendent of schools! 
 
 On Chapter Twelve 
 
 As the period of pubescence is past, it sometimes requires 
 something a little out of the ordinary routine to cause the youth 
 to become conscious of his increased mental power. Often for 
 a part of the period of pubescence the vital forces seem so cen- 
 tered on developing the physical that the mental power is weak. 
 This leads the youth to mistrust his mental ability so that when 
 the vital forces turn their attention to the strengthening of the 
 thinking centers of the brain thus giving renewed energy and 
 increased power to his thinking, the youth fails to avail himself 
 of this increased mental ability until something out of the ordi- 
 nary causes him to put forth an effort to use his mental powers 
 and makes him conscious of his mental strength. It means every 
 thing to a boy or girl to be awakened to consciousness of mental 
 power. 
 
 What two things did the declamation contest do for the boy 
 Myers? 
 
 Why did the superintendent have sufficient faith in Frank K. 
 to encourage him to try to complete his work for graduation? 
 
 What did the father's persistency in holding Harmon C. to 
 his school work and the school's interest in the boy, finally do 
 for Harmon? 
 
 The story of Amelia is the story of one of the most inter- 
 esting developments I have known. A girl freshman of most un- 
 promising type; a second year student evidencing but little mental 
 power except that her teachers had come to know that that for- 
 
APPENDIX 269 
 
 lorn looking little body was faithfulness personified. Then came 
 the wonderful transformation and the accomplishing of the al- 
 most impossible. 
 
 What did the school do for Amelia? 
 
 On Chapter Thirteen 
 
 What authority is claimed for the school on the way to and 
 from school? 
 
 Under what conditions are the parents held directly responsi- 
 ble for the conduct of their children on the way to and from 
 school? 
 
 Who should hold authority for conduct at all parties, or 
 gatherings held by high school scholars or grammar grade pupils 
 in the name of the high school, the grammar school, or in the 
 name of any organizations of these schools? 
 
 Does a teacher owe it to his school to deprive himself of 
 some social privileges in order that he may the better serve his 
 school if occasion seems so to demand? 
 
 Why should the school social life of high school scholars be 
 considered a vital high school interest, and be given as thoughtful 
 attention in the organization of the school work as other depart- 
 ments of high school work? 
 
 Is successful cooperation of scholars and teachers in conduct- 
 ing the social affairs of the high school possible in all high schools? 
 
 Can you use the story of the development of the social life 
 of the Bloomington High School to aid other school officers and 
 teachers? 
 
 On Chapter Fourteen 
 
 Since the attraction of the opposite sex is one of the indi- 
 cations of healthy, normal development in boys and girls of the 
 adolescent period of life, and since the greater number of the 
 boys and the girls in the advance grammar grades, and in the 
 high school, are adolescents, in what spirit should teachers, prin- 
 cipals, and superintendents, meet some situations that come as 
 a result of having to deal with adolescent boys and girls? 
 
270 APPENDIX 
 
 Are adolescent boys and girls in our schools today more silly, 
 and given to infatuation than their parents were at the dawn 
 of early manhood and womanhood in their day! 
 
 While boys and girls are experiencing their first attack of 
 this all-absorbing instinct before judgment has come to their aid, 
 at school whose good judgment and common sense should guide 
 until their own powers are developed? 
 
 How can the freest possible mingling of the sexes in the 
 social affairs of the school be made wholesome and thus safe for 
 all? 
 
 What care should be taken in regard to opening the school 
 building for the reception of grammar grade pupils and high 
 school scholars, and what with regard to closing when the day's 
 work is done? 
 
 How can a kindly guarding and directing of the movements 
 in the social mingling of these adolescents be kept on a high 
 friendly plane that has nothing of disagreeable spying in it? 
 
 On Chapter Fifteen 
 
 What would the reader of this chapter do with John King if 
 he had him in his school? 
 
 What would the principal of whom I have written in another 
 chapter who would have none but high grade scholars in his 
 school do with John King? 
 
 What is the work of the public school? 
 
 Could Jane Moore have been treated more justly than she was 
 when she was given the opportunity to get out of the school all 
 the good she could? 
 
 Was Julius Clark receiving anything more than was rightly 
 his when, after getting all it seemed possible for him to get out 
 of the elementary school, he was given the opportunity of the 
 high school? 
 
 How wise is it to recognize the fact that adolescent boys and 
 girls are living in a very different world from what they were a 
 few months before and give them the high school studies that are 
 of the new life interests and hence better adapted to them? 
 
 How fair is it to the scholar and the teacher, and financially 
 how fair is it to the school district, to keep scholars marking 
 
APPENDIX 271 
 
 time in a part of their studies because they are not regular in 
 the grade work? 
 
 How can most of the loss of time that comes to irregular 
 scholars in some schools be avoided? 
 
 Let the reader of this chapter answer for himself what he 
 would do with these the stories of whom are told in this chapter. 
 
 On Chapter Sixteen 
 
 Why are athletics a necessity to youth? How deep seated? 
 
