The farmer and mechanic. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 18??-19??, 1910-01-11
DUE TO HOME INSPIRATION.

him. are sincerely DESTROYS Of aiding
in the educational progress Of the
South, which they have done III d
small way. The war left the South inn
poverished, and the burden OF negro
education was wholly placed on the
Southern white people, many OF whom
did not believe that negro education
was desirable. Beginning with Vance
and Scarborough. the State undertook
to make bricks without straw, and,
aside from the aid Of those who help
ed negro schools, white property sup
ported the schools for both races.
Under wise administration by the
State government, under the lnSplra-
ton Of native North Carolinians, the
schools OF the South have been i'm
proved, the condition of the negro ad-
vanced until he now "a q considera-
Bile sum to the support OF the school
for his race. and the State builds a
new schoolhouse every day. Much re-
mains to be done and the spirit Of the
| people is most admirable.
Some days ago a narticie was writ
ten by Mr.. VIM. r. Curtis, a we'll
known newspaper correspondent, de-
| failing the marked progress OF public
education in the South, and he
ttributed the revival to the Ogden
, movement. That movement had as
little TO do with the roSress as the
passing OF a Pullman a through an
orange grove had to do with the pro
duction of the orange, with which the
travellers regale themselves. 1t did
serve to show, to those who needed
to have facts brought to their at
t~ention, the needs Of Southern educa
tional institutions and may have in
fiuenced Mr.. Rockefeller and the
others who have made conditional
gifts to certain Southern colleges.
Charity and Children has this com-
ment to make on the misplaced credit
for Southern educational develop
ment:
1--WE are not surprised that the
metropolitan newspapers are giving
all the credit for the revival OF
the educational spirit in the SOu1n TO
the New York gentlemen headed by
Mr.. Ogden, who come to see rs once
q year and bestow their gracious ia
vor upon those leaders who bow down
before them and acknowledge their
disintereSted virtue in saving the
south from the darkness of ignorance.
We would have been surprised if the
in impression made on the big Journals
had been otherwise. We are sorry.
0ough. that there are North Carolina
people who lend color to this ridicu-
louS claim by their silence. There is
q tide in the affairs Of men which,
taken at the flood, leads on to for
tune Mr.. ogden and his cohorts
struck the time. Everybody who is
at all acquainted with the history OF
our educational revival knows that the
Ogden crowd had no moro to do with
it than King edward VII. The way for
their cordial reception had been
opened. The people OF the State had
seen q vision. John Is. Holman. Ste
phen Mcintyre, Charles D. McIvcr, z.
A. Alderman, ]. w. Bailey. and other
and won. The educational spirit
would have been just as strong and
high if MT. Ogden had never put hts
foot on North Carolina soil. Per
haps the coming of this shining
throng to some city OF the South once
tuate the Importance of general edu-
and to suggest improved and
methods in the teaching busi-
but we resent, and we wish every
paper IN the State would resent. the
false and absurd claim that but for
the Ogden crowd we would still be
to the high call that has come
to us in behalf Of universal educa-
ton. Charles B.. Aycock, perhaps, has
done more than any one man among
US to awaken the State TO a sense of
obligation to its own children. One
or ms eloquent appeals for the neg
all the Ogdenites that could
be ovid in forty Pulln1ans. In
certain quarters We may expect the
clam of the big apers to be ap-
proved and endorsed, even in North
There are people who
more for the favors of these
bright strangers han they do for
the honor of North Carolina or the
truth OF history. DR.. Cook claimed
to have discovered the North Pole.
but that did not make it true. and
IN the run of years the men who
set the high educational tide