UC-NRLF 984k GIFT OF OUR PUBLIC SCHOOLS THE NATION'S BULWARK OR Proper Child Development Means a Better Civilization WHY WAS MAN CREATED? By JOHN F. MURRAY 1916 BOARI FRANK B. N L. F F c. c. SE( GEO. H. CL C. N. HAW C. A. BODV B. F. WALT OUR PUBLIC SCHOOLS THE NATION'S BULWARK OR Proper Child Development Means a Better Civilization WHY WAS MAN CREATED? By JOHN F. MURRAY 1916 J. F. MURRAY 2704 Dana Street, Berkeley, California $1.00 Dedicated to the Children of the Earth, and the Millions yet Unborn Without Regard to Color, Country or Creed. 360758 PERSONAL CHARACTER. A sacred burden is this life you bear; Look at it carefully, bear it solemnly, Stand up and walk beneath it steadfastly, Falter not for sorrow, fail not for sin, But onward and upward till the goal you win. Frances Anna Kimble. The wise know that foolish legislation is a rope of sand which perishes in the twisting; that the State must follow and not lead the character and progress of the citizen; the strongest usurper is quickly got rid of; and they only who build on Ideas, build for eternity; and that the form of government which prevails is the ex- pression of what cultivation exists in the population which permits it. The law is only a memorandum. We are superstitious, and esteem the statute somewhat; so much life as it has in the character of living men is its force. Emerson. CHEAP MONEY FOR SCHOOLS CHEAP MONEY FOR SCHOOL PURPOSES. Some years ago the Federal Government established the Postal Savings department. There is nearly $100,000,000 in the fund at present, and it is growing rapidly. This money is being reloaned to the people at 2 l / 2 per cent, per annum on "Bonds backed by the taxing power." School bonds are thus backed and are being accepted as security for loans from this fund, but only from "National banks, State banks, local banks or trust companies doing a banking business." Believing that the future good of the Government demanded proper care of the children, I saw no just reason why banks should step in and take from the children the difference between 2 l / 2 per cent, and what we now pay in interest on our school bonds. So I prepared an amendment to the present law, empower- ing school district trustees, when bonds were prop- erly voted, to go to the Federal trustees of the postal fund and borrow the money direct, without the inter- vention of any bank or banking institution. This amendment applies only to school district bonds. I do not want to make it a general commercial propo- sition, I only want the children to get the benefit of this cheap money. This amendment has been endorsed by our State READ, THINK, ACT! Legislature, our county superintendents of schools, the American Federation of Labor, our State Federa- tion of Labor, every banker to whom I have presented the matter, every State Superintendent of Education to whom I have talked (some twenty), every editor whose sanctum I have penetrated, as well as by the majority of Senators and Congressmen. In San Francisco we are paying $300,000 annual interest on our school bonds. We pay 5 per cent. If we could get this cheap rate it would save us $150,000 without costing anyone a penny. And the benefit San Francisco would derive from this amendment would be duplicated (according to the amount of bonded indebtedness) by every dis- trict in the nation. It would be like dipping water from a running stream: there would be as much water after you clipped as there was before. The child is father to the man. As we rear our children to years of accountability, mentally and mor- ally clean or vile, so will be politics, government, business and society. If we would abolish white slavery, gambling, drunkenness, divorce, all man's in- humanity to his fellow man, all we have to do is to care for the children in a complete manner. I have been asked if it would be possible for a school district whose bonds were already issued and sold to get the benefit of this 2^2 per cent, money, AGITATE, EDUCATE, ORGANIZE! Dr. Wiley, the Pure Food Expert and Friend of Children, Says Half the Children Are Undernourished. Think How Much Good This 2'/ 2 per cent, on All School Bonds Would Do If Put Into a Fund to Give Every School Child a Warm, Hearty, Wholesome Dinner. How Many Children Might Be Turned From Our Mills and Factories to Our Schools READ, THINK, ACT! even if this proposed amendment to the Postal Sav- ings fund were passed. Let me cite a specific case, then you can apply the same reasoning to your local district. Pittsburg, California, issued and sold $55,000 5 per cent. 40-year school bonds. It was intended to erect a 20-roomed school building. The estimated cost fell short. The lower story is finished and oc- cupied, the upper story uncompleted, and as the dis- trict is bonded to the limit for school bonds, the upper story is likely to remain unfinished for some years. By reason of these bonds bearing 5 per cent, and running for 40 years, the interest thereon is equal to twice the face value of the bonds ; in other words, the taxpayers are taxed to the amount of $165,000 to pay the original $55,000. Now, let us assume that the Federal law becomes amended so as to allow school districts to borrow money direct from the Postal Savings fund just as banks now do. The trustees of the school district could go to a local bank and have it purchase their bonds from the present holder. The trustees could then give the bank personal security, take their bonds, deposit them at the postorfice, get the money, pay the bank, and the transaction would be completed. At present the district is paying $2,750 annual in- terest on its school bonds. By transferring these AGITATE, EDUCATE, ORGANIZE! 10 bonds to the Federal Government it would save $1,375 each year for 40 years, which, deposited in a bank at interest, would more than meet the original bond issue of $55,000. And the upper story of their school building could be finished at once. All this vast benefit would not cost the taxpayer one additional penny. Some persons seem to think that school bonds han- dled by a bank would necessarily be better secured. The folly of such an idea is plain when we know that hundreds of banks fail for every school district that fails. Then when you consider that a school bond is a mortgage against the entire property of the district, and school bonds cannot exceed 5 per cent, of the property valuation, you learn that there is no better security issued than school district bonds. And should a district suspend, the bonds still remain as a mortgage against the real property of the district. If you favor getting this 2^ per cent, money for our schools, write to your Congressman about it. I have carried on this fight single-handed for two years. There must be organization, a united effort. READ, THINK, ACT WILL HISTORY REPEAT ITSELF? WILL HISTORY REPEAT ITSELF? America, thy bulwarks should be thy people's hearts, Thy might their moral strength. In the course of human events the United States has come into the leadership of the world. Every nation on the earth is looking to us in lively hopes that we may find a way out of the many vexing ques- tions of the times. California cannot escape being the banner-bearer and drummer-boy. The march of empire westward has circled the globe. The OLD civilization and the NEW civilization face each other across the Pacific Ocean. The battle of Armageddon is inevitable and imminent. The Asiatic hordes sweeping across the Pacific Ocean, and the European hordes rushing through the Pan- ama Canal, will find the many undeveloped natural resources of California as attractive as flies find a molasses barrel. We cannot escape becoming the battle-ground. Here will be shed the blood and tears of a dying civilization, or here will be opened the doorway of opportunity to the best civilization the world has ever seen. It rests largely with the women of California whether this war will be one of brute force, such ai is now devastating Europe, or a battle of brains and heart. California is peculiarly situated to make this final READ, THINK, ACT! 13 contest between the right ideals and the wrong ones, between selfish greed and brotherly kindness. Cali- fornia is not yet cursed with any very large cities. By the natural conditions of business competition, selfishness flourishes and corruption runs riot. Where great multitudes of people are striving to gain the same object, whether selling goods, seeking office or looking for work, competition breeds selfishness, and selfishness is the foundation of corruption and sin. Since the world began, large cities have ever been cesspools of vice and crime. History informs us that about every nation gone before had a strong move- ment from the farm to the cities just before the na- tion fell. This was occasioned by the fact that the scattered farmers could not organize as closely as the business men who met daily and consulted about how to get the. most out of the masses. Governments having the power to coin money, and regulate the value thereof, and the sum of the demands for money being equal to the sum of the demands for all other things, to regulate the volume of money in circulation meant the power to say what the farmer could ask for his produce as well as fixing the price he should pay for what he purchased. Thus the business world, by controlling politics, could farm the farmer. No wonder farmers desired to join the ranks of politicians. The establishment of each nation that ever existed AGITATE, EDUCATE, ORGANIZE! 