The Oskaloosa herald., 1893-06-08
MANUAL TRAINING


are some suggestive queries.
MANUAL TRAINING.
Wherein has the public school failed
wherein can it be made stronger and
more beneficial to those for whom II
was created? In the years that have
given close observation to the thought
that makes this portion of my topic,
have found this conclusion forced upon
me: that the public system fails to-day
in this fact, that there is no unificatiOn
of the work that will at the same time,
give education and training to head,
hand and heart! In other words, that
the need of the day and hOur-and of
the nation-is an education, that will
carry industry and healthful thrift
along with that knowledge that is culled
from books and classroom In how
many cases that could present them
selves to your quickened observation
would this combination of books for
the head and heart, and labor for the
hand, under proper program, have kept
boy or girl in schOol-that were dis
heartened and discouraged from natural
causes as to book study, but who did
have an aptitude for something practi-
cal in labor line-and so kept in the
path of progressive development and
out of the ranks of the street loafer
and slouchy gossiper-in the paths of
goOdly youth to come into manhood
and womanhOod free from that pesti-
lential rot of being either ashamed to,
or of, labor at once honest and useful.
1t cannot be successfully denied that
along within the lines of general edu-
cation has grown up distaste and dis
respect for labor that soils the hand or
smuts the face. With knowledge has
come great desire to move away from
the taxing toll of trades into lines
promising something easier-yet never
so found where success has been
wrought. All that which has been
done successfully has only been wrought
out by labor that left its trade mark in
some form. The worthy things of this
life are never easily accomplished, for
they all call for sacrifice and personal
devotion. 1t is impossible for all to-
find lodgment in the learned professions
now crowded and over crowded by
callOw and untitled heads, whose fail
ures make CHASTITY the path of human
life. Well applied courses of manual
training-that mixture of half book
and half work, has for its fruitage and
from educational lines the
fatal tendency to dudedom and seeking
to reap where some one else has sOwn.
Not long since was
STANDING AT PRISON DOORS
outside of them-snd there met many
bright, young men, bearing the convicts
garb. One by one questioned them
as to school days-hOw they had gotten
along,-What the failures were with
them in book studies whether they had
had any natural aptitude for any Voca-
ton as boys-all inquiry being in the
direction of the manual training idea.
In nearly every case it was found that
as boys, they could have been held to
lines of safety and labor, had there
been an escape for them from some of
the book tasks that to them were the
unsurmOuntableA Alps. There being no
relief, they played truant to their tasks
and their school days and work knew
them no more. Idleness breeds vicious
intent as the swamps breed malaria.
And / am here to say to night that a |
well considered course Of manual train |
ing with its change Of trend of thought,
with the rythm and music of imple. !
ments and machine, two-thirds of these
young men so ohampered In study would
have been saved from downfall and
given TO the world its best heritage
the honest and industrious man. It is
pleasant to know that elsewhere this
system has proven, and is daily prov
ng to be one OF the most certain means |
of projecting out into our life the
worthiest of the race, men and women
who are not afraid of labor, but honor
ng its dignity with most useful and
profitable lives, and ] am here also to
Iay, that this system so needed to COM
,liment the book branch of education,
lis coming, Is q coming, hail mighty |
Iayp
It may call for money-and it will
md the great Samuel, the people, win
lear the call and it need not be thunder
d out three tImesl All, my friends. Il
s infinitely cheaper to pay for these
hings than for prisons and guards
making no reckoning Of the sobs and
leart breaks OF those who are left be-
lind, when the prison doors go clang-
ng into their stony rests. Nor making
u account OF those whose lives are
aiIures to 8 less degree OF human
Not long since Phil Armour, of Chi
ago, in great and grand generosity, en-
lowed 3 noble school Of this character,
nd IN 9 recent letter be says: ssay TO
Il that the best Investment ever made
gas not IN pigs Or wheat, or lumber,
las ID the efforts 70 save tbs lives and
oals Of boys and girls through such In
|astfsal agencies IS these. As