St. Johnsbury Caledonian. [volume] (St. Johnsbury, Vt.) 1867-1919, 1915-04-07

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May meeting. The work of the in
dustrial committee received special
praise from the president and the
forestry meetings were reported to
have been most interesting. The
board voted to pay SIS for the ex-
penses of Miss Sage, the speaker who
was taken i'll while here and is now
in a serious condition. Mrs. Re-
becca Fairbanks spoke of the serv-
ing of school lunches which has
proved so successful. For the first
| two weeks the committee financed
the undertaking. Since then the
movement has been self-supporting
except that the club pays the salary
of the dietitian. On Friday eve
ming the committee will give an en-
tertainment at Academy Hall to help
pay the expense of carrying on the
work.
Miss Wilcox spoke briefly of the
plans for school gardens now under
way for children in grades three
through eight and the president an
nounced that the May number of
the Vermonter will be a woman's
club number under the direction of
the State Federation and asked that
a large number of club members
promise to purchase a copy.
The program had been arranged by
the forestry committee. In the abb
sence of the chairman, Mrs. Mackin-
non, Mrs. Harlan N. Wood, presided.
After a very pleasing vocal solo by
Mrs. F. H. Burt with Miss Ruth Flint
at the piano, Arthur R. Merrill of
the Lyndon School of Agriculture
told the club about the work that
institution is doing. He gave the
history of the school briefly and
showed the difference between an
agricultural college and a secondary
school of agriculture like that one at
Lyndon. He said that the Lyndon
school is not a charitable institution
but aims to give a boy chance to
earn his way through the course. The
boys go to school in the morning
and in the afternoon work either on
the farm or in the shop. At morn
ing and night the regular farm chores
have to be done, the boys starting in
at o'clock.
At the beginning of the year every
boy is charged $500 and the boys
receive credit toward this amount for
all the work they do. At first every
boy received the same credit but it
was found that such plan was not
fair. Now the boys receive credit
for three things, the amount of work
done, the quality of work and the ap-
plication they make. The boys are
expected to stay two full calendar
years beginning in September but
some of the boys have all their cred
its worked out by May. The stud
ents who pay cash for their tuition
have to put in $50 hours of practical
farm work. The school does not at
tempt to fit for college but some of
the graduates have entered agricul-
tural colleges and have done very
creditable work.
The school aims not only to make
good farmers but good citizens and
in order to graduate the boys must
complete satisfactorily the courses in
English, arithmetic, civics, etc., as
well as the distinctively technical
branches. In order to enter the
school a boy must be a ninth-grade
graduate but many of the boys have
been in high school two or more
years. A strange fact is that the
ninth grade graduate often does more
creditable work than the boy who has
been through high school. The boys
have done all the construction and
repairing work on the farm and
learn enough about carpentry and |
ordinary repairing about a farm. |
Some of the graduates of the school
who were earning about $50 |
month when they came to the school |
are now earning around $1,000 a |
year which shows that the training |
was worth while financially.
When the school is turned over
to the state about $500 acres of
land will be included. The school
is trying to reforest much of the
waste land and every year sets out
from 10000 to $4,000 trees. Every
year, also, trees which have reached
or passed maturity are cut down in
parts of the woodland. AS a future
financial asset some of the sandy soil
which has always been an eyesore to
everyone is being set out to trees.
Mr.. Merrill expressed the wish that
the different towns in the Passumpsic
valley would undertake the task of
setting out Scotch pines on the ugly
sand strips which run clear through
this section and spoil the landscape
In time the timber would be valuable
and meanwhile the country would
be beautified. He spoke too of the
need of conserving our wood lots
In riding through the parts of the
state which have been despoiled by
the great lumber companies, it will
be noticed that i'm place of the val
liable woods which have been cut
down the cheaper varieties are grow
ing up in their place. The brush
which is so often left scattered
around ought to be piled up neatly
and could be if it was done in the
first place. He emphasized the dan
ger of setting out trees too close to-
sether, using as an example the I
Holmes apple orchards at Charlotte
which were set out 20 feet apart but
proved to be too close together and
,rees had to be cut out to make the .
'emaining trees 40 feet apart. Mr..
Merrill told of the great dangers
rom fire and of the need of fire pa IS
rolls. Lookout stations have already
been established on some of our Yer
mont mountains, including Burke s
mountain, and have demonstrated
heir worth.