The Kansas City sun. (Kansas City, Mo.) 1908-1924, 1916-07-01

the Houston schools have taken much
interest In the industrial arts courses.
There are three masual training teach
the teacher OF the night school, and
two others divide their time among
the ward schools. Mary j. Holden is
at the head of the domestic science
department.
r. NJ. Catchings was graduated
from the Prairie View State Normal
and Industrial college and later he
pursued a postgraduate course at
Bradley Polytechnic at Peoria, Ill.
Later he made an inspection of man
ual training and industrial art schools
in st. Louis and Chicago.
manual training in our Houston
schools" said Mr.. Catchings, "is in
Guided In all the courses from the
fourth grade through the high school.
and every boy student passing through
these grades is compelled to take the
course, while the girls passing through
the same grades are compelled to take
domestic science and domestic art in
order hat they may be taught the es-
sentials of taking care of homes prop
erly.
Manual training gives the boys the
fundamental ideas about handling the
tools. We want to teach the boys the
underlying principles of the trades. We
endeavor to give them ideas about de
signs and try TO raise their tastes. In
doing this we bring to the boys mind
that there is a great advantage in
skilled labor. All the manual train
ing work is done according to me-
chanical drawings made by the stu
dent, and in this way the student is
compelled to have a certain thing in
view.
Mary ]. Holden, the teacher Of do
nestle art and domestic science In the
high school, is a graduate of Tuskegee
institute. In these classes the girls
are taught the essentials of cooking,
launderying and proper care of the
home.
I'm q way our work will be slow but
even in ten years the things we are
teaching in the schools in Houston will
be readily observed in the Negro race.
Our people will be better citizens, more
able to help themselves and they will
make q greater impression on the white
people as well as the colored race of
Houston.
"This occasion is evidence that the
leading men and women of Houston
and what Is true here is becoming true
generally all over the country-believe
that education makes the Negro a bet
ter citizen by making of him a more
useful citizen. That is a logical and
very evident fact. 1t is the ignorant,
idle Negro who cHuses most of the dis
t~urbance. And what is true of the
Negro is largely so among all races.
1t is the least intelligent among any
people that are hardest to control, and
for this reason education everywhere
is receiving a new impetus-whether
it is education of the head or of the
hands. One is impossible without the
other, to n greater or less degree. The
intelligent man just won't be idle. He
will employ his time to some profitable
end and therefore has no time for evil
CONCENTRATIONS. On the other hand,
ignorance breeds Incidence, Incidence
induces ldleness and idleness leads to
crime.
with the night school open in adj
dition to the excellent public day
schools there is no reason why, within
a few years, every Negro-old and
young-in the city of Houston should
not make of himself or herself a bet
ter and more useful man or woman