The daily Gate City. [volume] (Keokuk, Iowa) 1855-1916, 1866-07-22
rur r1mE ron ACTION.

Our citizens generally seem to spprehend
the importance of home institutions and OF
local facilities for trade and manufacture,
and of permanent improvements in the way
Of roads, bridges, and water power for the
development of cur resources. IN every
hand ii is admitted that these things are nee
essary to render our superior local advanta'
ees available, and to secure the application
Of capital and labor to promote the prosperi
ty Of the city by home production. But for
n long time past the embarrassments Of the
6,y and of many of our citizens prevented
apv practical action in that direction, and the
public have sunk into chronic condition OF
thinking and talking good deal about such
matters without any practical results.
1t strikes rs that the time has at last come
for action. The prospects for the settlement
of the city debt are favorable; and that in
cubus, which has well nigh crushed the life
out of our city, and clogged the enterprise of
our citizens, will soon be removed. The
general improvement Of the country, the ex-
tension Of our railroads and their connec-
tons, and the increasing tide Of emigration
Westward, all have favorable bearing upon
the prospects of the city, and are tending to
increase its population, business and pros
perity.
Now is the time, then, for our people to
rouse up and consult together about our Local
interests, and to engage with a will in such
feasible enterprises for the public good as
may present themselves and obtain genera
favor in consequence of their importance,
And of the many things required to be don,
there is none more important, in many ways
TO the welfare of our city than the establish
ment of q Female Seminary. Those WHIT
have daughters to send to school will no
question this on their own behalf, nor vii
any volunteer to contest the proposition 70
them. The actual cost per annum of sendin
girl off to boarding school is said to b
near thousand dollars. The expense, there
fore, is very serious matter to any of gu
citizens who have two or three daughters t,
educate. But to such parties the expense i
not the most serious disadvantage, in man,
cases, attending the sending of daughter
away from home to obtain their education
Our citizens are interested in this matter t,
the extent Of the amount expended else
where in the education Of the daughters O
Keokuk, for it is so.much money sent abroad
to be expended for the benefit of other local
tiles. But our city would not only save tina
amount of money, great or small, but goot
Female Seminary would attract pupils from
other localities, and would be the means 0
inducing respectable families with daughter
to educate to settle in our CITY,
Aside from these pecuniary considerations
it is clear that with our present restitution o
the facilities for female education, a yer,
large proportion of the girls Of Keokuk will
from lack Of means, be deprived of the in
estimable benefits of an education, and socie
ty must, in the long run, suffer great dete
rioraton in the standard of intelligence anc
refinement as result Of the present negli
gence of our citizens to provide the necessar.
facilities for education
There are scores of Keokuk girls abroad
attending school now, and there are hundred
more that ought 10 be in school without de
lay. A Seminary Of popular character
with competent and efficient managers an
teachers, would command hundred pupil
in thirty days, and double the number in
year. But there is no Seminary building
and persons engaged in these education,
enterprises are not accustomed to build the
own Institutions, and have not usually til
means or the business habits to qualify the
TO do SO. Wherever Seminaries of any gel
eral reputation have grown up, they os
their inauguration to public and associate
enterprise, and if our citizens expect to ha,
Seminary during the present generatio
they will have to build it, and the til,
take the matter in hand the better for {
parties concerned. J.B. II.