14 was on the basis of equal rights to all. Soon brainy, aggressive men in devious ways acquired possession of the natural resources of the country. When the masses awoke to the conditions, it was too late to do anything but institute reprisal. Privilege-holders, to retain their ill-gotten gains, began corrupting leaders of the people and also coercing the masses. Then followed class wars and national decay. Look closely into the actions of the nations of the earth to-day, even before the present war, and you will find NO stability of public opinion, and but LITTLE stability of private opinion. Their legislatures, their courts, even their churches, are drifting all are being tossed about on a sea of doubt and uncertainty. And yet there never was a time when so many brainy, big-hearted men and women were devoting their time and money to the betterment of the people. Why, then, do we fail? Because of our neglect of the children. As the twig is bent the tree inclines. With 30,000,000 children of school age in the nation and less than 13,000,000 daily average attendance at school, we are compelled to exclaim with the poet: "Oh, ye blind and selfish freemen, boasting of your land and time, While the children soak and blacken soul and sense in filth and crime." As the child is the seed from which conies every human activity, and as the public- school is the only institution in the nation that lays a guiding hand on READ, THINK, ACT! 16 the head of every child, proper school conditions should be the first consideration of the Government. It is almost universally acknowledged that our present school conditions and methods are largely failures. This was strongly emphasized by many teachers of national reputation at the recent session of the National Education Association held in Oak- land, California. And every person interested should be earnestly seeking to find out where the fault lies. Every person, no matter what his or her financial standing or political or religious belief, wishes well of every child, and hopes to see it get every possible development that will fit it for its life work. And so I come to you with a message the tale of the In- dian schools, the best child-developing system the world has ever seen. Habit is the strongest of human characteristics. It can grapple with love and trample it into the dirt. A drunkard or dope fiend may sincerely love his wife and babies, yet when habit calls the loved ones are neglected. We might liken the forming of habit to a cement sidewalk. When the cement is first laid a tiny kitten walking across it will leave indelible marks, but a short time later an elephant walking across it will leave no track. The time to form a nation's charac- ter is in the childhood of the people. It is seldom READ, THINK, ACT! 17 you see an old man change his politics or an old woman change her religion. There are in this country 50,000,000 minors. Where is this on-marching, ever-increasing army, such as the world never dreamed of, going? Will they fill happy homes, or insane asylums, jails and brothels? With these children properly cared for, nothing in after life could drive them into selfish, wolfish living. Let us always keep in mind the fact that omission of duty is equal to sin. Thus will the makers of public opinion and the guardians of the children the President and Congress, Governors and State Legis- latures, mayors and city councils, preachers, teachers and schools officials find their souls smeared with the blood and debauchery of their times if they do not put forth every possible effort to bring about just conditions for child-development. AGITATE, EDUCATE, ORGANIZE! 18 "Our public school education is inefficient and flabby." Ex-President Taft. "Our schools to-day spoil the child instead of de- veloping it." Mrs. Macy, the teacher of Helen Keller. "I agree with Mrs. Macy, 'the lock-step' system of child-development should be abolished." Dr. Frederic Burk, president of San Francisco State Normal. READ, THINK, ACT! COMING SCHOOL SYSTEM THE COMING SCHOOL SYSTEM. What humanity needs more than anything- else is fair dealing between men. Yet under our present condition of business morals we cannot expect that men will give up all hope of personal betterment for community good. And so in trying to bring about a better condition of politics and business and society we must take into consideration conditions as they are as well as what they should be. Let us Look into the future far as human mind can see, Note the glories of the world and all the wonders that would be If each child had proper guidance, and selfishness was slain In a brotherhood of man, where righteousness did reign. As the future status of government, politics, busi- ness and society will be determined by our present treatment of the children, it is evident that proper child-conservation is the paramount issue with free government, and as the public school is the child's developing-ground, we must give our school system more careful consideration than it has heretofore re- ceived. Our schools must be made so attractive that they will hold the attention of each child in the school- room or on the playground. They must reach every READ, THINK, ACT! 21 child, the weak and wayward, so that all will find pleasure and profit in attending school. The coming school must conform in full to the laws of nature. The man or institution that tram- ples on nature's laws is defying the creative power and will certainly fail. The man who obeys natural laws will reach old age hale and hearty, while the person who tramples on those laws will, while yet in his youth, find himself pain-wracked and decrepit. Man has free will. Devils may entice, angels may implore, but man can act according to his desire. Too many speakers and writers confuse the minds of the people by classing free-will and foreordination as antagonists when they are as the two blades of a pair of shears. Used jointly they cut out a clean, straight path for man's guidance. Used separately each fails. "We feel sorry for our merchants, bankers and million- aires, Our workers and our shirkers, with their worries and their cares, Our teachers, preachers, statisticians, Lawyers, doctors, politicians, Yet the farmer is the man who feeds them all." From the ground comes everything needed for the sustenance of man. So if we are going to work with nature we will acknowledge the farmer as the leader and counsellor of state, and his wife as the first lady of the land. AGITATE, EDUCATE, ORGANIZE! 22 As the home is the place to rear children the coming school must have a home-farm environment. Where a man and woman are happily mated there is the nearest heaven on earth the mind of man can conceive. The child needs both the firm guidance of a father and the enduring love and patience of a mother to develop in it the best characteristics. Select eighty or one hundred acres of ground for a school site. Erect thereon a large, roomy house. Then have the present teacher get married and live in this school-home. Pay both husband and wife a salary. Employ them for life, the parents of the district alone having the power to remove. Then teaching would assume its rightful place among the professions. Sickness and old age having been pro- vided for, these parent-teachers would devote all their energy and brain-power to the development of the children, and through them the development of the community. Erect a many-roomed schoolhouse, a barn, stable, chicken-coop, hog-pen and other needed buildings and fill them with live stock. Then will the school be a real child-developing home and the grounds be the most attractive in the neighborhood. A dairy, hog-ranch and chicken-yard will be started. A ten-acre grove and a ten-acre fruit-field will be planted and soon becoming productive will help make the school self-supporting. A dynamo for READ, THINK, ACT! 23 producing electricity will be installed. Then each farmer can get cheap electricity for light, heat and power. This also will add to the income of the school. Picture 250,000 such home-farm school cen- ters in this nation. What a universal uplift ! Thus would much of the drudgery be lifted from the backs of farmers' wives and daughters. In hot weather, instead of standing over a hot stove for hours cooking, the women would prepare the meats and vegetables in a cool room. When all was ready the electricity would be turned on and in a short time the meal would be cooked and the current turned off. The men coming hot and dusty from the fields The District Pleasure Ground in the Coming School System AGITATE, EDUCATE, ORGANIZE! 24 would step into the wash-room, turn on the shower bath, cleanse and cool their bodies, put on a change of linen and go into the dining-room in comfort, where the cool atmosphere would exhilarate both body and brains. Do not say, "bosh," "visionary," but re- member that all things are possible that we set our minds to. Also remember that we do not act beyond our thinking, so if we wish to bring about a bet- ter condition we must think deeply and clearly. Do you hear the children crying, oh, my brothers, Ere their sorrows come with years? They are leaning their young heads against their mothers, But that cannot stop their tears. Browning. Every orphan in the school district will live at the school-home as one of the teachers' own children. Not as charity, but as a future community asset be- yond prke. If professing Christians will take liter- ally Christ's saying that the soul of any person, per- Ifjaps a hungry, ragged, foul-mouthed child, is of rjiore value than all the land, water, railroads, com- merce, money and banks in the whole world, we will get busy giving the children a chance. With a home-farm school established in every school district in the nation, the present outrageous and de- grading conditions of child labor, child poverty and child idleness will be shut off forever and to the full. Keep in mind that child idleness is as detri- READ, THINK, ACT! t 25 mental to the child's moral nature as overwork is to its physical body. Think of the uplifting influence of such a school system every child well fed, warmly clothed, its little brains and body washed clean by words and water, then tucked into bed each night with a kiss and a smile. At present too many of them go to bed dirty and hungry with a curse and a kick as their nightly benediction. Men and women, will you pt help change this condition? A school established as above, with ten acres of grapes, apples, nuts, or citrus fruit would be prac- tically self-supporting. This would save the tax- payers much of the money now used for public edu- cation, as well as considerable of that spent to gov- ern us. There would be less need for police and courts, jails and penitentiaries, insane asylums and reformatories if all children were properly developed. Every Saturday afternoon would be given over to amusement. There would be a contest of some kind between local schools, the visiting school to bring its band, while the home school furnished light refreshments during the afternoon, as well as a sub- stantial meal in the evening. As every young man and woman in the district would belong to the band and athletic clubs of the school, the entire family would enjoy every school entertainment. Thus would the homes and school AGITATE, EDUCATE, ORGANIZE! 