News and citizen. [volume] (Morrisville, Vt. ;) 1881-current, 1911-04-05
TH0MPS0NS ISLAND SCHOOL
An interesting Description Of Unique Institu
tion Presided Over by Lamoille County Boy

Harbor, taken from Boston paper, wi
be of interest to many in this vicinity
as Superintendent Bradley is native G
johnson and brother of Mrs. A. A
Niles OF this town, and has many friend
throughout the county.
As we aspire. so are we. A boy on
Vermont farm dreamed of being ring
master in circus, and he is. His nam
is Bradley, and he is the superintendent
of the Farm and Trades School for Boy,
on Thompson's Island. His circus last
all the year round. 1t has more than tiv,
score of rings, and he is master of then
all.
You had supposed, of course, tina
Thompson's Island was an abode for lit
tie boys with hoofs and horns. Wha
you are thinking of is Rainsford's Island
and even then you are wrong. Boys nc
more have hoofs and horns than they
have wings. What they have in great
abundance is arms and legs and keeI
little heads, and Thompson's Island is
the place where they are taught to use
them.
Even those who knew, or thought they
knew all about Thompsons Island land
they are by no means numerous) had
come to take it for granted. For the pas
! few years we have been hocking to the
State House to vocferate for industrial
education; we established commission
to look up this new thing" when all
the while, down in Boston HarbOr, we
had an institution which was doing this
new thing, and had been doing it for
nearly one hundred years. The maya.
zines have gone over and over the glories
of the George Junior Republic; and down
on Thompson's Island was boys gov
eminent when Mr.. George himself was
not very far out of his own boyhood.
New England is beginning to talk 'inten-
sive farming" Mr.. Bradley has been
practicing intensive farming and making
a go of it on Thompson's Island for
nearly quarter of century. We have.
I say, taken Thompson's Island for
granted. 1t is time it was rediscovered.
For the best part of all is that the farm
and trades school has gone quietly about
it's business all these years and while
others Grated on industrial education, in
tensive farming and the rest, this insti
tuition was actually on the job and making
no noise.
A private school, then, and not for
orphans, but not to be behind in the race
after ali, thanks to this school. The
only trouble is that the Island ought to
be towed up nearer to the ship channel
where the thousandsof passengers, trans
atlantic and coastwise, could see it's fer
tile fields and pleasant groves and ask
whether the dignified pillared portico of
the main building is genuine Bultnch
front, which it is. But since the Island
must stay where it is, and passengers
concentrate their sightseeing on Deer
Island, explanations must do duLy in
stead of the guidebook.
In the morning the boys 60 to school,
and in the afternoon they go out and do
what they were taught in the morning,
and the play is pretty freely mixed in,
because, boy-like, they will manage to
make play out of it. They keep the
printing presses going, and make circu-
lars and letter-heads for uptown firms;
they work at the lathes; they are learn
ing to use machines and tools in the ma
chine shop; they are driving hay cart
over the meadows; they are acting as
chambermaids to herd of COWS; they
are washing the luncheon dishes; they
are scrubbing clothes, playing ball, build
ing cottages for themselves, rowing about
the bay and studying, all in rotation, like
their crops. The noticeable part about
pear To be having an extremely good
time, or, if not having it just at that mo-
ment, then looking forward TO one. They
are all of an age when boys are crammed |
full of energy, from eleven to seventeen
or eighteen, and they are much out of |
doors; their studies correspond to those |
of BOston's grammar schools; their prac- |
tcal work is fitting them for definite en-
ployment, and their play includes every |
thing normal boy enjoys; swimming, |
skating. boating, snow ball battles, games |
and sports.
The sum of it is that the school fits IN
orphan boy into the training scheme of a
big family, where each member has Ob-
legations and responsibilities and must
contribute something to the little com
We all know what the big fam.
lily bred in country boys-pluck, gener-
Dsity, ingenuity and resourcefulness.
When they came to the town these were
heir assets and these are the assets they
Are getting at Thompson's Island. Every
hing so far as possible rests with the
boys. IF they are Industrious, they earn
exua holidays: if they idle they must
work just so much longer-the big family
principle again. Last Monday was a
,owy day on the harbor. A party of
hem were permitted to take big boat
md go rowing. Presently someone came
'unning to the superintendent with the
news that" the httle idiots =" had started
IF towards fleet of anchored coasting
rowing with the wind. The
showed no excitement.
The boat was large and the boys were
trong. That's all right" said he,
let them row back again against the
Wind. They won't do that again" Nor
will they, for in the afternoon they vol !
uttered the information that they had .
lad all the exercise of that sort they de- =
ired
SOME OLD-FAsHIoNED THRIFT
The frugality practiced on Thompson's a
sland is a study in itself. Mr.. Bradley
oes not call his economy by fancy a
ames; he merely practices it. Twenty a
bree years ago he brought the principles Il
{ thrift which he had learned on farm
p in Vernon to Thompson's Island. and
ct them to work. They have had steady {
Employment ever since. He combs down
he city for things people were going to v
brow away, carts them over to the Is e
md and, as they say in Vermont, "works 0
hem up" New metal telephone poles il
ost over $500 apiece. Mr.. Bradley OBJ a
lined the pipe of a burst boiler from G.
INK yard; his boys fitted it together, o
lrried it to fire escape, stood it on end 81
nd poured cement down its throat, and o
ad all the tplanhODa nolas thau eOuld a