The representative. [volume] (St. Paul, Minn.) 1893-1901, 1895-08-14
EDUCATING THE CHILDREN.

minneapolis, MIMI, aug. ON.
EDUCATING THE CHILDREN"
Editor Representative:
In the Aug. LIST issue Of Farm S. and
Home, Prof. ]. F. Downey, of the State
University, under the above head, criti-
cises the farmers for trying to reap any
| benefit from the labor of their children.
He seems to think it stigma on the
| farmers family, because the boys hold
the plow, or the girls wash the dishes,
and says: ga hindrance to the educa-
| tion of the farmers children, is found in
| the fact that the boys and girls, from
| mere children, can render much assist
| ance, and the farmers finding source of
profit in their children, are disposed, for
| the sake of the profit, to limit the at
| tendance of their children at school 20
the winter months, and after the age of
16, to keep them out altogether
| Now let us see how much truth there
| is in these assertions. In 1888, the aver
| age length of schools in the state was
| over six months and half. So then, if
| the farmers work their children nine
months in the year, and only send them
| to school during the winter months, why
did they pay teachers for teaching their
schools six months, when they had no
use for schools except for the three win
ter months? For the year 1888 there
was enrolled at the State Normal School
at Winona 291 students, of which $50
were the children of farmers; so we see
that more than half of all the students
attending this school were boys and
girls from the farm, that were not, as hei
asserts, kept out of school altogether
after they were Is years old, and the per-
centage of farmers children attending
this school will undoubtedly hold good at
every other institution of learning in the
state.
Again this wise University professor
comes at the farmers and their sons and
daughters in a strain of language that
will not have tendency to increase the
respect, of the numbers of our farm boys
and girls that are now, and ever have
been, the main patrons of the State Uni
versity and other institutions of learning
OF our state. He says, "The farmers,
| land he speaks of them as class allow
| their children to reach maturity with I'M
developed intellects, meager knowledge,
and an experience limited to small part
| of the county in which they are born.
| We condemn as cruel and wicked the
| Chinese for preventing the growth of the
| feet of their female children, but pre-
| venting growth of intelligence is equally
| barbarous."
Will S. M. Owen look upon the above
| as a deserved compliment paid his intel
ligent farmer friends? How will the
| farmers relish being likened to Chinese
| barbarian? Will the hundreds of young
| ladies and gentlemen, sons and daugh-
| ters of farmers who are attending the
| University feel at home when one of the
| faculty has told them that their parents
| had been the means of dwarfing their
| intellects, stinting their knowledge, de-
barring their intelligence, kept them
from school, worked them for profit nine
| months in the year, confined their expe-
rience to their birthplace, and thus met
ing out to them treatment that was
cruel, Wicked and barbarOus?
| Now I denounce the picture he has
drawn of farm children and their treat
ment by their parents as utterly errone-
| Gus. Take my own Immediate farm
neighborhood. in the town of Claremont,
Dodge county, Mimi, and how do we find
| the farmers have treated their children
as to school privileges? Of 20 children
of IA families, are graduates, and are
| students of Pillsblry Academy at Owa-
| tonna; 4 have been students at the Uni
| versity; have attended the preparatory
school of Carlton College at Mortified; 5
| have attended the Normal School at Wi
mona, and are students at high schools;
and of the whole number, Is have taught
school, and what is true of this neighbor-
hood, is true of thousands of other farm
neighborhoods throughout the state.
That the farmer turns out so many weak
| intellects, may account for the large
number Of statesmen and professional
men who got their intellects moulded on
the farm, and it doesn't seem to be such
a poor place for moulding intellects, as
the professor would have the world be-
lieve, for according to the statistics fur
Eished by our consular service, the far
mers of this country give their children
a better education than the rural popu-
lation of any country in the world
E. N. DODGE.