Vermont watchman and State journal. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1836-1883, 1880-03-10
Does Education Educatei

Does Education Educatef
1t is a somewhat significant fact, the rea-
son for which we will not stop here to dis
cuss, that many Of the suggestions to make
the schools the dispensers of such knowl-
edge as pupils will be called upon to exer-
else daily in fighting the battle of bread
and butter come from sources which are
not professedly educational in character, or
rather which lay no claim to the title of
specialists in common school matters. Thus
the Popular Science Monthly for February
pertnenty asks: "What shall we say of a
system of education which throws its stu
dents into society unable to protect them
selves from the grossest impostures To
what end is a community filled with col
leges, high-schools, and common schools
upon which millions of dollars are spent,
when its graduates go out to become the
ready prey Of charlatans and sharpers, who
can enrich themselves by pushing the most
absurd aud preposterous projects? We are
led to these reflections by the last curious
report of lightning.rod swindes. The proud
state that gives us our president and chief
Justice, and makes great ado about its
education, has also the honor of originating
and harboring Chambers National Light.
ming Protection Company of Cincinnati.
The Americans are a progressive people,
great on improvements, aud the westerners
are specially wide-awake in this respect.
So the new lightning-ro is great step for
ward in inventive science. 1t is laid fat
upon the ridge of the building, and turned
up at the two ends, and has no connection
with the ground. Its rationale seems to be
that the lightning-discharge is caught upon
one of the points, and, there being no rod
to convey it to the earth, it is obliged to
diffuse back into the air where it belongs
and whence it came OF course, such an
arrangement is worthless for protection, and
is, moreover, absolutely dangerous, as every
intelligent schoolboy ought to know; and
yet such is the grossness of public stupidity
that the company drove a thriving business
with their contrivance, mounting it upon a
great number of private dwellings, and even
upon school-buildings. Professor Macomber,
of the Agricultural College at Ames, Iowa,
seeing the extent to which people were hum
bugged by this so-called Protector" pub
licly denounced it as fraud, whereupon he
was prosecuted by the company, which laid
its damages at S50,000."
As the thing was getting serious, the pro-
fessor concluded to make thorough work
with the exposure, and accordingly appealed
to large number of scientific men OF the
highest reputation to give their opinion of
the "Chambers rod" He has published
the replies of Morton, Anthony, Rood,
Mayer, Clarke, Baird, Newcomb, Todd,
lie Conte, Silliman, Kedzie, Davies, Edison,
Trowbridge, Rowland, Young, Hinricks,
Harvey, Pickering, Loomis and Tyndall,
who all agree that it is worthless humbug
Of no protection, and an actual danger To
any house upon which it is placed. Yet the
company will probably suffer but little in
terruption in its business, as its main stock
in trade is public ignorance and credulity.
The lightning-rod fiend may be expected to
ply his profitable vocation until the common
schools do better work than they have hith-
erto What can better occupy the teachers
| time than the imparting of such informa
ton as should make it impossible for sharp
ers to perpetrate these wholesale frauds
upon community composed of people who
ever attended the public school and how
vastly superior is such knowledge compared
with acquisition of those microscopical nice
ties of grammar and mathematics, which
scholars spend years in acquiring, but which
are never heard of outside the school-room
and have an existence only under the mag
nifying glass of the critic Yet one of oul
exchanges calls the above &" q general broad
| side against the uselessness of common
schools" and adds: "Now, a more scientific
way of going at that particular thing woult
be to consider the fact that Iowa is a new
state, filling up with people of all sorts
some, of course, desperately ignorant, and
too old, even, to learn to read the Popuiai
Science Monthly, than to ask how many O.
the lightning-rod dupes ever went to an,
school; if to any, how long and so on"
These remarks might carry some weigh
if confidence men garnered their abun
dant harvests in new states alone, bu
nearly every community, not only in tn
newest territories but also in the oldes
commonwealths, has skeleton in its close
Of one who listened too long to the plausible
theories of these oily-tongued seducers
People who permit themselves to be gulle'
by this class can well learn a lesson iron
the action of boy mentioned in the follow
ing al. E. French, a messenger boy from
commercial house in New York, outwittet
two scamps few days ago. French wa
counting roll Of bills, when one of tn
men, tapping him on the shoulder, said
Young man, you've dropped some of you
money Recollecting stories of similar al
tempts to dupe victims, French seized tn
pile of bills Ia his hands before he looke'
up. He saw bank-note on the door, an
quietly putting his foot on it, continues
counting the money. Then he picked u
the bill, and was walking out, when one O
the men, who saw that he had been beate
at his own game, said; Pardon me; | wa
mistaken. That bill was dropped by me
The other stranger added Yes, that make
out the exact amount Il guess I'll keep
to remember you by was the boys answe