The Emporia weekly news. [volume] (Emporia, Kan.) 1881-1889, 1885-06-04
TIE KRONG Idea.

THE WRONG IDEA.
The Kansas City Journal of yesterday
has cold-blooded article upon "The
Commencement season." the quotation
marks being from the Journals font of
nonpsreil head letter. Exhibitions
and commandments are frauds" says
the hard hearted wretch, who must have
written the leader with a pencil made
of Peruvian bark. We did not be-
lIeve this of the Journal and
really thought that its writers must now
be in peculiarly happy frame of mind
since their triumph in the long drawn
out unpleasantness in regard to the
knight who champIoned the bluffs and
dales of the cIty's streets and alleys.
But no, there Is some bad
taste still in the mouth. The depths
were stirred up and the blood is yet q
little riley" 1t is very pitiful to think
that commandments are frauds IN Mis-
souri,. There are so many things over
in that state that lack the genuine SAVIOR
that it really seems too bad that the line
could not have been drawn beyond COM
mencements. We always allowed e
good deal of margin upon the papers
booming reports of the greatest city on
earth" which Is getting on very well, too,
but we took great deal of stock IN what
that journal said ON spiritual matters
a Ia Mott. and for the school exhibitions
and commencement exercises so nicely
and handsomely reported at times In the
local columns-why, those, we thought,
were gospel truth. We had hopes for
poor old Missouri and thought her flu
ture was assured IN this rising genera
ton, which was coming to the front so
beautifully amid flowers and music and
learned dissertations that actually were
brighter than many of the papers own
PHILOSOPHERS (or the flowers would GER
tainly have withered in the donors
hands, Alas we were deceived "they
are frauds" Indeed it is poor old
Missouri. Fraudulent commandments
Children growing up in the ignorance of
their ancestors! We are awfuIly sorry for
Kansas City. We hoped that along with
their temporal progress and commercial
prosperity, their educational affairs were
keeping apace. Now, Mr.. Clam or Mr.
Iceberg, you ought to come over to Kan
sas and brace up little. We have no
such state of affairs over here. Kansas
commandments are not frauds. "Here
are flowers, diplomas, music and a gen
eral gala day is made of the last day of
the school term" and that is what we
Kansans like. Why do you "kick"
against flowers and spirited music and
gala day on commencement? Do you
want it to be like funeral, solemn
and grand? Do you want
the ''sweet girl graduate" to
dress IN black and the class ribbon to
be Grape? We do not. The jOllier and
pleasanter commencement is the better.
The serious part of life will come fast
enough, and it will not help along the
student on lIfe's journey to play dirges
on commencement, nor to have the worst
pupils In the school deliver the Orations
and read the essays. The paper
| W VIC AC4Nl IAob
children now know little about affairs
of the world and learn more about
abstract matters and foreign countries.
If this is so of Missouri children, as the
paper says, we again say poverty strick-
en- state. Kansas school children are
well versed IN the geography and hap
penings of their own cities and counties
and their own state and country. They
are especially we'll up in the topics of
the time. Kansas pupils read
the papers and their teachers
question and drill them on every day
affairs and happenings. An Emporia
teacher said the other day to the writer
that she was really surprised to see how
much her pupils knew of what was 60
ing on over the country. She said she
often overheard her school children, OUT
of school hours, discussing current
topics and giving REMARKABLY
intelligent ideas and opinions
upon them. The Kansas pupil
knows all about the resources Of
his county, state and the United States
He and she, for the girls are right along
with the boys, have the political situa-
ton, oftentimes, "down finer" than many
a Missouri editor who sits on tripod
and writes about what he does not know
of affairs. These same pupils know not
only who Gladstone is, but are acquaint
ed with his conservative views, and they
know also about Woolsey and Gordon
and foreign matters with a home signifi
| canoe. At commencement they are ablt
to present original ideas on the "CongC
conference" or present suitable themes
at the exhibitions on the "Grasshoppe
Scare" or the Condition of the Crops,
, and we doubt not that many a brigh
pupil over IN Wysndotte, away from tn
, shrinking pavements, could write an in
, terestIng sketch upon the Darkness G
, Night" and spell the night with littl
IN" or big"K." We sincerely hope ths
the Journal man who is down on aoW
, ers for students, says commencement
e are frauds, that pupils of these time
| know nothing of those things they ougt
} to know will shake off the Missouri
Q clay from his feet, was
the dust out of his eye
? and come down in a few days to hig
5 school commencement at EmporIas
D the Normal commencement, or take
| run over to Lawrence where the EN-
z nent Secretary Bayard will spend thre
1 days, and enjoy the commencement SCI
# son at that Athens of Kansas. He ca
), GO into almost any Kansas town durin
e the next week OF so, and we think
n will he sorry he made the statement tn
IS | commandments are frauds" and Il
IS ill-timed and erroneous remarks. abol
students and their studies.
g We do not wish the Journal man ar
st bodily harm, because he is evidently
ir little off on account of too muC
p knight, but if he should happen
make himself known within a few da
3 in the presence of Webb Wilder, Mob
lie Prentis or Henry King he is liable
i think there Is dynamite in the schOo
r. or at least think that the champions
70 the schools carry it about in their poke
for use in just such emergencies as th
one.
i Exchange; Painstaking people. VI
O know next to nothing about prIntin
find special delight IN searching o
NJ topographic errors in newspape
"A periodicals. and books, the detection
10 a blunder, in their own estimation, pl
tn ting a premium on individual intel
"a gence-conferring a privilege of di
= paragipg printers. Men of intelIjpen