26 be brought into the very closest relationship, which is something devoutly to be wished. All members of every family rinding their greatest pleasure on the home-school grounds, the false pleas- ures of the city would lose attraction. In this home-farm school every child would re- A Playground in the Coming School System ceive its completest possible physical, mental, moral development. Here each child would gain the strength of character attained by rural environment as well as the intellectuality received at our best city schools. In such a home- farm school girls would get real home training until the school re-established real home life. Home making is the greatest business READ, THINK, ACT! 27 on earth. It is the foundation of contentment and happiness. The man who stays at home in the eve- ning, smoking and pottering about the yard, finds himself in good physical and mental condition to do the next day's work. But how can our daughters make happy homes for their husbands and children if they know noth- ing about house keeping and have to depend on hired help who very likely know even less than does the mistress? The question of providing a few weeks' outing* for sickly children and tired mothers would here be met to the full. The large swimming-pool in the grove, providing for girls as well as boys, would make every idle hour an outing for chil- dren, while every evening would be an outing for all parents. With the young people in the school- room singing, spelling or debating, or the band playing in the park and the children playing about, parents would sit and smoke and gossip in complete contentment. And all this without our wives and mothers going away from home leaving us men discontented and grouchy. AGITATE, EDUCATE, ORGANIZE! 28 "There is no disguising the fact that we have a most difficult problem in the United States and I can not believe it is ours alone in the rural com- munity. A majority of our school children are in rural schools. The query arises, Are our rural schools doing their part in making life in the country desirable ? "The old-fashioned one-roomed schoolhouse, which holds forty or fifty ungraded pupils, having but a single teacher who knows nothing but books, is not a modern institution, though great men have issued from its door. "How can the schools of a country be so co- ordinated and combined as to make them efficient tools ? "The teachers, the superintendents and the school boards need leadership; they need an authoritative statement of conclusions by the wisest and most prac- tical men in the land ; they need to be shown the better way. And with even as little as $100,000 a year for two or three years we could, I believe, con- duct a Federal campaign through the Bureau of Education for a new kind of rural school that would work little less than a revolution in rural life."- Franklin K. Lane, Secretary of Interior. READ, THINK, ACT! INDIAN SCHOOLS OUR INDIAN SCHOOLS. In the preceding chapter I wrote about a pos- sible school system. Now I shall show you that all I told you about in that article I have seen in the Indian schools of this nation. At Pine Ridge agency, South Dakota, there are thirty-three day schools. Each child is given two suits of clothing, two suits of underwear, shoes, gloves, hats, etc., every year with a warm, whole- some dinner every day. Each school is established on a plot of ground eighty or one hundred and sixty acres in extent. A five or six-roomed cottage is erected. A three- roomed schoolhouse, barn, stable, hog-pens and chicken-coops are erected. A man and his wife are employed for life, at least so long as they keep up with the advancement of the community. Each is paid a salary. The school grounds soon become so attractive that the children hasten thereto in the morning and are loth to depart therefrom in the evening. These teachers have learned the lesson that whoever lives close to nature is not apt to become vile, and so they lead their pupils into close com- munion with nature through gardening, caring for stock, etc. This school gardening has brought about a won- READ, THINK, ACT! 31 derful change in the home life of these Indians, who were the last to submit to governmental au- thority. They did not take readily to farming, their lives having been spent in roaming at will over the plains. But as the children learned to cook and eat the vegetables they themselves had raised, they talked so much and were so enthusi- astic about their school meal that the old folks have taken to farming. Every Indian family that has a child in school has a small field under culti- vation. They have gardens, hogs, chickens and cows. If this Indian school system is doing so much for these children, who will never become out- leaders, what might it not do for the white children who soon will be our rulers in politics, business, and society? Such noticeable child growth makes enthusiasts of teachers. At school No. 4, the .teachers, Air. and Mrs. Fisher, are very wealthy; they could live in idleness all their lives, yet their work holds them with the same grip that horticulture holds a gardener. It is an inspiring sight to see Mr. Fisher in the garden with his coat and collar off, his sleeves rolled up, leading the work with such intelligent enthusiasm that the task becomes play to the pupils. My visit to No. 5 was just at noon. Mr. Mc- Laughlin was busy in the school room and Mrs. AGITATE, EDUCATE, ORGANIZE! 33 McLaughlin was conducting a class in domestic sci- ence, while the girls prepared the meal. On the kitchen table was a baking of bread and pies fit for any man's table. I announced my delight at such pastry. Mrs. McLaughlin called to a thirteen-year- old Indian maiden, introduced me, and informed me she was the baker for the day. My visit to No. 11 was on a field day. All the teachers and matrons for forty miles around were there. It gave me a splendid opportunity to get acquainted with the various ideas and individualities of these teachers. This school, taken all in all, is my ideal. Mr. Bragance is an enthusiastic farmer, the pupils take great delight in their work as he conducts it. The daughter is an expert musician. She plays the organ to measure time while the pupils sing, march in and out of school, or have physical culture on rainy days. But the leader of leaders is Mrs. Bragance. Her Heart yearns after the children's souls, she gives herself to them, and so, love beget- ting love, the little Indian children cling to her skirts as to a mother's, their eyes follow her in adoration. Her slightest wish is their law. Man is as the sunshine, woman as the rain. Too much sunshine without rain and the land becomes parched and dry. Too much rain and the land be- comes soft and mushy. Any old-timer can tell you about the time when the San Joaquin Valley was a AGITATE, EDUCATE, ORGANIZE! 34 great stretch of dry, sandy soil. But when the mountain waters were conserved and carried on to the soil, this great valley, hundreds of miles long, blossomed as a tropical garden, with flowers, vegeta- tion and fruit trees. All because water and sunshine joined forces. And thus it will be with our civiliza- tion when our school system becomes a home-farm school system. At Independence, California, school is conducted most of the time out of doors. There is a fine lawn, well grassed and comfortably seated. This teacher holds that in a room ever so well ventilated, the child must inhale much foul breath that may come from diseased lungs, nasal tubes or stomachs which other children may have. Out in the fresh air this is not so. But the big result is that the child's eyes resting on the natural shading of grass, leaves, flowers and clouds are rested and strengthened in- stead of being weakened and tired and thus dis- tressing every nerve of the body. If, for any rea- son, the children get a bit restless, the teacher gives them a physical culture lesson. She leads them into the garden where the older children take garden hand-plows, the smaller children take rakes and hoes. After fifteen or twenty minutes of such play, their excess physical vitality being worked off, they return to their book work mentally alert and physi- cally contented. It is indeed wonderful what de- READ, THINK, ACT! 35 vclr,p:r!tnt we can give children if we take them early in childhood and lead, not drive, them. At Carson City, Nevada, I saw many little Indian tots playing about the school grounds. As it was va- cation time I asked the Superintendent why these children were not at home. He replied that the school took care of every orphan in its jurisdiction, at the school, as one of the faculty's children. At Riverside, California, I learned that the Super- intendent had secured work for seventy-five of the older Indian girls in the best Christian homes in the two counties during vacation. Thus they were en- abled to earn some money for themselves while get- ting an insight into real home life. This idea of helping the pupils is carried out at every Indian college, and boys are secured positions with farmers or business men who are engaged in the lines of work the boys wish to follow for a life work. At Carlisle, Pennsylvania, I was informed that when a mechanic left that school he could go at once to work for the Pennsylvania railroad, with the as- surance of steady employment. When a young man leave- that school he is given a kit of tools such as his work will require, he is secured a position and for years the faculty keeps up a correspondence with him. Thus he feels that others care for him, that he is of - -)me importance in the world, and he is thereby much strengthened in character. AGITATE, EDUCATE, ORGANIZE! 37 Indian teachers give their pupils all the responsi- bility they can maintain. They hold that recognized responsibility develops character. I once visited an Indian school where I found the teacher conducting a class in arithmetic. He stepped to a bell and tapped thereon, a number of small Indians left the school room and went into the domestic science room. I soon followed them. I found an older pupil in- structing a number of smaller pupils in their let- ters. The lesson was being conducted with dignity and decorurh. This pupil-teacher was a tower of strength to the regular teacher. Some people question if such conditions could be brought about in our public schools. I want to most emphatically state that we can lead the children wherever we wish if we will start early enough with them and use judgment and patience. I saw the In- dian boys and girls hurry to their field work with the same enthusiasm that our white children hurry to their play. What young children need most is just the privilege to play and grow in beautiful, peaceful home surroundings. I have been asked if such a home-farm school system would not be very expensive. First, as to maintenance, I will show in my next chapter that it is almost self-sustaining. In comparison with our universities the cost is almost nil. As to the estab- lishing of the 500,000 such schools needed, if we AGITATE, EDUCATE, ORGANIZE! 