The Birmingham age-herald. [volume] (Birmingham, Ala.) 1902-1950, 1908-11-29
TEACHING FIRE
DANGER IN SCHOOL
instruction Is Compulsory In
/ hi0
WAY PRESERVE LIFE
instructors in Every State Are Becom
ing More and More Interested
in the Importance of This
Department.
PRESERVE LIFE
BY PRESTON M'eooDwIN.

When teacher, once each week, asks
the little tots in the primary grades to
lay away their. books and states and lis
ten to interesting accounts OF how $780,
100000 worth of buildings were destroyed
and 6S4 women and children were burned
TO death in this country last year by
earelessness with fire, does it pay?
This is what prominent educators in
every section of the United States are
asking.
The scheme is in operation In Ohio, the
first of the states to take hold of the
proposition, and, under the requirements
of the law passed by an almost unani-
nous vote in the Ohio general assembly
last spring, these lessons on fires are abb
solutely compulsory. Provision is made
for instructing pupils between the ages
of and IA years in all schools within
the state, public and private, by means of
lessons given by the teachers. These les
sons shall be read once each week during
the school year, and penalties are pro-
vided for violation of the law.
Inasmuch as there was hitherto no lit
erature on this particular subject in any
ord of oral instruction being given either
to school pupils or adults anywhere on
the globe, the plan was essentially an ex-
pertinent. Men of letters, fire insurance
experts, prominent humanitarlans, dnd
particularly educators, became at once
deeply concerned in the project. They
have watched the operation of the Reed
law with ever-increasing interest since it
became effective with the opening of the
school year in Ohio last September.
The destruction of 266 young lives in
the public school building at Collinwood,
Ohio, last March attracted the attention
of the legislature to the enormous loss
of life and property resulting from igno-
rance of common fire dangers. The re-
ception accorded the new textbook ia the
schools of Ohio has stimulated effort to
provide such instruction in other states.
Impressing the seriousness OF common
fire dangers upon the minds of the young,
to the extent that they will not only heed
the advice of the writer, but in all lil1eli-
hood impart many things they have
learned to their parents at home, the
iVeness.
The writer, Clarence MarIs B. Sc, NJ.
D., pyrologist to the state fire marshal of
Ohio, has told the children facts simply,
which the parents of these children would
read through with ever-increasing inter-
est to the end of the 40 lessons.
The little tots, and their elders in the
grammar grades, are permitted to draw
their own conclusions, in manner which
Is distinctly original. The boy and girl
are not commanded or admonished to do
thus and so, as in ordinary textbooks,
but are given interesting facts to digest.
Is it likely that one boy IN a million,
under ordinary circumstances, will refrain
from striking any matches he may find?
But when he hears something Of the casu-
atty lists that are attributed directly to
the careless handling of matches this lad
will think twice, perhaps he will stop to
consider several times, before he again