River Falls journal. [volume] (River Falls, Pierce County, Wis.) 1872-2019, 1902-01-16
Calasiao, Nov. q, 1901.
DEAR BROTHERS:

to the readers of the JOURNAL:
Calasiao, Nov. II, 1901.
DEAR BROTHER:
Have just finished good days work
and have latter deliberation) decided
that will write a letter before going
to bed. I find your letter of Oct. 9,
which came over week ago, among
my unanswered letters and will write
you. I thank you in advance for the
papers. am sure that shall appre-
ciate them very much. do not get
lonesome, however. Am busy during
the week, and Saturday and Sunday
there is always something going on.
My girls, mere, i. e., my teachers, are
would-be society girls and have several
of the masters and officers in the adj
Joining towns on the string, and they
usually ring me in when there is
trip to be made. This coming Sun
day | believe that we are to take
launch ride on the Gulf Of Lingayen.
Yes, my school work is now we'll
to dom fact our schools will not be
''up to scratch for many years. Yet
when we consider the difficulties, L
think we are doing we'll. / have every
reason to believe that our work is
recognized by those above as good as
| the best.
The trouble here is that no native
has any idea of doing things in any
but the old way. We have to be very
careful and keep the people with US.
Our success depends upon our being
popular, so before we can make a
change no matter how badly we see
the necessity of tive have to create
a sentiment for it,. We lind that the
old men and ladies who have been
teaching for years, while they seem to
desire and try to learn English, can
not do so. Neither can they get out
of the old ruts-old methods Of teach
ing. We are gradually getting rid of
them. We find that young men-al-
most boys-make the best teachers
because they are more plastic.
We teach the children from to 10
a. M; the teachers in the city from 10
to II a. M, and then have the noon
intermission. In the afternoon we
teach the pupils again from 2:3O to
4:30. This makes four hours day for
the youngsters and one hour for the
teachers. During the four hours L
teach in various rooms as see tit
usually do it system tically though.
Three afternoons in the week the
barriO teachers come in and i spend
the afternoon teaching them. We
also teach adults II hours three nights
in the week. We have center school
of over 500 pupils and II barrios which
are too distant for the pupils to come
to the center school, They each have
their own school and their own teach
er. II is my duty to superintend
these also. / manage to get to each
about once month and take right
hold Of the work giving them a good
COu UlOA 1COSOh'
l am now in position to give you
some statistics In 1896, according to
| Spanish census, Calasiao had 14,058
people; now it has 1920. Children
from to II years of age, 2,126; en-
rollment SO far, l., 1856, about as many
| girls as boys. Now our attendance
has fallen off to about Is pupils to
each teacher owing to the great
amount of work. We have two busy
seasons-rice planting and rice cut
ting season. This is the rice cutting
season. On every hand are to be seen
| groves Of cOcOanuts and beetle nuts,
orchards Of bananas, forests Of feath
| cry BAN boo and fields of waving rice.
The rice here is all plante by hand.
1t is first planted in beds When it
gets sufficiently large it is transplant
ed by hand. It is now PLAN ted in rows
about as near together as the rows Of
wheat when sowed with seeder. The
grain is also cut by hand. Men,
women, boys, girls and 5-year-olds all
work in one field-frequently fifty or
hundred in the same field. Each
laborer has knife about the size Of a
good-sized pocket knife. He takes a
straw, cuts it and places it with that
already cut. When he gets a good
| sized armful he ties it up. One labor
er cuts from 5 to 20 of these bundles
in day and gets one-fifth for his
work. These bundles are taken home,
dried, threshed and hulled by hand as
needed. 1t is necessary that 90 per
cent. Of the people (men, women and
children) work, or the crop cannot be
harvested at the proper time. Hence
the small attendance at school. The
Spaniards used to have vacation at
this time, but we wish to have ours in
April and May as that is said to be