38 can get the Federal Government to stand for the con- servation of children as it now stands for the con- servation of mu dholes and waste lands, it will not cost one cent, save interest for twenty years. We can buy the land, erect all needed buildings, install the dynamo and pumping plant as w r ell as make the needed improvements without a dollar expense to anyone. Let a school district issue its 20-year 5 per cent, bonds under proper regulations. Have the Federal Government take these bonds, at the end of twenty years the Government to return the bonds to the dis- trict without cost. The Government is not out a cent on the transaction as the interest for twenty years at 5 per cent, pays it back, and the people are not out anything to purchase the grounds, buildings and improvements, as the Government has returned its bonds without cost to .the district. All we need in this school-developing system is to get the Gov- ernment to stand for the children. These ideas, being out of the realm of your previ- ous thought, will seem- a bit big 'and difficult to accomplish, but let me tell you, the people get just what they are capable of thinking out to a logical conclusion and then demanding and working for. Do not be afraid to investigate an idea. READ, THINK, ACT! INDIAN vs. PUBLIC SCHOOLS INDIAN SCHOOLS vs. PUBLIC SCHOOLS. I now come to the point where I will show you the meager cost of maintaining an Indian college compared with our universities, and the superiority of the Indian school education. I shall compare the two systems, not in antagonism to the public schools, but as comparisons are usually illuminating I hope to arouse such a public outcry that our leading edu- cators and lawmakers will investigate, which I feel certain would result in bettering our public school system. When I was at Albuquerque, New Mexico, the National Commissioner of Education delivered an inspiring address. I thought to myself, "Here is an opportunity to get a bit of widespread publicity." After the meeting was over I spoke to Dr. Claxton and asked him to go with me to visit the University and the Indian College. He consented. I got into touch with Dr. Perry, head of the In- dian College ; with Dr. Boyd, head of the University, and with Mr. White, State Superintendent of Schools of New Mexico. The next morning the five of us visited the two educational institutions. While at the University we learned that that institution had a registration of ninety-nine, with an available school fund for the year of $55,000. At the Indian College we learned that that school had a registration of 450, READ, THINK, ACT! 41 with an available school fund of $68,000. Here was a great difference in favor of the Indian school. But when we learned that the Indian College fed, clothed and housed its pupils the comparison was almost beyond understanding. Now, parents and taxpayers, the difference was not in graft nor inefficiency. Dr. Boyd is a capable and honest man. But this tremendous difference is in the system. At the Indian College the pupils who intend to follow farming, produce much of the table supplies while learning their lessons. The young men who wish to become mechanics study their work both at the bench and from books. One result of this practical development was seen in a girls' dormitory, just finished, which cost the taxpayers $12,000. This building if erected by the University would cost about $35,000. The difference in cost lies in the fact that the Indian pupils, while learning the finishing touches to their work, did all the masonry, carpentry, plastering, plumbing, and built the fur- nishings, etc. After a long life spent in hoping to help the working people, I am fully convinced that the public school must fit the child for meeting its life's work. This must not be done by a school here and there, as is now being done, but it must become a part of the school curriculum and of universal application. Always bear in mind that the child is as a tripod, AGITATE, EDUCATE, ORGANIZE! 42 break any leg of the instrument and it falls to the ground. Develop a man mentally brilliant but mor- ally weak and he becomes a cruel grinder of other men's faces. Develop a man morally strong but men- tally weak and he becomes an easy mark for every human hyena he meets. Let us take up again, for a short time, free-will and foreordination. Let us keep firmly in mind that the person or institution that defies nature and tram- ples on her laws is defying God, and consequently Scene at a Washington Indian School READ, THINK, ACT! 43 will certainly fail. Such action is a terrible, irrepara- ble mistake. The first law of childhood is activity. The minute a child is born nature tells it to cry, to cry loudly so as to fill its lungs with air ; and to thrash its legs and arms about, to wriggle its toes and fingers, thus starting the blood to flowing. The minute the public school gets its hands on a child it flouts nature, it compels the child to assume a prison-like rigidity or be punished as a law-breaker. The day may be hot, the air close and sultry, the teacher, matured in body and brain, has to move about to keep awake. But the child must sit still or receive punishment. And so the child comes to hate the teacher, to dread the school, and to despise the laws of the land. The Indian school works in harmony with nature. If a child gets sleepy the mother-teacher takes it in her arms, carries it out of doors into the grove, lays it down on the grass in the shade of a tree or shrub, and lets nature do the rest. When nature has re- stored the child's vitality it comes back into the school and takes up its mental work with vigor. Indian pupils worship their teacher, they love the school and they respect the laws of the land. Nature tells women to marry. Motherhood is the highest peak of human attainment. Teachers well know that the way to learn to do anything is by AGITATE, EDUCATE, ORGANIZE! 44 doing it. Thus women know if they are to become the best teachers for other mothers' children they should have children of their own, that they may know to the full how to care for and control children of different natures and dispositions. But if a teacher is brave enough to go to the school board and talk thus to them she is informed that motherhood is a bar to teaching. Thus does the public school trample upon the most sacred law of nature. The bravest battle that ever was fought, shall I tell you where and when? On the maps of the world you'll find it not, 'twas fought by the mothers of men Deep in a walled-up woman's heart, a woman who would not yield, But silently, patiently bore her part lo, there is the battle-field. Miller. Indian schools know the value of having a mother on every school ground. They well know that a foul-mouthed, blaspheming boy quiets down in lan- guage and demeanor when he comes into the pres- ence of a mother. The mother-teacher's sanctifying influence habituates the children to ways of gentle- ness and truth. Nature has endowed each child with a different capacity. The public school slaps nature in the face and ties the children into groups and makes them walk lockstep. Thus are bright pupils held back, and not having to give much attention to their lessons, READ, THINK, ACT! 46 become restless, often mischievous, and these handi- caps go with {hem through life, often to their un- doing. Dull pupils are dragged so rapidly over their lessons that they cannot comprehend anything they read or are told. Thus their time is worse than wasted and their diploma is a false beacon light; it leads them to believe they have abilities which they do not possess. The Indian school studies each child's home envi- ronment as well as its individuality. Each is given several lines of employment. Then as the child shows some adaptability for any special line of work, it is given every opportunity and personal attention to develop along that line. Our public universities, colleges and high schools are developing a spirit of selfishness, a snobbishness that is bad for the individual as well as for society. Indian colleges allow no distinction in dress or demeanor. All girls dress alike in neat, serviceable garments made by themselves. It is indeed a most pleasing sight to see hundreds of young women wan- dering about the campus with arms lovingly entwined about each other. It never enters the mind of an Indian girl to ask her companion if her father is a ditch-digger or a millionaire. The mind and heart are the measuring values at the Indian colleges. Thus are selfishness and pride kept down. And when these girls marry they do not dream about silks and READ, THINK, ACT! 47 satins, automobiles and foreign travel, dansants and after-theatre dinners. Their minds are fully devel- oped into desiring to make happy homes for their husbands and children. We well know that an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. And yet we act much as did the retired merchant who purchased a fruit farm. He found thereon ten thousand young, straight and thrifty fruit trees, and a few old hulks. He spent all his time endeavoring to straighten out the old crooks, and as a consequence, at fruit-picking time he found most of his young trees with bodies bent and broken, with limbs twisted and misshapen, and ail because of his misapplied efforts. Parents and teachers, it is very evident that the public school is the only institution that can meet the present conditions. And the proper care of our 50,000,QOO children is the only thing that will meet the future conditions. So if we would abolish white slavery, drunkenness, gambling, divorces, we must conserve the children, and I know of no other way than to put the Indian school system into the public school. AGITATE, EDUCATE, ORGANIZE! 