Harrisburg telegraph. [volume] (Harrisburg, Pa.) 1879-1948, 1919-06-14
(Continued)


The State authorities admit that
the elementary educational system
is not the best in the Union, and
that there are many things that need
to be done to bring it's schools up
to the highest standard; but the
Governor and the Legislature are
addressing themselves to the prob
lem and propose to solve it.
Adequate pay for school teachers
is one of the first items in the pro-
gram. One can scarcely realize that
there are in such progressive State
more than eleven thousand teachers
receiving salaries of less than $500
a year-a sum that even an un-
skilled laborer would turn up his
nose at to-day.
Th0se teachers are pursuing a
calling second in dignity and in use
fulness to none. They are influential
factors in the intellectual develop
ment of the future citizens of the
State, and cannot but be handicap
ped in their work by the less than
living wage they have been receiving.
Pennsylvania is joining the ranks
of those States which realize what
debt American civilization owes to
the faithful, overworked, and under
paid school teacher, and which un-
derstand that no investment can be
made that will yield greater returns
than the voting of living salaries
for instructors.
In the realm of higher education,
no State is better equipped nor has
more vigorous institutions. The
University of Pennsylvania has an
enrolment of some 5000 students,
most of them from the State, but
with a minority drawn from all of
the other States. and from some fifty
foreign countries. It has 10000 liv-
/ ing alumni. The University of Pitts
burgh possesses a department of
| industrial research and is one of the
country's foremost engineering in
stitutions. The Pennsylvania State
College was once called The Far
mer's High School," Now it is a
modern institution, with schools OF
agriculture, engineering, liberal arts,
and natural science.
Lehigh University and Swarth-
more both have famous engineering
schools. Then there are Bucknell,
/ Dickinson, Lafayette, Bryn Mawr,
Franklin and Marshall, Washington
and Jefferson, and many other in
stitutions which have given many
brilliant men and women to the
Nation. The Carnegie Technical
School of Pittsburgh, with its elab-
crate engineering laboratories; the
Drexel Institute of Philadelphia
with its fine course in the textile
art, and Girard College, where an
orphan boy is "mothered" and in
due course sent out into the world
with a college education in his head
a kit of tools on his back, and q
grub stake in his pocket, are
types of special schools of which
there are a number in the State.
Two Great Industries
There is no part of the story OF
Pennland that is more striking or ol
greater significance than that relat-
| ing to it's industries. Modern civili-
zation is based primarily on coal and
iron. They enter into every truss
and brace. every door-post and cor
nice-indeed. into every element OF
| foundation and superstructure OF
the edifice of human progression
man has been able to rise from his
primitive situation only as he has
utilized them.
| In the year that George Washing
ton laid down the cares of life. the
world was using per capita less thar
bushel of coal and less than three
pounds of iron, per annum. In the
year before the Hun undertook his
ill-fated program of making the
whole earth his own. the average
human being that inhabits the earth
whether South Sea cannibal oil
American business man. could claim
four-fifths of ton of coal and near.
ly ninety pounds of iron as his share
of the worlds output.
The story of Pennsylvania without
an account OF her share in these
two great industries would be like
Hamlet with the central figure for.
gotten. However, both have beer
so ably described in previous mum.
bers of The Geographic (see "Stee
l-Industry's Greatest Asset ant
"Coal-Ally of American Industry,
in the August, 1917. and November
1918, numbers of The Nationa
Geographic Magazine). that they
are merely referred to, not described
here.
Another industry in which Penn
sylvania was a pioneer is the manu-
facture of Portland cement. Will
the age of concrete upon us. will
buildings. bridges. lighthouses, tele
graph poies railroad ties even ships