The weekly times-record. (Valley City, N.D.) 1912-1922, 1921-10-27
GIVES LECTURE
MOONLIGHT SCHOOLS

A very rare treat was given the
members of the Barnes County In
stitute and the students and faculty
of the State Teachers College Tues
day morning, when Mrs: Cora Wilson
Stewart, woman of charming per-
sonality, and famous the world over
as the "Founder of the Moonlight
Schools of Kentucky" gave the history
of the founding of those schools;
In her opening remarks Mrs: Stew
art complimented very highly our
state, our educators, and did not ex-
cept Valley City.
Mrs. Stewart, who is very bril-
liant speaker, told of the founding of
thise famous schools. When Mrs.
Stewart was county superintendent
of Brown County, Kentucky. a large
number of illiterate people came to
her to have her read and write their
letters for them. Some of them came
MANY miles over rugged mountain
roads after hard days work.
Mrs. Stewart told of the "three peo-
pie, who brought the need Of the
moonlight school most clearly before
me-" one, an old woman who walked
seven miles to have her daughters
letters read and answered; another, a
middle-aged man, who had to make
his mark instead of signing his name
and who had said, ~ would give twen-
ty years Of my life to be able to
write" The third was a young man
who composed and sang a beautiful
ballad and told Mrs. Stewart he had
thought of many better than that, but
forgot them before he could find any
one ''to set them down."
Mrs. Stewart called her teachers to-
gether and asked for their co-opera-
ton in starting night schools and they
gladly consented to do all they could.
On September 4. 1911, the Moon
light Schools of Kentucky were or
ganized and on September S they were
started and the moon it seemed never
shone more brightly over Kentucky
than it did at that time.
The teachers expected about l5O to
respond but 1900 came. Men worn
and weary from toiling all day, WON:
en- carrying babies, people ranging all
the way from 10 to "a years Of age
often travelling over unbridged
streams, over the rough mountain
roads, all eager to learn.
The older men and women wanted
to read their Bibles and to be able tc
write to their children far away ir
other states. The middle-aged mar
wanted to be able to sign his name
and others of the young people who
knew they were missing great priv.
ilege which was rightfully theirs
Those people applied themselves sc
thoroughly to their studies that IL
seven or eight days they could write
fairly good letter and few &C
complished this task in five days.
The next year the attendance was
increased to 1900, and the interest o.
the people Of that state so aroused
that census Of the illiterate wa:
taken and a movement made to wipe
out illiteracy entirely with the result
that 100000 illiterates have beer
taught to read and write. A campaign
Y has been started in nearly every state
in the Union to eradicate illiteracy.
| Of the five and a half million il
literates in the United States, Nortl
Dakota has 9937 and Barnes Count!
has 90. ten of which are in Vale!
City. Let us keep the North Dakot'
slogan before us: "No illiteracy il
1924" and let us teach the 1897 t.
read and write.
The address had in it in marked
degree the human element interest
This together with good voice, splen
did poise, and almost unbounded en-
thusiasm gives Mrs. Stewart the op
portunity to make her appeal particu
larly compelling.