48 MELTING-POT vs. S MELTING-POT. Our public school system has often been likened to a melting-pot by many leading educators. I fear they are correct. A melting-pot is a vessel into which one pours many and various ingredients or materials and they melt together, the pure and the impure. It might be compared to a dinner-pot into which the house- wife puts various wholesome vegetables and a bit of rotten meat. The result is not the best. The Indian school system .is like a smelting-pot ; it separates the dross from the pure metal; it develops personal character, which in turn makes community character, and that means better government, busi- ness and society. READ, THINK, ACT! PERSONALITY AND SYSTEM PERSONALITY AND SYSTEM. When the first transcontinental railroad was being built across the Great American Desert, and Hearing the Sierra Nevada Mountains, it crossed a small stream of pure mountain water. Because of this stream a division station was built there and named Wadsworth. No human beings, save the few whites in the town, lived within hundreds of miles of these Indians. The station soon became the parade and show-grounds for the redmen. Here the women displayed their handiwork in blankets, baskets and pottery. As years rolled away, the Indians acquired all the dissolute habits of the whites without any of their energy. They were rapidly becoming vagabonds. Honor and chastity were fast disappearing. They took to begging and stealing as the easiest methods of getting a living. They were reduced to the lowest conditions of human existence. The Federal Government established an agency at Wadsworth and recently placed J. D. Oliver in charge. Mr. Oliver was a man of family with large experience in dealing with men. He soon discovered that these Indians were not in their deplorable con- dition from present environment alone. He saw that many of their habits were from centuries of tribal READ, THINK, ACT! 51 customs. He saw that if he elevated them to a clean, self-supporting manner of living he would have to take into account their tribal customs as well as their acquired habits from present associa- tions. When the railroad built through the Indian coun- try, an agreement was entered into between the In- dians and the railroad managers whereby all Indians were entitled to ride on any train, free of charge, at any time. Mr. Oliver observed that as soon as an Indian got the least bit restless, he, having free transportation, went to Reno, where through drink and gambling he soon lost everything he had to card sharps. The Indian would then get drunk and steal anything he could pawn for a drink or a dime. Thus the Indians' standard of morals had descended to the level of the gamblers and harlots of Reno. Air. Oliver called into counsel his women folk and the church missionary, Rev. K. Severance, who was a big-hearted and brainy man who had seen a great deal of life and knew the power of habit. After several serious talks, Mr. Oliver, well knowing that the task of reclaiming these Indians would be long and arduous, concluded not to apply too severe meth- ods at^ first. He called a council of all the Indians. "When they had assembled Mr. Oliver said: "Friends, you feel that you have reached the end of the trail. Turn which way you will all seems AGITATE, EDUCATE, ORGANIZE! Here We Have These Pyramid Lake Reservation Indian Homes. There are Many Such. What a Contrast to Their Former Home Life 53 dark and hopeless. You no longer dream of a home for your loved ones. To you, virtue seems to con- sist in getting the best of the other fellow. Even your daughters' chastity is being bartered for strong drink. During the summer months when nature pro- vides you with plenty of wild game, running streams and .warm weather, you exist in comfort. But when the chilling winds of winter sweep across the plains you are without food or shelter. Then you freeze, you starve, you die. "But, friends, I come to you with glad tidings. No longer need you look at what seerhs the end of the trail, but you can see the turning of the road. I will undertake to find each of you a good home, plenty to eat and wear, with a bright future before you, but in return you must promise to do what I ask." With one voice the assembled multitude shouted, "We will." "Very well," said Mr. Oliver, "first you must relin- quish your privilege to ride on the trains without a permit from me. So long as you have the privilege to go where and when you please without cost, you are constantly under temptation to leave the agency and go among white schemers who soon rob you of all you have. Thus do you not only lose your money, but you lose your time, and you form habits of idler ness and vice. "Xext you must be willing to work. I will set AGITATE, EDUCATE, ORGANIZE! 54 apart a farm for each of you as his own, and I will furnish you material for a house, but you must build the house. I will furnish you with teams, wagons, harness and the necessary farm implements, but you must sow and reap the crops." The picture of a comfortable home with plenty to eat and wear was very alluring to the Indians, but the thought of working was repugnant to them and so they kept quiet. ''You must quit stealing and going to Reno." At these statements from Mr. Oliver there was a loud protest from the Indians. But Mr. Oliver continued : "In return for these restrictions I am going to give you a very great privilege. I realize gambling is a mania with some of you, and it is hard for you to refrain therefrom even when you know that you will lose everything you possess. And so I am going to allow you to play games among yourselves on the agency grounds for non-essentials every Saturday afternoon." Then up spoke a young Indian, saying: "\\e dearly love to dance, and we have to go to Reno to dance," To this Mr. Oliver replied: "I will see to it that you have your own dances on the reservation. I will organize a brass band and a string band, and we will have a dance every Saturday night where your parents may watch you dance and thereby enjoy themselves." READ, THINK, ACT! 55 On that basis of understanding, with this capable, honest leader, these homeless, hopeless, dissolute In- dians turned their faces towards the rising sun in hope. What is the result? Every Indian on the reserva- tion has his own home and his own farm. They are self-supporting and self-respecting. No longer do they go off the reservation to spend their time in idleness, drinking and gambling. And these vices are rapidly dying out among them. They hold an annual fair in the fall. They enjoy displaying their crops and handiwork. Bootleggers and card-sharpers are not allowed on the grounds. There is no rowdyism. Every one acts with decency and decorum. If a proper school system, with capable, untram- meled teachers, is doing so much for the redman, what could it not do for the whites? AGITATE, EDUCATE, ORGANIZEI A Nevada Indian School and Agency TEACHING MORALS TEACHING MORALS IN SCHOOL. Teacher Children, what a wonderful thing is life! Why was man created to endure the trials of earth for a season, then die and go where no one knows? But as we study man, animals and vegetation we realize that humanity is greater than all other created things. We believe that the spirit of man will live after what we call death. This being so, it follows that we shall depart to a condition of pleasure or torment beyond what we endured on this earth. Pupil Will that pleasure or torment be physical or mental? Teacher I do not know. I can only reason from what I see and know. One of our poets depicts it as a mental state when he says : I sat alone with my conscience in a place where time had ceased, And thought of my former living in the land where the years increased, And ghosts of forgotten actions came floating before my sight, And things I thought were dead things were alive with a terrible might. So I have learned this lesson: howe'er dreadful hell may be, To be alone with my conscience will be hell enough for me. . I hope you will never see a man with delirium tre- mens. The mind of man cannot conceive a more ter- READ, THINK. ACT! 59 rible punishment than that. He imagines snakes are crawling all over him, that devils are driving nails into his brain, prodding him with redhot irons. Even if the torments of eternity are no worse than those of this life, still we should strive to so live that we will escape that torment. Pupil Is not your Christian God a cruel, revenge- ful monster? Teacher No ; man was created for a stupendous purpose. To be effective he must have initiative, so was given the power of choice, of free-will. But God did not leave man in a forest of doubt as to right and wrong. The laws of nature, which stand from everlasting to everlasting, are as a pillar of cloud by day and a pillar of fire by night to guide man aright. Man on earth is as a person crossing a river in a- rowboat : he has the boat and the oars ; if he goes to sleep and comes to disaster he alone is to blame. Pupil I do not want a religion that keeps me good from fear of punishment. Teacher In all things we must consider man from his standard of reasoning power and his develop- ment. There may come a time when man will be sufficiently developed to appreciate an all-enduring love and live accordingly. But, in our present stage of development how long would any government exist under absolute personal liberty? Suppose this Government should abolish all courts, and police, tear AGITATE, EDUCATE, ORGANIZE! 60 down all jails and penitentiaries, would not licen- tiousness, thieving", murder aye, chaos reign? No, children, I have seen too many political gather- ings where every man had a knife up his sleeve, to think you can deal with men other than they are. Pupil Do men act wickedly more than righteously ? Teacher To answer your question I shall assume that negative acts, that is, those not wicked, are good, and so I answer you, no. But as a dirty spot on a white collar attracts adverse criticism despite the much larger surface of white, so one evil deed at- tracts more attention than ten thousand good ones. A man reaches the age of thirty or forty years. He has lived uprightly. In an evil hour, in the heat of passion, he kills a fellow man. The million hours in which he did no wrong are of but secondary con- sideration with the court. The evil hour, the one wicked deed, sends him to the gallows or penitentiary. A young- woman lives a pure and noble life. In an unguarded moment, perhaps under promise of marriage, she falls. Her many resistances to tempta- tion are forgotten, while the one misstep damns her and even her child. I feel certain God is more mer- ciful than man. Yet, despite all this, children, we must deal with life just as we see it. A railroad is built from New York to San Francisco. Four thousand miles of the road are perfect, but one bridge in the Rocky Moun- READ, THINK, ACT! 61 tains breaks down every time a train runs upon it. Who would travel on such a road? Children, let each of us build our life's road free from any weaknesses of temper or desire, all the way from the cradle to the grave. Pupil Cannot we join the Church and thus escape damnation ? Teacher Simply joining the Church will not save one. But by joining the Church we get into the habit of attending church and Sunday-school. And if we find pleasure in church society we will not take pleasure in getting drunk or gambling. Thus, join- ing a Church helps us to form clean habits, which should be the earnest desire of every person. Pupil Cannot we go the pace and later in life repent and be saved? Young blood is hot and boys must sow their wild oats. Teacher I have small patience with that devil's doctrine that "boys must be boys." Boys will be what we make them. I am rather with that great writer, Ruskin, who wrote : A youth thoughtless, when all the happiness of his home forever depends on the chances or the passions of an hour! A youth thoughtless, when the career of all his days depends on the opportunity of a moment! A youth thoughtless, when his every action is a foun- dation-stone of future conduct, and every imagination a fountain of life or death! Be thoughtless in any after years, rather than now though, indeed, there is only AGITATE, EDUCATE, ORGANIZE! 