Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1907-04-04
NEGLECTED PEOPLE
Why Cubans Are So Ready for
Insurrection.
IGNORED BY EMPLOYERS
No Better Off Than Under Spanish
Rule.
NEED OF COMMON SCHOOLS
Educational Work Among the I'M
portant Undertakings of Protest
ant Church on the Island.
NEED OF COMMON SCHOOLS
BY WILLIAM f. CURTIS.

an loiHS VI WoISiHp tACtpt VI TIC
Roman Catholic Church were forbidden in
Cuba. Neither Protestant, nor Jewish, nor
any other faith was tolerated. No mar
! riages were legitimate except where the
ceremony was performed by a Roman
Catholic priest; none but Catholics could
be buried in the cemetery until the de-
struction of the Maine, when all the bodies
that were recovered were laid in consecrat-
ed ground. The importation of Bibles was
prohibited by booksellers and by the pub
lie, and the British government was re-
fused permission to build a chapel for the
Church OF England in connection with the
consulate. Private worship was held con-
tlnuousl9 i'll Havana, however, and the
Episcopal service was read every Sabbath
morning at a room i'll the San Carlos Hotel,
or some similar place, which was construed
as private worship. and Therefore was
not Al violation of Inc law. The same pro-
hibltioA prevailed throughout the island,
and no PROTESTANT churcneS existed at the
time of the American intervention in 1898.
Today. however. ten Protestant denomi-
nations save l4J regularly established
churches anu cighty-eignt mission stations,
with Inty -C,sLt buildings costing S1tS.4
in charge or nnety-siX pastors and sixty
seven helpers. There 139 Sunday
SCHOOLS, Tlth iG0 officers and teachers and
60 sy1olarS nearly all Cuban children.
In-.e ere forty-four young peoples Pro-
testant societies, with 1,32J active members
ana IS honorary or associate members
There are twenty-five parsonages valued at
> .,.,J belonging TO the various Protestant
examinations.
lie Professionals also have twenty -one day
anu Eoardlng schools, with ninety-fve
teachers, 2,!T pupils, and twenty-seven
young men studying for the ministry.
during the last year S3S 446 was collected
as tuition fees in these various schools.
fhe Professionals of Cuba now support
two religious weekly newspapers.
The total membership of all the Pro-
testant churches in Cuba is ISL, and 30
per cent of them are natives converted
from the Catholic population since the in
telVention.
These figures were given me by the Rev.
]. Milton Greene. superintendent OF Pres
byterian mission work in Cuba, who spent
ten years in Mexico and three years in
Porto Rico before he came here six years
ago. He built the first Presbyterian church
in San Juan. p L.. and the first in Havana.
He now has handsome new building oc-
cupying one of the prominent corners in
this city. which seats about 800, and has
twenty-eight other organized churches, with
a total membership of 100 under his care
in other parts of the island, with twenty
two missionary stations.
In addition to the Presbyterian Church
regular services held by the Enscopa-
lians who have lust laid the corner stone
OF cathedral. the Methodists, the Bap-
lists and the Christian Scientists. and there
is fiourishing Young Mems Christian AS
ISOLATION occupying large building on the
Prado, the most prominent street in the
city, in the next block to the American
Club. The y. NJ G.. A. has a reading room,
gymnasium fencing school, swimming
pool and other attractions which have
made it very popular among the younger
generation of Cubans
The Educational Work.
The Methodist Church South and the
Baptists have the largest membership and
were the first to come in said Mr.. Greene.
Their most important work. and ours is
educational. General Wood established
public schools all over the island, but
aside from a summers study at Harvard
under the direction of Prof. Frye, the first
superintendent, no provision was made for
the education of teachers. AS natural
result the schools going down. The
government appropriates S6,OCO0O0
year for educational purposes, but the
larger proportion of it is wasted The To-
cal school boards are entirely under po-
litical control and in nearly all the prov
lnces teachers are appointed for political
reasons, so that good many of them are
ignorant and illterate. | have not seen it
myself, but l have been told that an official
circular giving instructions concerning the
manner in which applications for appoint
ment as teachers should be made contains
a foot-note stating that applicants who
cannot write will be permitted to make the
sign of the cross. There is a bureau of
education supervising all this. but there is
no normal school to prepare native teach
ers and it will not employ foreigners. 1t
is all politics.
''The parents generally, particularly
among the poorer classes, are eager for
education, and often send their children
to parochial schools which are defective
and do not give thorough education.
This Is particularly true of the converts
and other Catholic schools for girls, where
they teach music. embroidery. the legends
of the saints and the catechism, but very
little else. Since the present Intervention
there has been no improvement in the
condition of the schools. Very little or
no attention has been paid to them; in
deed, in several cases, children have been
turned out of school houses in order to
accommodate attachments of United States
troops. At the town of Gunes, about
forty miles from Havana, there is a SPLEEN
did school building. but the children were
driven out of it last October and the
building is now occupied as barracks
Effect Of Lack Of Schools.
There are 32,0O0 primary schools in the
island supported by the government, ac-
cording to the statistics" continued Mr..
Greene, but they exist in name only. The
attendance is falling off year by year be-
cause of the inefficieny of the teachers. and
President Palma in his last message de-
plored the fact that it $4,000 less in
1909 than in the previous year. The general
government appropriates money for an
academy in each province and for a uni
versity at Havana, at which there are now
between 500 and 600 students, but the
whole system is defective and unproRres-
sive and grows more and more inefficient
because Of political interference 1t NAV
be truthfully said that the people of Cuba
are in state of intellectual stagnation
THE lack of schools will perpetuate pres
ent conditions and the people will con-
tinue incapable of self-government for an
other generation, because only the favored
class Is being educated. The rich who
can afford to pay tuition send their chill
dren to private schools, but nothing in
done for the poor-not SO much as was
done by the Spaniards. The 500 600 negro
population are growing up entirely hitter
ate and throughout the entire island YOU
will be fortunate If you can find twenty
men out of hundred who can read or ten
out of a hundred women.
1.-The Protestant churches are doing all
they can with the money and the forces
at their disposal but it is an insignificant
trihe compared with what ought to be
done. There is an almost universal yearn-
ing among the common people to have
their children educated. They realize the
advantage.
THE Cubans as a mass are an excellent
people. They are Industrious. temperate.
gentle and law-abiding, and the worst of
them are not wholly bad. They can teach