The Wilmington morning star. [volume] (Wilmington, N.C.) 1909-1990, 1945-05-10

OF making peonle Think
BY WESTBROOK PEGLER
Copyright 1915, by King Features Syndicate)
SAN FRANCISCO. May 81 have not given
up on this little practice peace conference
here but I figure that these people, may
fel about as 1 used to when I was COW
ering the fights and, when a big show
was over, most of us had to stick around and
compose living human documents about the
1.-THE lean bodies in their contests for fame
and fortune while a lot of llver-lip slobs hung
over our shoulders, spelling out the words
aloud or muttering sUrly asides such as this
mugg is leaping He said it was a left in the
belly done it. Was a right to the jore.'' =.
Whatever these people do down here is sure
to be fearlessly denounced by one group or
another as betrayal OF democracy which is
a putty word that be nodded into any
meaning you like and there has been so mitch
preaching and lecturing in print and on the
air that, no kidding, pounditry are just
making themselves plum dam ridiculous. This
discussion has been moreover the dullest most
tasteless lot of ashes of old arguments ever
heard outside the College OF the City OF New
York so that the effect is that OF a lot Of
grog-pots talking it out in a gritty tavern But
the pity of it is that the people In the confer
ence, except maybe Molotov and one or two
others, can't help feeling that if they dlsplease
our noted molders, and muddlers, OF public
opinion they will get depicted with rat-eyes
and dirty leer in the act of feeding on human
babies in i'll drawn cartoons in the radical
papers.
So I have just been pretending that they
aren't even here or, anyway, that amt,
hoping they will get loosened up pretty soon
and hit few for Us
ApJ 4odo r1n that
Delaney, who seems to be the press agent
for the Chicago school system, wants me to
express my sentiments regarding public school
education, the occasion being a celebration
commemorating the opening of the first pub
lie school there, 100 years ago.
Well, as to that, when my family Landed
in Chicago in the fall of 1904 down from Min
neapolis, the Horace Greeley school to which
we were sent was considered to be an old build
ing Like most Chicago grade schools of that
era it was red brick and stone and it must
have been put Up not long after the big fire
of 1870 because its floors and the treads OF
the stairs were grooved by the feet of thou
sands of kids. The incest teacher we had was
an Irish girl named Mary Hurley who, I sup
pose is gone now, but the rest Of them were
not too bad and the boys and girls were very
decent lot and with the exception OF one who
went to the reform school and was a
heroic figure among us, none OF them
turned out bad as fas as ] ever heard.
On the credit side, there was Herb Graffis a
writer who has distinguished his name in the
newspaper business in Chicago, and fellow
named Varges, whose old man was janitor
of the school and who, in the first big war,
was one of the pioneer battle photographers
Then there was noted swimmer and Olym-
pic champion Of years and years ago named
Harry Hebner and, for a time at least, II
think we had as fellow student boy named
MT ho n Norm
summer commanding American division
with skill and grace. This group occurred in
period of four or five years and l suggest
that it isn't bad score, and hope the rate of
distinction has continued.
OF course buildings of themselves cannot
make any educational system but should think
Chicago ought to pull down that old timer be-
cause it seemed very inflammable heap
and it certainly has served its time, by now.
started there only "a years after the big fire
which isn't so terribly many years when you
have accumulated half hundred and have
lately marveled that Chicago had shaken off
the ashes and expanded and showed absolute
ly no trace of the fire except some trash kept
in collection at saloon called the relic house.
That fire was and gone and Chicago was
stretching north and northwest
In recent years, friends of mine in Chicago
have told me that they wouldn't risk their
kids in the public schools and therefore either
send them to pay schools or move to the SUBJ
urbs where the social class is nicer. Well. that
is pretty generally the case in big cities now
adays and if / had children in New York I
would go to Jail rather than expose them to
the conditions in the public schools. Not all of
them are alike but in some New York schools
the kids are actual little gunner and knife
fighters who terrorize teachers and other kids
and put on stick ups before they are OFT Of
the eighth grade. The condition has grown
worse in La Guardia's time not only because
of the war but because his crowd encouraged
some of the lowest riff raft from other parts
of the country to colonize there for the relief
benefits and unemployment payments In re-
turn or which, of course, they voted for La G
| and the new deal.
| Nowadays you have to stretch an ear, too,
to what the kids are saying to learn whether
some teacher lis giving them communism and
may say that in my time they were all just
straight line Americans who gave you the RS
and no funny business. l guess they may not
have qualified many of us for good prep
schools but our people didn't go to good prep
schools, anyway. We went to public high
schools and with most of that was the
end of all that for there were only few hun
i dred thousands college students in the whole
United States.
The best public schools nowadays are in the
! small cities and towns where the. teachers
are known personally and socially to the par
ents but the whole system suffered a knock
i when it DEVELOPED that for all their talk about