The Coconino sun., 1924-12-05

The entire subject of Indians is so
broad one that in the time allotted
me for this informal talk but one or
two phases of it can be given conSid-
eration. AS an illustration of this
auring the time | was connected with
the great Carlisle Indian school in
Pennsylvania we had enrolled there
members of more than rs different
tribes who had come from homes from
Maine to California and from Florida
to Alaska. Each group spoke diff
ferent language and in only one other
place in the known world were there
then so many languages spoken in any
bne place, and that in one of the dis
tricts of India.
Time could profitably be spent
studying the early life of the Indians,
their customs, art, religion, supersti-
lions, their agriculture and their han
Hicraft. Missions among them would
be a large field in itself and their
study a romance of the zeal of the
hltruistic spirits who left nothing un-
Hone to spread their beliefs. The
Indians oratory, their training for en-
hurance, each would be a separate
study worth being given attention.
What | want to bring before you
specially this afternoon is what the
United States government is doing to
Educate the Indians and to fit them to
take their place with the rest of US.
This is of vital importance here in
bur own state of Arizona, for you
know that $4,000 Indians are num-
bered among our citizens and the edu-
cation of the children of school age
among that number is no small under
taking involving considerable expense.
4 The education of the Indians dates
back to the arrival of the first white
ben on our shores, for Immediately
the Indians began to copy their white
heighbors and unconsciously they
n1oved at almost bound from the
Stone age to the iron age. In each
colony an effort was made to educate
the Indians and number of the youth
we're taken to England to school. The
founding of William and Mary college
provided specially for the admission of
indians. Yale and Harvard accorded
privileges and the founding of Dart
mouth college provided for the educa-
tion of Indians under special agree
nnent. New York state appropriated
funds for Indian education. As early
as 1775 a committee on Indian affairs
MAS appointed in the continental con-
greSs and money was appropriated the
following year to support Indian stu
dents at Dartmouth and Princeton
colleges. Not until 1879 did the gov
ernment establish schools and it was
then that the Carlisle school was
founded.
Lieut.. R. H Pratt of the Tenth
eavalry was in charge of a group of
Indian prisoners who had been taken
from the Indian Territory to st. Aug
1stine, Florida. When their three
year sentence had terminated % of
the younger men of the group ex-
pressed a desire to remain in the east
IL they could attend school. They had
been taught by some philanthropic
people at St. Augustine while they
were prisoners and had gotten a de-
sire to learn more of English and
what is in books. Leave to have them
remain in the east was granted and
those who were not taken to the
Hampton school in Virginia were adj
mitted elsewhere. An immediate ef-
fort was made by Lieut.. Pratt to Sc
cure a separate school and finally the
abandoned Carlisle barracks near Har-
risburg, Pennsylvania, was turned
over to the department of the interior
and there on November 1st of 1879 the
first Indian pupils were admitted,
among them II of the prisoners who
were originally sent to st. Augustine.
Soon after the opening of the Carlisle
school other great schools were es-
tablished by act of congress, among
them the Haskell institute at Law
renee, Kansas, the Sherman institute
at Riverside, California, the Salem
school at Chemawa, Oregon, the Chi
locco school in Oklahoma and the
school at Phoenix in this state.
Last year total of 1852 Indian
Schildren were in government schools
lin Arizona alone and throughout the
land a total of 24,145. In govern
Iment, mission, private and public
schools more than total of 10000
Indian children were educated last
wear Under the western Navajo jur-
lisdiction we have about 400 pupils in
various schools.
l. The result of these years of educa-
ltion has been that number of Indian
young men and women were prepared
to make better homes for themselves,
the very foundation of our progress
and well being, just as the advance
ment of white people has been pro-
moted by education and culture. Such
educated Indians have contributed to-
ward the prosperity of their commune
ties by their earnings and they have
lever been urgent that their children
lbe educated. In fact, the education of
THE Indian has made him able to take
Ihis place in his community and to be-
lcome part of the human strength of
THE land.
All human progress has ever been