Charlevoix county herald., 1906-02-17

College, was secured as Director of the
School Of Horticulture. The buildings
were soon erected, and the School es.
tablished as the first public Handicraft
School Of Hartford. Besides givins
apprentice work, and a course I'm hor.
| t1culture and botany to the bovs from
the Watkinson Farm School, the fol.
lowing season a course in school Gar.
den1ng was established. This course
was opened to the boys and girls from
the city sc-ools.
The school garden work at the
School or Horticulture proved attrac-
tive and popular from the first, and
after one or two years of free work
tuition was charged for each person
who took a garden. This tuition need
not keep any one from having gar
den, as 100 hours of work for the
School pays any boys tuition.
The school garden work has been
systematized, until now there is a nvs
years course In school gardening for
boys and girls, as well as one to trais
public school teachers, and one coursu
for adults which is largely taken BY
clergymen Of the city.
One of the reasons which has mads
this work so popular is because of thu
fact that the school shows results
Every boy here, every person, for THAI
matter, who has garden gets a great
deal more in value from his garden
than the price Of the tuition.
The first year the boys begin thef
garden work the 1st Of May. They
come out Cor lesson one day a week
They come into the classroom, whers
each boy receives a notebook, marks
his own attendance, keeps a weather
report, and writes down from dicta-
ton, or copies from the blackboard, q
detailed lesson for that day. With
the seeds they are given, they then
pass with the instructor to the tool
room, where each boy receives hiS
TOOLS and with these he goes to hin
pre-. ent to explain the things which ha
learns in the classroom. In going h
his garden he passes by the observa-
tion plots, which are studied.
The second year the boys begin In
March, taking up the mixing of thu
soil, potting and repotting tie tomato
pepper, and egg plants that they have
in their gardens.
The third year they begin in Febru-
ary and take up root-grafting. cutting
pruning, spraying. digging and setting
trees, spading and caring for grounds
as we'll as the garden lessSss.
The fourth year boys begin fh<J Jan-
uary and take up the making Of hot
beds, management of hotbeds, prun-
ing, spraying, soil analysis, plant
foods, testing seeds, planting the gar.
den, besides the garden lessons, and
in the autumn they have budding
fruit culture, and asparagus culture.
The fifth year they take up system
attic study Of the soil, beginning IN
January. All gardens continue until
after the 1st Of October.
That the gardens pay Is best shown
| from record of the garden yields dur.
| Ing the past summer. A first year boy
got S9.66 worth, third year bog
$25.4, a fourth year boy $23.03, and
one Of the clergymen $17.21 worth Of
produce in the gardens.
The first year the gardens are u
30 It., the second year 10 40 e,
the third year 10 60 It., the fourth
year 10 80 It. The clergymen have
gardens 10 40 It. Public school
teachers have gardens 10 80 and 10
| x 40 TT the plan is to give them a
practical training in the method or
training school children in the WORK.
Already several schools Of Hartfof0
have established gardens in connee.
ton with the schools, and the Schosa
! Of Horticulture is furnishing instrue.
tors OF late; those that are giving In
| struction were trained at the School
| or Horticulture. But there is another
| thing that the school does. It keeps
the children occupied during the sum-
mer months, keeping the boys and
girls Off the city streets; because they
| come to love their gardens and como
| out to work In them, and to work out
their tuition. This is not all, as soon
as the planting is done in the gar
dens the children take up the system
attic study Of weeds. they become ia
miliar with them and learn methods
Of destroying them. Also at the School
there are about 500 observation plots
containing many Of our common
things, and the children learn to know
them In all stages Of development
People are beginning to realize that
a boy from the School Of Horticulture
Is better to work In their garden than
the average man they can get, be-
cause the boys will not pull up ex.
pensive seedlings as the men so often
do Frequent calls are made upon Mr..
Her1enway for boy to take care Of
a garden or lawn, and many Of tho
boys are able to spend most of their
spare time during the summer In this
line OF work.