 In what way do athletics benefit a school, a community, and 
 in final analysis, the whole country? 
 
 Explain the way in which practically all scholars of a school 
 receive some good from athletic games by school teams? 
 
 What good could come from a half -day's celebration of the 
 school basketball team's winning the state championship? A 
 celebration such as I have described. 
 
 Why should the coach be a man of high ideals, and, if pos- 
 sible, a member of the school faculty? 
 
 Why does a coach have an unusual influence over the team 
 members? 
 
 What are some of the possible evils attendant on athletics? 
 
 How can they be guarded against? 
 
 On Chapter Seventeen 
 
 What care should be taken to prevent possible injury to girls 
 of this age from wet clothing or wet feet, or a chill from com- 
 ing to school in rain or snow? 
 
 Has the reader ever known girls who in their development at 
 this time of life were somewhat similar to the two cases "man- 
 aged by the parents and teacher " whose stories I have toldf 
 Were those the reader has known wisely cared for? 
 
 What kind of teachers are safest for the extremely nervous 
 girl at this period of her life whether she is in the grammar 
 grade or the high school? 
 
 What was wrong in the cuttingly sarcastic teacher's making 
 scholars so discouraged in their work that a number of girls went 
 
272 APPENDIX 
 
 home to spend the next half -hour in crying hysterically from the 
 nervous strain! 
 
 How should the simpering, silly, giggling, boy-struck girl be 
 treated! 
 
 On Chapter Eighteen 
 
 Possibly no one today could tell why the rapid growth of the 
 body should seem for a time to lower mental power as in the 
 first two boys in this chapter, while in others, as the third boy, 
 it should seem to give increased mental brilliancy. 
 
 What is necessary on the part of the teacher in order that 
 he may deal justly with the many different types of development 
 common at this period of lifef 
 
 On Chapter Nineteen 
 
 In what way was the first teacher whose story is given in 
 this chapter more than the ordinary rural teacher f 
 
 What was the greatest thing she did for the youth and 
 younger pupils of her school! 
 
 What was radically wrong with the young man in the second 
 story! 
 
 How would he measure in value to his district compared with 
 the teacher in the first story to her district.' 
 
 What was it worth to be under the teaching of the teacher 
 in the last story in the chapter, even though she taught in a 
 one room rural school! 
 
 On Chapter Twenty 
 
 Should parents be found fault with if they prefer for their 
 daughter only a fair standing in her school work that she may 
 have more time to gain culture and ease that come from mingling 
 socially with cultivated people! 
 
 Is it well for the coming voters, the high school boys and 
 girls, to learn from the able political campaign speakers who 
 present the leading questions of the day! 
 
 In times of great religious awakening in a community ought 
 not those most susceptible to religious impressions be given op- 
 
APPENDIX 273 
 
 portunity for religious teaching and training? What if the 
 time is taken from school work or school lesson study hours! 
 
 What is possible for the best teachers to accomplish when the 
 religious outside influences make heavy demands on the mem- 
 bers of their school classes? 
 
 What does the community gain when for weeks the attention 
 of the people is centered on the thought of better living, and 
 higher appreciation of their responsibility to their God? 
 
 On Chapter Twenty-one 
 
 How does the attitude of the teacher toward the scholars affect 
 the attitude of the scholars toward the school? 
 
 What is meant by giving the scholars an "intelligent con- 
 fidence!" 
 
 Why is self-control on the part of those in authority an im- 
 portant quality? 
 
 Observe the plan of talking frankly with young teachers com- 
 ing into the high school faculty, observe the plan, not that any 
 one would necessarily follow it, but as suggestive that each prin- 
 cipal or superintendent should have his own plan for this im- 
 portant work. 
 
 Bead a second time the story of Miss M- and Mack Vaney. 
 Should a superintendent or principal be thoughtful in assigning 
 some scholars to certain teachers? If such consideration of the 
 personalities of the teachers and the personalities of the scholars 
 leaves some teacher of the subject with fewer pupils than other 
 teachers have do not the best interests of the pupils control the 
 way adjustment is made? 
 
 The case of Martha Pollard is given as showing how much 
 time and effort it sometimes takes to make a teacher; and the 
 story of the other beginning teacher is told to show how some- 
 times a young teacher asks nothing but the opportunity to grow. 
 Of course, this young teacher learned from her supervisors but 
 she learned so easily that her supervisors were almost unconscious 
 that they were teaching her. 
 
 Let the reader in his own mind make a list of the good quali- 
 ties of the young manual training teacher. 
 
 What qualities in him made it possible for him to grow as 
 a teacher? 
 
274 APPENDIX 
 
 To whose class-room work alone should a teacher confine his 
 criticisms? 
 
 If the teacher who reads this book is a believer in the gross 
 immorality of grammar grade pupils and high school scholars, he 
 should seek other employment; for no teacher who reads im- 
 morality in the ordinary outcroppings of the physical and the 
 mental developments of youth, has that faith in youth that makes 
 him a wise and inspiring leader. 
 
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