The Climax-Madisonian. (Richmond, Madison County, Ky.) 1914-1917, 1915-10-27
Education in Kentucky.

Education in Kentucky.
/ Kentucky has history with as much
of tragedy and romance, of fascination
and inspiration as has any State in the
Union. Every reader appreciates what
Daniel Boone and Abraham Lincoln did
for the mountains and blue grass of
Kentucky, but few understood even
family how many phases of Kentucky
life have represen ed foresight and he
roism. energy and pluck, patriotism
and culture.
In the eighteenth century provisions
was made for county academies, each
county in The State ultimately receiving
5000 acres of land to provide fund to
aid in the support of an academy in the
county. Not even Massachusetts had
such a county vision in the eighteenth
century.
In 1921 was passed an act 10 establish
Literary Fund, " and not even Gov
| ernor Chiffon, of New York, or Cover
nor Wolfe, of Pennsylvania, ever voiced
more brilliantly the need of public ed
NC cation than. did Lieutenant Governor
w. T. Berry and his committee asso-
ciates in 1921.
Here is paragraph
Popular education is the proof
which sustains free institutions,
and the lever which overthrows
the oppressor's throne. Happi-
1y not 10 boripn IN ,1pAor
mine fabric of despotism; but
to remove the work on which
tyrants build. 1t was not Cae
sar that overturned the lber-
ties of Rome-it was ignorance.
1t was not Napoleon that made
France a despotism-it was ig-
norance.
That extended report contains cores
pondence with the ablest men in Ameri-
ca, many of whom wrote an educational
classic. That was almost a hundred
years ago. The letter of the venerable
ex-president of the United States, John
Adams, far into the eighties, is worthy
| companion piece to the letters received
Horace Mann was ready to devote him
self to the public school cause in Massa-
chuseLts. Kentucky set aside a million
dollars as public sceool fund.
In 1888, following close upon the laws
of Massachusetts and Pennsylvania.
Kentucky established a State Board of
Education, the same law they now
have, and established the Office of Stale
Superintendent. Kentucky was one of
the very first States in the Union TO
take those Two steps
In 1888, before the Normal School was
opened-at Lexington, Massachusetts
the first State Superintendent of Ken
lucky. j, ] Ballard. made an appeal
for a State Normal School.
That Kentucky did not realize her
educational ideals of those early days is
due to the variety and violence of prob
| lens which she had to face With the
delays and their causes, we do not con-
Germ ourselves.
Each of the nineteen State Superin-
tendents has worked for educational ad-
| vance and each achieved something oi
which he and his descendants may well
be proud. but circumstances and per
sonality have made three administra-
tions stand out conspicuously for their
noble accomplishments.
Students of the educational history ol
Kentucky must always give first place
TO the administration of Robert Jeffer-
son to Breckenridge, D. d. LII. D, from
1917 to 1858. 1t was he who made the
public school system free public
school system''
Second place will always be given to
Hon. Zachary F. Smith, 1867 1871.
! Breckenridge had written the word
free" into law but during the war and
Immediately after the war money was
sadly lacking. 1t was The noble mission
of Mr., Smith to provide for the perma-
The thiEd place will always be &C
corded to Hon. J. c. Crabbe, LII. D..
now president of the Eastern State Nor
NAL School at Richmond. 1t was Mr.
/
tire State up to the Common Free
School idea and support More thar
one hundred and fifteen years ago the
fathers of Ke1tucky had the first coun-
ty unit vision in the New World, but il
was one hundred years before DIT. Crabbt
breathed into that idea The breath o.
| life. He was the genius and the mas
terfulness that developed the ''whirl
wind campaigns of 1908 and 1909
awakening a popular demand for ad
vanced educational legislation, th'
greatest change in public sentiment II
two years that has ever been known il
any State in the Union. Most FORUM
ately the present State Superintendent
Barksdale Hamlet, has been able anC
willing to continue the perfection of tht
educational system of Kentucky
DIR. A. E. Wenship in the Journal o
Edvcation: Boston.
L