62 one place where a man may be nobly thoughtless, his deathbed. Nothing should ever be left to be done there. Again, can you get an ink stain out of your copy- book? The way to live is to form right habits early in youth. Strive never to do or say anything you would be ashamed for your mother to see or hear. Study the life of Jesus Christ, strive to become like Him in word and deed. Live so that when you pass away you can dwell in His presence and He will cover your transgressions. Pupil If sin is as a blot of ink on a piece of white paper, how will sitting in His presence hide it? Teacher Let me liken each individual to a street- lamp. In the darkness of the night it shines forth and attracts all manner of vermin, bugs and beetles ; but when the sun shines forth, the light of the street lamp wanes and the dirt and filth on the globe is not seen. So if the street-light could keep in the light of the sun all the time no one would notice its dirty condition. Let us so live in this life, children, that when we stand in the presence of the all-seeing Judge, He will not send us into outer darkness where our sins will show forth and remind us of what might have been. As it is difficult to stop when you are sliding down a steep icy hillside, so it is difficult to change evil habits. READ, THINK, ACT! THE BIBLE IN SCHOOL THE BIBLE IN SCHOOL. Question Would you have the Bible in school? Answer I would as soon think about building a house without using lumber as I would attempt to teach morals without the sayings of Jesus Christ. His life and teachings, so pure and simple, must ever be the foundation of our moral instruction, or our morals will be as shifting as man's desire. While no father wants his son to become a drunkard, and no mother desires her daughter to become a harlot, yet fathers and mothers are leading their sons and daughters to the doors of saloons and brothels by submitting to, even if not indulging in, the trend of the times. One trouble with our morals is, the Church has discarded the Bible truths for man's interpretation thereof. Let us have one lesson in morals. In this lesson we will lay the foundation for our future moral instruction. The 30,000,000 children of school age are in their seats. The several hundred thou- sand teachers call their various schools to order and say: As the man who owns his home is a more con- tented and better citizen than the homeless man, so the man who has his mind satisfied as to the future life will live a more wholesome, clean and simple life than the man who is always trying to convince him- READ, THINK, ACT! 65 self that there is no life after death. And so, chil- dren, in this first lesson on morals I will try to make it plain to you why man was created. Pupil My father says man was not created, he just evolved. Teacher Your father's statement is worthy of serious consideration. So let us search deeply into the question. Let us consider the origin of matter. Matter is here, so it must have had a beginning. How, where or when matter first appeared is be- yond the mind of man to grasp. Man cannot fully understand a place or condition without time or space. As we throw our minds back, and yet back, grasping for a stable condition, we find as much space beyond our utmost outlook as when we started to investigate. And so we become bewildered. The best illustration I can give you of eternity is the horizon as I crossed the ocean. It seemed but a few miles away when the ship left the dock at New York, but as we traveled for days the horizon was ever as far in advance as at the beginning of the journey. To get a solid mental foundation on which to erect a structure of rules to guide us, we arbitrarily say "In the beginning." And yet we know no more about eternity than before, but we have a solid foun- dation for thought. In the beginning was a creative force. The Chris- AGITATE, EDUCATE, ORGANIZE! 66 tian world calls it God, evolutionists call it matter. It seems reasonable to me to believe the Creator greater than his creation. Man being matter, is he both creator and creature? This does not harmonize with known facts. Man is the only animal that can, by working hand in hand with nature, produce greater results than nature alone can ; yet man cannot produce flesh or vegetation other than by the way nature has provided. Thus we see man is not su- preme, although he is above all other forms of mat- ter. Man is not the finality. There must be a higher power. Long ago people said life resided in the sun, hence it was the creative force back of all. They satisfied their own minds by placing an egg on ice and another in sand warmed by the sun's rays. The heat of the sun hatched the egg in the sand, while the egg on the ice did not hatch. And thus they were satisfied that heat was life, and the sun, being the center of heat, was the creator of life, until someone called their attention to the fact that other forces of nature frequently overcame the sun. And so man learned that there was a creative force beyond his under- standing. This he called God, and from that day to this wise men content themselves with the knowledge that there is a force beyond the limits of time, and that they can reach a state of peace beyond their mind to grasp if they live according to the laws of nature. READ, THINK, ACT! 67 Pupil My brother says there is no God. Teacher Let us look into your brother's state- ment. Always keep in mind that it is very difficult to clearly demonstrate that which we ourselves do not fully understand. Herein do many preachers err, they make dogmatic statements about eternity which they themselves cannot prove. Then when children K-.n'in asking questions, they tell them they are too young to understand such deep things. So the chil- dren, a-s well as older persons, become skeptical and become mental wanderers. I ask you to investigate eternity as you would a problem in algebra. We say x represents the un- known quantity, then by proving the knowable quan- tity we find the power of .v. Matter exists, that is the known quantity. What- ever exists was created by an intelligence or by chance. Let us prove that there was an intelligence before time began and we need not worry about the form of such intelligence. Go to the shore of old ocean. Watch that ever- moving body of water. See it hurl itself against its rocky barriers. And yet we can tell, a thousand years in advance, to the hour, on any given day, when it will be high tide or low tide. There is no CHANCE about the movements of the tides. Watch the sun and moon. They are ever moving. Yet you can tell, ten thousand years in the future, when there will be an eclipse of the sun or moon. AGITATE, EDUCATE, ORGANIZE! 68 There is no shadow of possibility of CHANCE domi- nating the movements of the sun or moon. Look into the heavens and watch the myriad mil- lions of worlds as they rush through space without crashing against each other. If their movements were by CHANCE would there not be tumult in the heavens ? Do we not well know that people, animals and vegetation produce each after its own kind? Could this be so if CHANCE ran this world? So we find, children, by investigation from the known to the unknown, that this old world and the fulness thereof were created by an intelligence, and reason tells us that it makes no difference to us what the shape of or the name we give to this in- telligence. It is enough for us to know that it has being and that it is watching over our every action. If we call it God every person understands what we mean, although we cannot understand its personality or describe its being. Pupil Father told me never to believe anything I could not see and explain. Teacher While your father did not intend to mis- lead you, he spoke without due consideration. You cannot see electricity, and yet you well know there is such an element, as you have seen electric lights, as well as the power of electricity in moving cars and machinery. READ, THINK, ACT! 69 It is just as certain there is an intelligence back of the sun, which gives out more light than all the electric lights of the world. And to hold this world in space requires more power than the mind of man can conceive. Xow, children, the lesson I want you to learn from this discussion is, there is an intelligence back of creation which is beyond the mind of man to grasp. The brainest of men can barely glimpse its vastness. This intelligence existed before time began and will as certainly exist after time ceases. Man is superior to every other form of matter. Some men call this superiority soul, others call it intelligence. What matters it to us what name it bears? It is sufficient for us to know that it is in- destructible, that it lives after our bodies have mol- dered into dust. And so the thing that should con- cern us is the knowledge that this never dying part of us will go to a place of blessedness or torment according to the deeds we do while in the flesh. Remember, children, every word we speak, every smile or frown we give, every act we do is placed on our soul's forehead just as ink marks are placed on white paper. I want you to think seriously about this great re- sponsibility that rests with each one of us personally. And so, at home, or on the street, or at work or play, speak and act kindly to parents, teachers, play- mates or casual companions. AGITATE, EDUCATE, ORGANIZE! A Nation That Treats its Children Thus Will Reap a Reward of Weakness and Corruption HOME GARDENING IN SCHOOL HOME GARDENING DIRECTED BY THE 'SCHOOL. A PLAN FOR THE BETTER ECONOMIC AND EDUCATIVE USE OF THE TIME OF THE CHILDREN IN CITIES, TOWNS, AND MANUFACTURING VILLAGES. By P. P. Claxton, National Commissioner of Education. In the cities, towns, manufacturing villages, and suburban communities of the United States there are approximately 13,000,000 children between the ages of 6 and 20. Of these about 9,750,000 are enrolled in the public and private schools. The average daily attendance is 6,500,000, two-thirds of the enrollment and one-half of the school population. These children are taught by 300,000 teachers at a cost for all pur- poses of $300,000,000. The average length of school term in the cities is 180 days. The average attend- ance is 120 days. The length of the school day is about five hours. Probably 5 per cent, of these children are away from home during the summer vacation months with their parents at summer resorts or visiting in the country. Between 5 and 10 per cent, are employed in some useful, healthful, productive occupation. Eighty-five per cent, remain at home without any useful, healthful occupation requiring any large part of their time. Most of them have little opportunity for play. Some of them work a portion of the time READ, THINK, ACT! 73 at occupations at which they earn "very little and which are not suited for children of their age. The dangers of idleness and unsuitable occupation are very great for all. A large majority of them belong to families whose members must earn their living by their daily labor and for which the earnings are so meager that anything which can be added by the children is much needed. Many of them are cold in winter, and must go hungry much of the time. More of them live in small, crowded rooms and in poorly- furnished homes. More than two-thirds of them leave school at 14 years of age or earlier, to become breadwinners. Because of lack of proper contact with nature and the experience which comes from suitable, purposeful, productive occupations, most of them do not get from their years in school such education as they should. In this situation is involved an important problem of education and economics which can, it is believed, be solved in no other way so well as by home gar- dening done by children under the direction of the schools. In all of the manufacturing villages, sub- urban communities, smaller towns, and outskirts of the larger towns and cities, there is much valuable land in back yards, vacant lots, and elsewhere which might be used for this purpose. In every school in a community of this kind there should be at least one teacher who knows gardening, both theoretically and AGITATE, EDUCATE, ORGANIZE! 