The news & observer. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1894-current, 1901-05-10
your best to live up to and fully discharge
that responsibility.


After the diplomas had been awarded
| and degrees conferred, President Me-
serve delivered his parting address to
| the graduates He said:
when young men and women leave an
institution of learning and enter the busy
world of affairs outside, they ought to
go forth with an iIts lligent understanding
of the questions that are engaging the
attention Of thoughtful men and women.
In our own goodly State, as well in many
others, the paramount question of the
day is the education of the masses. The
particular kind Of education that is
made prominent in the secular and to a
large extent in the religious and educa-
tional press as well as in conferences
and conventions of educators and philan-
thropists, is Industrial education. The
idea is abroad that Shaw is an institution
exclusively for the so-called higher edu-
cation; that industrial education receives
no attention. and that the very name is
lightly regarded. 1t may be unknown to
many in this audience that the A. e. NJ
College, before it had a separate exist
ence, was department of this institution
DR.. Atticus Haygood, Of Georgia, the pre-
decessor of DR.. j. L. NJ. Curry, the pres
ent able administrator of the Slater Fund
visited Shaw many years ago He was
delighted with the idustrial features Of
the work and made report to his board
that resulted in an annual appropriation.
DR.. Roberts, Prof. Bruce Rev. Caesar
Johnson and hundreds of others aided in
the construction of most of the buildings
on our campus and student labor has
very largely kept them in repair. AS
far as means would allow our industrial
work has been enlarged and we have
endeavored 20 keep up with the times,
and in some lines our work is unsurpass-
ed. At least this is the judgment of
intelligent outside parties, and cordially
invite all present when they leave this
chapel to step into Estey Hall and Judge
for themselves of our work by an exam
ination the industrial exhibit Shaw
has from the beginning provided indus
trial training as well as the higher edu-
cation. Her increased activity this year
industrially and her plans for the new
year are ample evidence that she will
keep abreast of the best educational
thought both industrial and literary.
''In industrial education as in all other
schemes and systems, there must be
avoided the rock of Scylla on the one
hand and the whirlpool of Charybdis on
the other. The rock of Scylla is the APP
prehension of many that the white man
in his advocacy of industrial education for
the colored youth is striving to put upon
the race a form of industrial slavery, for
it has been said that negro youth should
be taught to work and should be denied
the higher education. The whirlpool of
Charybdis is the claim of some prominent,
devoted and worthy members of the race
that the colored man has been at work
$50 years and does not need to be taught
to work. In fact he has had enough OF
it; indeed. too much. He must soar into
literature and art, unlock the storehouse
of science and strive for the honors of
craftsmanship and elevate his race to the
heights of fame. Now there is just enough
of truth and error in each OF these ex-
tremes to make the adoption Of sys-
tenn of instruction based on either OF
them dangerous. Confne a race because
of it's race to Industrial training and you
deaden the spark of hope and ambition
divinely implanted in the human breast.
scheme Of education that would destroy
aspiration and prevent the exercise of tall
ents endowed by the Creator himself
would be nothing short of the most cruel
sin. Cod does not intend that beings
created in his own image with hopes, as
pirations and abilities of a high order
shall be denied the opportunity to attain
to the best of which they are capable. Let
us dismiss this apprehension of industrial
slavery. for while / have met men in
North Carolina and Texas, in Maine and
Massachusetts, who favor it, yet the ma
iority of right thinking men everywhere
want negro youth to have a fair chance
to make the most of themselves.
LET us examine the claim of $50 years
of work. That was a period of enforced
labor. In these days of freedom there is
the choice of doing or not doing and too
frequently it is the latter. The streets
of our large towns and cities and the
railway stations at train time abound in
idlers devoid of both the desire to be
somebody and the skill to do something.
This class ought to be gathered up by the
power of the State, for they menace her
welfare and be made to do something
and to be somebody Industrial training
should be introduced into all grades Of
the pubic schools especially in the cities
and larger towns to the end that the next
generation may not have another crop
of nobodies and do nothings The race
has not vet been on the road of freedom
long enough for large numbers to attain
to the higher education, but there mus;
be the opportunity to attain TO the high
est and there is and always will be. The
large majority, however, must get thelr
living outside of the professions and their
educa ton must be of a character that
will make skilful artisans, thrifty farm
ers, intelligent citizens and owners Of
homes. 1t is the aim of Shaw to train
young men and women in her industrial
departments who shall go out as capable
teachers of mechanical industries.
IAN education that is purely industrial
is advocated by some on the ground that
| any other kind will educate young peo-
pie out of their sphere and make them
disconnected. The State has no right to
| say what shall be the sphere in which
| the son of Jack Smith or the son of the
| Honorable James White shall move, but
| it is her duty to see that the former shall
not because of his poverty and humble
origin, be deprived of the opportunity to