The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1908-01-11
BUTTER FOR THEM
Mrs. Brown President OfWOmen's
Federation Makes a Plea.
Objects to Deaf and Dumb
Pupils Being Fed OleO.
FOR FEWER SCHOOLS.
Superintendent Fairchild Wants
Them Consolidate d.
Prof. Hunter Tells OF Expert
ence With Green Bugs.
FOR FEWER SCHOOLS.

Real butter and not oleomargarine
should be fed to the students of the
state school for the deaf at Olathe,
thinks Mrs. Eustace Brown, president
of the Kansas Federation of Women's
clubs, who made a plea to the State
Board of Agriculture, last night, for
better care for the attendants on the
state school located at Olathe.
"These pupils as well as those in
the school for the blind in common
with our convicts, incorrigibles and
mentally deficient have oleomargarine
placed before them in lieu of butter,
from one years end to the other. and
the Kansas COW produced 43,37S,171
pounds of real butter in 1906, so Mr..
Coburn tells US. in his report" says
Mrs. Brown. Mrs. Brown said in
part, speaking on a Honey Maxim
From a Wise Man."
"Do you know of the originality,
the brightness of mind of these chill
dren deprived for life of hearing, but
thanks to the oral method of teach
ing not necessarily of speech? They
are vastly more interesting than the
usual hearing child of the same age
the deaf will say when she can't rec
ollect or remember,f I am empty of
think young girl who saw snow
ball melt upon a radiator asked,
What Is the name?' she was told
that it had melted; later when ques-
toned as to her friendship with her
young girl chum, her answer also was
1t has melted I have understood
that is what sometimes happens with
the friendship between politicians in
Kansas in
for the deaf are just as your rosy
checked little daughter or sturdy lad
might be if tomorrow they should be
seized with scarlet fever or spinal
meningitis; they need an education of
the right kind, even more than be-
fore; and the state should feel its
obligation more keenIy to both dear
and to the blind, than to the hearing
child; perhaps it does, but I want to
make sure that you do; and as you
do, SO will you empower your legisla-
tors, officials, boards and superinten-
dents to a more liberal policy.
"A few years ago, pardon my refer
ence to the past, the test of efficiency
in office, in this state seemed to be
rigid economy; and a plea for re-
election was based upon the amount
saved from appropriations made by
the legislature. OF course that spirit
has died out with the disappearance
of grasshoppers, droughts, cyclones
and mortgages. But until the just
claims of the unfortunate have all
been met, so long as we have need of
philanthropies and reforms; so long
as we have children to educate the
test should be, not how much saved
but how well expended, especially
from state whose agricultural pro-
ducts, including live stock, amounts in
one year alone to $463,64S6O6
But to return to the School for the
Deaf. which is so near me 1 ought to
be able to keep it in sight-to reach
these minds. shut out as they are
from sound, requires a special train
ing for the instructor in addition to
the usual preparation for teaching, a
training which is required in no other
class of teachers For this purpose
they must go to the expense of at
tending one of the special training
schools in the east; I will say here
that on account of the limited num-
Der who take this course and of the
low salaries paid, all employed in our
state have not had this preparation
But after they do, Kansas employs
them the first year on the munif1cent
salary of $40 per month; and this is
skilled labor; and if they continue in
the service of the state, teaching the
little ones to make sounds and signs
to express their thoughts-in sixteen
years, if they have good luck and the
usual raise of S25 per year-they will
,
there is an exception to this limit;
one man teacher gets 5000. After
the seventeen years if they still stay
in Kansas. there is nothing more to
hope for. but that they may hold
their jobs.
Gentlemen, I am speaking of this
seriously-what inducement is that for
young men and young women of char
acter and attachments to enter this field
where they are SO Sadly needed? Other
states have realized this and are more
generous to teachers and superintend-
ents: Illinois pays her superintendent
So, 000 per year, Kansas $1,000, Colorado
recently offered $1,000 per year and
board to get hearing young man upon
its faculty and failed to get him then
from our state.'
Consolidate the Schools.
State superintendent of Public In
struction E. T. Fairchild believes III
the cons olidation of the rural sch ools
and took this as his subject last even
ing in the concluding session of the
state board of agriculture.
The rural or country school has not
kept pace with the advance made by
the schools in the city and that of
general education, said Mr.. Fairchild