74 practically. This teacher, who should, of course, be employed twelve months in the year, should teach the elementary sciences in the schools during school hours and should, out of school hours, direct the home gardening of the children between the ages of 7 and 15. If possible the teacher should have the assistance of an expert gardener, so that the work may be done in the most practical and profitable way. The teacher and the gardener should help the children find the plots of ground near their homes best suited for garden work, aid them by some co-operative method to have the lots properly plowed and pre- pared for cultivation, help them select seeds, and show them how to plant, cultivate, and harvest, so as to obtain the best results. The teacher should spend the afternoons and Saturdays of winter, spring, and fall, when school is in session, and all of the vacation days of summer, visiting the children in their homes, directing their work, and giving to each child such help as it most needs. Once a week or oftener, during the vacation months, the teacher should as- semble the children in groups 'for discussions of their work and of the principles and methods involved. Vegetables, berries, and fruits grown should be used first as food for the children and their families ; then the surplus should be marketed to the best ad- vantage. Through the help of the teacher this can be done in a co-operative way. Ten or fifteen cents' READ, THINK, ACT! 75 worth of vegetables each day from the gardens of each of 200 children would amount to $20 or $30. In the summer and fall, when the surplus is large and can not be marketed to advantage, the teacher should direct and help the children in canning and preserving for winter use or for sale. The canning and tomato clubs of the Southern States have already shown what can 'be done in this way. It is difficult to estimate the results of this plan when it shall be in full operation throughout the country. For the children it will mean health, strength, joy in work, habits of industry, an under- standing of the value of money, as measured in terms of labor, and such knowledge of the phenomena and forces of nature as must be had for an understanding of most of their school lessons. They will also learn something at least of the fundamental principle of morality ; that each individual must make his or her own living; must, by some kind of labor of head, hand, or heart, contribute to the common wealth as much as he takes from it ; must pay for what he gets in some kind of coin. The economic and sociological results should also be considered. Many experiments already made show that with proper direction an average child of the' ages contemplated can produce on an eighth of an acre of land from $50 to $100 worth of vegetables. A third of the childen in the city schools of the AGITATE, EDUCATE, ORGANIZE! 77 United States might easily produce $200,000,000 a year. This plan in full operation would probably do more toward keeping young children out of the factories and mills than all of the child-labor laws on the statute books. A boy 10 or 12 years of age, with a quarter of an acre of land, working under careful direction, can produce more for the support of the family than could be purchased with the child's wages from the mill. Children should not be ground in the mills nor sweated in the factories ; their strength should not be sapped and their nerves racked by working in the heat and dust of indoors, yet all chil- dren should learn to work ; it is good for them, and they joy in it. 9 This plan w r ill also do much to solve the problem of the idle negro. A large part of the negroes of the Southern States live on the outskirts of cities and small towns. Their cabin homes are frequently on large lots and surrounded with vacant lots covered with weeds and rubbish. During the vacation months the negro children roam idly on the streets, falling into mischief and vice. Under proper direction they might make, on these back yards and vacant lots, enough to support themselves and more. Their par- ents might then put into savings banks a good part of their earnings. With the money thus accumulated they could buy or build their own homes and gain some degree of that independence necessary for good AGITATE, EDUCATE, ORGANIZE! 78 citizenship for men and women of any race. The negro children would be kept from vice and would gain habits of industry. Incidentally these negro quarters would be changed from places of ugliness to places of beauty. Probably the most valuable result of this plan will be found in the fact that it will make it easy for most children to attend school three or four years longer than they now do, a thing more and more desirable, since education for life and citizenship in our industrial, civic, and social democracy can not be obtained before the age of adolescence. In some way all children must have instruction and training after the years of childhood, or state and society must suffer for the failure. If a child can contribute to its support while in school, it may remain in school much longer than if it must be carried as a dead weight until it quits school to go to work. The fact that this work will produce a generation of men and women who will find their recreation after the close of their eight-hour labor day in profitable home gardening is also not the least important rea- son for its introduction. Compared with the results, the cost will be incon- siderable. No addition to the number of teachers will be required. It will only be necessary to require different preparation for one teacher in each school. Fifty thousand such teachers will be sufficient for all READ, THINK, ACT! 79 the city, town, and manufacturing 1 village schools in the United States. To add $500 to the salary of one teacher in each school, in order to retain his services throughout the entire twelve months, would require an additional expenditure of $25,000,000, only one-twelfth of the present total cost of these schools and less than one-eighth of the total value of what may easily be produced by the healthful, joyous, edu- cative labor of children who now spend much more than half of their waking hours in idleness hurtful to them physically, mentally, and morally. In the estimates submitted to Congress by the Commissioner of Education for the support of the Bureau in the next fiscal year, an item of $5,700 is included to enable the Bureau to begin the intro- duction of this kind of work in the schools of the United States. The commissioner believes that it will only be necessary to work out details of plans and to present them to school officers, together with full information in regard to results of somewhat similar work already done at various places. It will, of course, be necessary also to induce colleges and training schools for teachers to so modify their courses as to give to some teachers the preparation required for this work. Many such teachers should be prepared in the colleges and schools of agriculture. AGITATE, EDUCATE, ORGANIZE! CHILD LABOR AND POVERTY CHILD LABOR AND POVERTY. Employers' Responsibility. When I was in London I saw such poverty and degradation as I hope this nation will never come to. One gets a shave in the commercial end of town for two pennies. In the workingmen's living district one gets a shave for one penny ha'penny. As a conse- quence these working people must work twelve to fifteen hours each day for a mere existence. If one is out of work for a day he is in debt for a month, if he is sick for a week he is in debt for a year. They are degraded below the line of hope. It is ter- rible to think that human beings are thus treated, and especially is it so when we feel that unless some- thing is done our own children will come to that condition of existence. Josephine J. Eschenbrenner, secretary of the Na- tional Child Labor Committee, tells us that 2,000,000 children under fifteen years of age are employed at starvation wages, in unsanitary environment. What will these children do to politics and business when they come into possession of government? As I traveled through Scotland, England and France, I saw women by the thousands working in the fields, late and early. When I returned home and looked into farm conditions in America I found, by READ, THINK, ACT! 83 governmental statistics, that there are over 1,500,000 women and girls doing men's work in the fields. Are not the chances that the children these women bear will be puny, and very likely deformed? Is it thus we would rear a free and loyal people? Thinking over these things I fell asleep and was carried in the spirit by an angel to a high mountain where I saw the earth and all above and below the earth. And I beheld the throne of Satan. And I saw a man walk with haughty step into the presence of Lucifer and I heard him say: "I want to become a Captain of Industry on the earth/' Lucifer looked at him in sorrow for a moment, then said, "Knowest what you ask?" The man re- plied, "I know." Lucifer said: "What you ask for carries with it tremendous responsibilities; are you able to carry the burden?" The man replied, "I am able." Then Lucifer said: "Go, I give you the power you ask. May God have mercy on your soul." And the man went away to the earth. And I was for a season as one asleep, and when I awoke I saw the man who had been a Captain of Industry on the earth, approaching the throne of God saying in a haughty manner, "I have come to judg- ment." Then God said to him, "You shall see through the AGITATE, EDUCATE, ORGANIZE! 