The Emporia news. [volume] (Emporia, Kan.) 1859-1881, 1873-08-29
A FEW THOUGHTS ABOUT SCHOOL
BOOK AGENTS.

BOOK AGENTS.
Last spring some of our partial
friends took it into their heads to put
us on the city school board. We never
before knew the depths of SORROW to
which human being could be plunged
by the innocent action of unsuspeet-
ing friends. We supposed the place
one of good deal of responsibility,
but of light duties and no pay. BuE
the thought OF being compelled to give
up the greater portion or our valuable
time to the deep-toned eloquence and
seductive language of the school book
agent had never penetrated our mind.
The public knows but little of the
school book agent. He preys almost
entirely upon school boards. Tie gen.
eral public knows the life insurance
agent, but we can tell them confiden-
TALLY that they have tasted but lightly
of the ills OF life il they have not been
on school boards. The cheek of the
life Insurance agent that escaped the
frost of the hardest storms in Mime
sofa last winter, while all the balance
OF his face was frozen black, is soft
compared with that of the average
school book agent. The life insur-
ance agent that followed the fellow to
the top of mount Popocatapetl to
solicit him to take out policy was not |
circumstance to school book agent |
in energy, determination and impu- |
dence. They tramp, tramp through |
the streets In the hot sun with bundle |
Of books under theirarms, wrapped upin |
an old newspaper, as dusty and brown |
as the traveller OF the desert. Any of |
them we have seen would willingly |
walk two hundred miles rather than |
not see a member of the school board.
II you are not in your office they can
call again as well as not, and can keep /
on calling, always lookidg childlike
and bland, until you do come in. They
are gentlemen of leisure, and it is their
business to see unfortunate fellows
who are on the school board. Gener-
ally it is the delight of a member of
by one OF these agents, and with whom
he has had to wrcstle for several hours,
to see all the other members go through
the same process. Your fellow officers
will even 90 so far as to maliciously
tell the agent of your exact where
abouts. But occasionally a fellow
members sympathies are aroused, and
he gives YOU warning. We have been
warned in one or two instances, when
other members of the board wanted
good, flrst-class puff. There was
one In town this week and we got
word of it. For two-thirds of day
We tried to dodge him. We hoped he
might have a sunstroke as he ploded
his weary way through the broiling
sun in the hunt for the different mem
bers of the board of education. But
it may be mentioned as a singular cir
cumstance that nobody ever heard of a
school book agent having q sunstroke
or being struck by lightning. They
are safer from the later calamity than
feather bed or Texas COW. Rather
late in the afternoon we came into the
Office in answer to the never-ceasing,
all-pervading cry of "copy." Just as
we got to work on our Rrst local
item in came the school book agent.
Imagine fiend on one side describing
in detail SIX or seven school books,
page by page, and three or four copy
demons on the other hand swearing
because they had to stop work. If we
could have given vent 20 our feelings
We would have drowned the roaring
pillows of Soden's mill dam and the
Gathering of McDonald's furniture
factory. If VIC had dared We would
have thrown that innocent book agent
over the balcony railing in two sec
Onds.
In the short space of five months we
have made the acquaintance OF at least
three hundred of these book agents.
They all live in Leavenworth, and
that city, according to their seductive
stories, is now happily and successfully
using in her public schools at least two
hundred series of these excellent
school books. We should like to know
just what condition the society of
Leavenworth is in now. Can it be
true that she harbors q IL these school
book agents? Leavenvorth has had a
United States Senator, and now, in the
name of all that is good, what has she
done that she must have all these school
book agents? Poor I.eavenworth!
A few weeks ago some of our teach
ers made q general attack upon the
series of books now in use in our city
schools, and the board decided to make
some changes. Little did they dream
what was in store for them. Nobody
knew this but the members of the
board, and yet it was not two days till
the cars from Leavenworth began to
unload school book agents at our depot,
and the stream has been constant /
since. Two conclusions are arrived at /
after all the talks we have had with |
these agents, that not q series of all /
the school books now published Is |
worth the powder that would blow /
them as high as n one-story meeting |
house, except the last one. The last |
book agent we talked with convinced |
US that his books possessed all the vir- |
tues that such works ought to haYe;
yea, more. Now we are waiting tor |
the next agent. We know he will not |
be backward. He viii be here to-mor-
row morning just so sure as the sun
rises. The other fact of which We are
convinced is that school books cost
nothing. We are utterly amazed at the
mere trifle of cost, at the self-sacsific-
ing liberality of the publishers, who
support these agents out of their own
pockets for the benefit of the juvenile
world, and the special delight of school
boards. We are also utterly bewilder-
ed and bambooZled about this whole
school book business. We are subdued
and the school book agent can lead us
where he pleases.
by the way, we wish to remark
that the criticism upon a certain series
of school books, by some of our lady
teachers, before the board of education
few days ago, was sharp, sensible and
to the point. 1t would have done our
soul good to have had the agent present
, to listen to it. 1t would have given
him something to think about outside
of the usual ''set speech" parading the
/ virtues of the series. After listening
: to them he would have been a wiser