Martinsburg herald. [volume] (Martinsburg, W. Va.) 1881-1920, 1902-12-13

AAANA - tR 49, @RERNR
and conditions of modern High School
education. We canont teach Chemistry
at all as it aught to be taught. for we
have no laboratory and without a lab
oratory chemistry is only literature
and Of little practical value. We can
not teach Physics rs 1t ought to be
Taught, for even if the Board should
purchase apparatus for the purpose,
there is no place to keep q bit of it.
Apparatus is needed to illustrate the
principles and laws of the subject.
Botany cannot have the necessary IL
Illustrative material because there is no
place to keep it and geology which is
80 amply illustrated all through and
around Martinsburg, cannot have its
specimens in the form Of a cabinet be-
cause the only place to keep it is in the
cellar or in the garnet Ii we wanted
to teach the industries. manufactures.
commerce, and resources of our own
state and county. and gather a small
collection Of specimens to illustrate
them we could not do it. for we have
no place to put them. l have seen
such a collection in the Parkersburg
High School. whose enrolment is not
much larger than ours. We cannot
have a good business course in which
modern methods OF bookkeeping can
be taught as they should be, and the
principles of exchange and banking,
commercial law, commercial geography,
and the history of commerce explain
ed and illustrated, because we have not
the room and facilities. How many
more bows and girls could be kept in
school and led into much 0 produc-
tive lives than now. il some type-writ-
ers and tools for manual training were
available. We cannon use even the IL
brary we have because six years ago it
was transferred TO the city library be-
cause there was no room for it at the
High School building. We have no as
sembly room in the building in which
all the pupils of the school can be gath
cred together for public entertain
ments, debates, literary exercises. lee
lures. in which not only the pupils
have an interest bit their parents and
friends as well.
But someone will say we cannot af-
ford to have all these things, they
will cost too much money. 1t is true
we cannot get them all at once. but if
we have an adequate building they
will all come in time. Ii is folly. a
waste of funds and energy, TO patch
and build for just the present. We
must build for the future and the fu-
ture DEVELOPMENT, for it is coming just
as surlv as we are a living community.
We put large sums of money into fac
tories. into stores, into government
buildings. into farms. into churches,
in the hone and expectation of future
returns. Why not into school build
ings, especially when they are used five
times as mpch as the churches. We
point with pride to our beautiful
churches. Ought we not point with
equal pride to our beautiful school
buildings.
But the annual cost will not be so
great as many people may think. For
the past eleven years the Board of Ed
ucation has paid in bonds and inter
est a total of SlS. HAT or ar annual
average of $3.50 over and above the
running e expenses of the schools and
the interest paid has ranged from 8
per cent to 4 per cent. Now if the
present debt. which is drawing 5, 8,
and 4 per cent. be put into bonds,
which can be easily fioated at 4 per
cent, the whole $50. 900 will draw an
interest of only $1400, so that the in
terest could be met and an annual
sinking fund of $1,000 provided for
with an annual taxation very little,
if any in excess of what has been for
the past ten years and that too on
the su pposition that there will be no
increase in property or property valu-
atoms in the future, things which
probably no business man Who takes
any pride in Martinsburg would dare
to assert with any hope Of maintaining.
Another phase of the matter is to be
noted. If the site had in mind, that
of the Third Ward School ward, be ia
ken, no land will have to be purchased,
If the present High School build
ing be taken to provide for the pm
pills of the Third Ward, there would
have to be an addition to it of at least
two rooms. for there are six rooms al
ready filed in the Third Ward and
but four rooms in the present High
School building. But if only two
rooms are added that would barely
provide for present. conditions and not
for the future growth of the city south
and south west so that an addition
of not less than four rooms ought to
be thought of.