The Lafayette advertiser. [volume] (Vermilionville [i.e. Lafayette], La.) 1865-19??, 1907-05-15
TEACHING AGRICULTURE
IN COMMON SCHOOLS.
DR.. s. A.. Knapp Presents His
Views Before Press AssOcia-
ton at Lafayette.

III Ills dOOlCoo oSAciS
Association at Lafayette, DR.. 5.
A. Knapp, Of Lake Charles, field
agent for the U. S. Department
of Agriculture, said in part:
There is a good deal of trouble in
this world with our view point. After
a mar has been at a particular work
for a certain length of time he begins
to think he is either u%nderpaid or
over-worked and hence he sights his
lob or wants to strike. Or possibly
he may think another man has an
easier job and he would like to ex
change work with him. Or he may
think another fellows job more hon.
orable: and soon we have placed a
kind of honor account with work.
''The man who sits in a bankers
office. we'll clad. thinks he has a more
honorable job than the mason who
laws the foundation for a house. Or
the woman who plays the piano and
who is arrayed in fine linen. thinks
she has a more honorable job thai
the woman, who with sOiled garments,
cooks the breakfast. There is moth
ing in this. If there is any difference
in the honor it is in favor of the ma
son and the cook, for their employ
ment is older and more necessary to
the upbuilding of the world.
''But this honor trouble has dis
turbed a great many people. Some
how a kind of sneaking notion has
crept into the minds of young men and
boys that any sort of a town job is
more honorable than work on a farm
and as q result thousands OF people
leave the farm to take up mental m
ployment in a tOwn-as ii a town
made a man. This has continued un-
til it has become almost a national
calamity. This is not a new difficulty;
it's old and we have been trying to
improve this view point for a great
many years.
Zone of the first improvements at
tempted was the establishment OF
small factories in country villages to
give employment to the surplus labor
on the farm and to make a local
market for the products of the land.
"Another step was the establishment
of country schools. so as to widely
diffuse knowledge. Possibly the
schools were not as they should have
been and can ever now be greatly I'M.
proved, but they were a gain. Some
say they are too expensive. These
people forget that the most expensive
thing in the world is Ignorance.
"Again we have been trying. to inn
prove the rural conditions by making
better highways and establish rural
free delivery routes, and in other
ways, all Of which are helpful.
I'm the awakening of the public
mind to better conditions in the coun-
try just now, another plan is very
popular, and that is to introduce the
teaching of agriculture in the com
mon schools in all the rural districts.
In q certain way l am in favor of this,
but I do not accept it for as complete
q remedy as some.
''Let us discuss it more at length.
l think my view point is possibly a
1s<k1o lfxnon< fuAvo cOvn0 nnA will
try to make myself clear.
"What is the object Of this teaching
in the rural schools?
"The end sought is a higher life on
the farm; less drudgery and more
comfort, more attractive homes, more
time to read and to think out the
problems of the farm and q larger
part in the national life; not for a few
farmers, but for the great tOiling
masses In the country. The basis Of
this uplift is q greater earning capac.
ity upon the part of the individual
workers, for every step of progress
requires money. The average earn
ing capacity Of each lsborer on South
ern farms should be increased five fol6
aud can be. That increase may bt
distributed as follows:
'.Ffrst, net gain in increased pro.
duct per acre, due to better farming
one-ffth: second. net gain in the use
of better teams and implements, two
ffths; third, net gain in devoting thu
idle lands of the farm to the breeding
and raising Of improved stock, one.
firth; fourth, net gain in using better
business methods and greater econo