85 eyes of an impartial judge." And God plucked out His right eye and handed it to the man saying, "Look." The man did look and this is what he saw : A great forest, dense, dank and dismal. To the east of the forest was an innumerable army of happy, well-fed children playing and singing in childish glee. And as they sang and danced they passed into the forest. The forest was filled with hideous beasts. Seen from one viewpoint they appeared to be well-dressed Christian gentlemen. Seen from another viewpoint they were hideous monsters. Their heads were as the heads of swine, with flesh-tearing tusks, their arms were as the tentacles of an octopus which never let go of its victim but sucked the flesh of its bones, their fingers were as the claws of an eagle, while their feet were as those of a jungle tiger, soft to tread but swift and terrible to tear the flesh of its victim. And these beasts sprang upon the children and despite their pleadings did suck the blood from their tender bodies and did rend and tear their quivering flesh. Later the children crawled out of the forest to the west, maimed and decrepit, old while yet young. And all the days of their lives they were wracked Avith pain and hunger. AGITATE, EDUCATE, ORGANIZE! 86 The man who was looking through the eye of God asked, "What is this to me?" Then God replied: "The forest you saw is the mines, mills, factories and other places of child em- ployment where little children are put to work in unsanitary conditions, are worked long hours and are paid starvation wages. Thus are they destroyed body and soul. The beasts you saw are such men as yourself. When a child is put to work under such conditions that it loses flesh and blood I shall hold you employers guilty of sucking the blood and eating the flesh of that child. Be not deceived ; I will not be mocked." Then the Captain of Industry fell on his face screaming and writhing in great agony, exclaiming : "Let the devils in hell judge me." Then God replied: "So let it be." And the man was cast into the pit of torment where there was weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth. Parental Responsibility. And I saw a man approach the throne of God saying, "I have come to judgment." God looked at the man for a moment then He plucked out His right eye and handing it to the man said, "Look." When the man looked through the eye of God his face paled and he was terror-stricken. He cast the eye of God from him and ran screaming away. READ, THINK, ACT! 87 But an angel brought him back. Then again God said, "Look." The man did so and fell to the floor writhing and screaming as one demented. I turned to my guide and asked the meaning of the man's terror. My guide replied : "This man while on earth mar- ried and became a father. He took to drink, impov- erished his family, his wife died of a broken heart. He died a miserable drunken wretch, and when he looked through the eye of God this is what he saw : "A large city. A young girl clothed in rags. She is in great poverty. She is wringing her hands in fear and anguish. She starts to run through the streets and is pursued by a drunken man. The man looking into the eye of God recognizes the drunkard as himself and the child as his daughter. "The girl runs into a school-yard, but the other children turn from her, saying: 'Her father is a drunkard.' "The child flees down alleys and side streets but she cannot get away from her father. She goes into a store and asks for work but as soon as the pro- prietor learns her name he turns her away. "The child goes to a home and asks the mistress for work. She is about to be employed when a drunken man is heard raving on the porch. On investigation the man is found to be the child's father. So the AGITATE, EDUCATE, ORGANIZE! 88 mistress will not employ her and turns her out of doors. "As the child steps into the street her drunken father grabs her by the hair and drags her down the street to a low saloon and dance-house where he sells her honor for a drink of whisky, and the child de- spite her tears and moanings is started hellward." "But," said I to my guide, "did the father actually sell his daughter for whisky?" "Not actually in person," said my guide, "but his actions while he lived were such as make his name a hissing and scorning among men, and he spent the money that should have gone to support his daughter until she reached the years of discretion for self-gratification, then when the child asked for work the remembrance of her father's evil and trifling life deterred men and women from trusting the child. And God holds every man responsible for his influ- ence." Then I knew what the man had seen when he looked through God's eye, and I knew why he was terrified. And I prayed that we would know the truth ere it was too late. READ, THINK, ACT! WHY WAS MAN CREATED? WHY WAS MANKIND CREATED? "As unto the bow the cord is, so unto the man is woman, Though she bends him she obeys him, though she draws him still she follows, Useless each without the other." Let us look into the reason for man's creation. This same question has undoubtedly come to every one of us. Then as we look out over the world and see sin rampant and triumphant we feel like throw- ing up our hands and saying, What's the use? By so saying and thinking we .become as broken reeds to our children instead of just guides. If we want our children to grow into manhood and womanhood clean lived we must remember that home is the place to develop character, for despite all our failings our children believe in us and imitate us until it is too late for them to recast their charac- ters. The child is a natural interrogation point. It is ever asking questions which you cannot answer. If instead of putting the child off, you go to the Bible with the child for the answer, just as you frequently go to the dictionary, you and your child will soon find out why man was created. Eternity having no limitations we go to the border- line of our capacity to think and call that the be- READ, THINK, ACT! 91 ginning. In the beginning God created the heavens and the inhabitants thereof. There was war in Heaven. As war always comes from selfishness, we find Lucifer, chief angel of light, selfish, desiring some special privilege, which is the strength of hell and the weakness of humanity. God having no pa- tience with selfishness cast Lucifer and his fol- lowers out of Heaven. He sent them into a far country where they dwell in torment of recollection of what might have been. And to this day every child of the devil is a selfish seeker after privilege. As there is neither time nor space in eternity, God set apart a portion of eternity and called it time. To time He set limitations. Time was created for the redemption of devils, but as their sin had been grievous, their tribulations would have to be com- mensurate with their sin, otherwise their rebellious desires would again break out. For example: There were three farmer families. In each was a son. The boys grew restless and ran away from home. The parents of the first boy sent a policeman after him and had him forced back home. He again grew restless and ran away again. This time he went so far they could not follow him. The parents of the second boy went after him themselves. They made great ado over him. They promised if he would only "return home they would deed him the farm. He went home, had the farm deeded to him- AGITATE, EDUCATE, ORGANIZE! 92 self, then he made life a hell for the old folks and at last sent them to the poor house. The parents of the third boy took counsel together. Then sent word to the chief of police to keep an eye on their son. They allowed him to taste the dregs of poverty; then they sent a messenger to him. This neighbor told the boy some plain, wholesome truths. He induced the boy to return home and ask his parents' for- giveness. Forgiveness was freely granted, things moved on as usual, the boy had his lesson and every one was happy ever after. God could not send an ambassador to hell who had fought against Lucifer in the war in Heaven, as the devils would have imprisoned him and tormented him, so God created a new creature, a little lower than the angels and sent him to Lucifer as a mes- senger. This new creature God called "Man." After a thousand years, God, seeing that man was unable to fulfil his work, created woman as a help meet for man's great destiny. What great power did God give woman that man does not possess? He gave woman a stronger moral nature while He gave her a weaker physical nature. Thus woman ever clings to man, but her eyes are ever on the cross. That brings up the question, Is woman man's moral superior? The greatest organized effort for morality is the Church. This is so of whatever creed or country. READ, THINK, ACT! 93 It would indeed be to empty benches preachers talked if it were not for women. Who manufacture strong drinks? Men. Who conduct drinking places? Men. Who patronize sa- loons? Men. So on the drink question we find that man is the weaker vessel. Who manage gambling dens? Men. Who patron- ize gambling? Men. While it is true that some of the society women gamble the heavy preponderance is against men. As to the third evil, the brothel, a casual glance would seem to indicate that woman was the trans- gressor, but a full investigation will prove that for every woman who occupies a house of ill-fame hun- dreds of men go therein. So facts compel the acknowledgment that woman is morally the superior of man. Yet she should not gloat thereover, as this greater moral strength means greater moral responsi- bility. And those mothers who dress themselves and daughters in such suggestive and alluring attire as to draw the minds of young men to their personal attractions are opening the gates of prostitution to their daughters. Let us go a bit further in this investigation. Let us go to the grounds of any school where the toilets are kept separate. Go into those used exclusively by boys and you will find the walls covered with vile and filthy pictures and rhymes that cling to and cor- AGITATE, EDUCATE, ORGANIZE! 94 rode the mind. This condition does not exist in the toilets used exclusively by girls. So here, close to the cradle, ere the despoiling hand of Environment has laid hold of the children, we find sure evidence that God created woman with a strong morality for the drawing of men to clean living. Mothers, what a deep damnation will be yours if you neglect your talents! READ, THINK, ACT! Gaylord Bros. Maker* Syracuse. N. Y. MT. JAM. 21. BK YC 15278 UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA UBRARY