The news & observer. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1894-current, 1904-07-17

stitute, the Baptist University, Raj.
leigh Male Academy. Deaf and Dumb
Institute, the Methodist Orphanage
Kings Business COLLEGE. while scat
tered over the city there are graded
and other schools, filed to overflow
ing with scholars whose advantages
for acquiring an education are supej
rior to any, the boys and girls of &,
century ago ever dreamed of.
Sixteen miles north OF y the city
Wake Forest looms up like a noun
tain, whose peaks are seen at a great
distance. and so great has it grown
that all North Carolina feels the in,
1uence flowing from it. West of Tia
city, only eight miles distant, Cary
High School is more than equal to
what Wake Forest was fifty years ago
while at Apex, Holly Springs, Morris
vile, Wakefield, and in fact, in everH
school district, the children-all the
children-are brought in touch with
the best teachers and the best meth
DDS our county and State can furnish
or experience devise. In my young
days sixty days school was the av-
erage. By the time a teacher became
acquainted with his Scholars the
money gave out and, of course, the
school came to a sudden halt. TeachJ
ers received about SIS per MONTH anN
sisted of thirty days and the days exJ
tended from an hour after sunrise to
an hour before SunSet--So, an average
school day was eight hours, and two
hundred and forty hours made q
months work, for which the teacher
received fifteen dollars-equal to six
cents and Il quarter an hour, or fifty
cents aday.
TO earn that fifty cents he had tn
l., A ID 80 nC+ 1iTF
dred times a day. hear a dozen or
more alb abs, as many b-a ba's; nearl
ly as many b-a ba, k-e-r-ker bakers,
set all the copies make all the goose
quill pens, work all the sums hear
the big boys and girls parse, whip
boy every half hour and keep an eye,
the meantime, on the fellow on the
Ounce block; besides having to give
an account, almost daily, to some
irate father who came to see about
his boy, who got whipping the day
before. A fellow earned his fifty
cents by the time he went through
that program, and felt very thankful
when the hour came to close school
in the evening.
How different the work and pay
now from what they were then! Now
the uniformity of books divides q
school into grades, thereby reducing
the number of recitations, while the
pencil, pad and blackboard do away
with many little VeXations the old
time teacher had to contend with.
And instead of fifty cents a day, the
teacher is the happy recipient Of
about two dollars, if he gets forty dol
lars per month, for his month is
twenty days instead of thirty, as when
/ began to teach!
Yes, Old Rip Van Wrinkle is wide
awake now, and since the women
the good looking women-have cap,
tured the school houses. he doubtless
wishes he had not slept away his best
days and lost all his chances.
I congratulate Wake county upon
her good schools with their capable
and efficient teachers, upon her faith
full. Jealous and competent Superin"
tendent of Public instruction, and
upon the fact that her capital city il
the leading educational center in the
State, if not in the South.
And l congratulate myself, most OF
all that i have lived to see the day
when the man of money is but a ma
bob while the educated men and wo-
men are the princes and the prin-
cesses of the land.
r. II. WHITAKER. y