The Abilene reflector. [volume] (Abilene, Kan.) 1883-1888, 1886-02-11
"PROF." SMITHS SCHOOL.
Forcing Young Ideas in the South
~. west Many Years Ago.

Thirty years ago education in tn,
Southwest was lucky accident. An!
man who happened to know more thai
his neighbors became teacher. There
was no system of schools, the only
common belief being i'll the birch roo
as a quickener of the intellect
Throughout this section of country
were a number of families from the
Older Southern States, and chiefly from
Virginia. These families were usually
of good lineage, and drawn to the new
er country through land grants for mil
itary and other services. With them
they brought the habits and opinions Of
the mother State. These included,
above everything else, devotion to some
particular religious sect and respect fol
letters. The sons of the families were
usually sent to college, and were con-
sidered oracles of learning when they
returned.
Such teacher, belonging to one OF
these old Virginia families, was Will
lam Smith. His grandfather had
moved with his numerous family at an
early day into the famous blue grass
region of Central Kentucky, in conse-
ouence'Of grant of six thousand acres
from the mother State on account of
military services. Owing to the imper-
feet surveys of that day and the result
ing litigations, he threw up the grant
in disgust and retired to a neighboring
State.
When William Smith was boy, the
center of all accessible learning in that
country was the Miami University, at
Oxford, o., and to it the youth was
sent. Such an event in those days is to
be compared with that of modern ex-
plorer to unknown lands. The family
seamstress who got up his wardrobe,
was much in demand in social circles,
owing to her acquaintance with its de-
tails and her opportunities for compre-
hending the family'S state of mind in
view of the great event.
When William Smith returned from
college no youth was thought to have
ever carried away so large burden of
learning. All disputed questions-such
as the spelling of a word, puzzliug
problems among the bricklayers, and
bitches in the exchange of butter and
eggs for calicO-were brought before
him. Parents were fired by his sue
cesses with ambition for their own
sons; and William Smith. instead of
becoming the teacher in ordinary as
the other college men had been, opened
a school for boys preparing for college.
Into this it was the hope of every
father and mother to get their boy.
The school house was large brick
building, painted white, with a portico
and those imposing columns that were
part of the dignified architecture of
that country, and was called the col
lege. In keeping, William Smith was
styled professor. Years after, when
the school was only memory, middle
aged men would occasionally drift
around to William Smiths home, then
in different State, and to the astonish-
ment of his family, who knew him only
rs an active business man, call him pro-
fessOr-a title that sent his grandchil-
dren gigging behind the tables and
chairs.
At that time, however, as if to make
amends for the restraint of the title,
the boys out of school spoke familiarly
of him rs Bill Smith. A real college
professor has since told me that his life
was made miserable at one time. when
an installment of William Smiths boys
was sent to his college, by being con-
tinually told ''that wasn't what Bill
Smith said;' Bill Smith didn't do it in
that way"
= William Smith himself used to tell
with glee how little Drake Beasley,
whose father begged to have him sit in
the school room and gather what
crumbs of learning he could, since he
was too young to be admitted, too pre-
cOciOus for other schools. and too bad
to keep at home, used to twitch him by
the elbow in. the midst of a lesson:
''Say, Bill Smith, lend me a chaw of
tobacco"
The familiarity was all the more
marked since little Drake might have
borrowed tobacco from any of the boys,
for wooden boxes filled with sawdust
were as much a part of the school fur
niture as the desks.
knew William Smith as an elderly
man, although for some time familiar
with the reputation of this school,
which is one of the traditions of the
country he had long before left. Since
he has retired from active business, as
all men whom circumstances have
turned aside from chosen pursuits, his
mind delights to dwell on those early
days. This pleasure particularly keen
after he has been invited to some clos
ing exercises or public school examina-
Sions. 1t is announced by series of
t'ahemsI' an uneasiness in his chair,
an anxiety about getting his trousers
properly adjusted over his shoe tops.
all of which the children would call
getting a good ready" His friends
understand these signs, and usually
some one considerably says:
mir. Smith, the high school exercises
were very fine, now, weren't they? The
essays were creditable and the declama-
tions Just grand Well, well, children
nowadays are greatly blest. We didn't
have such schools in our day, eh?"
This is enough. William Smith gives
his person final adjustment. ''Well,
if You call it a school where one-hslf of
the time is spent in getting the chill
siren toes on a crack, and the other
half i'm keeping them there, all I've got
to say is we didn't have any such
schools in our day. Why, happened
60 go in the public schools the other
day, and the teacher, a young thing in
frills and buckles, was trying to get the