The united American : a magazine of good citizenchip., June 01, 1925, Page 30, Image 30

Page Thirty
THE UNITED AMERICAN
made possible through the cooperation of the Boards
of Education of the Methodist Conference and the
Baptist Convention, the college trustees and the State
Department of Education.
For years institutions have offered summer courses
to the educated but it was left to a Methodist college
and a Presbyterian college in South Carolina under the
leadership of the State Department of Education to
throw wide open their doors to the neglected and for­
gotten men and women of the mill and farm in order
that life for them might be, through study, made
easier, happier and more useful. Here folk from the
work-a-day world were given an opportunity to study
the elementary branches while surrounded by all the
cultural influences of college life. Eighty-one pupils
registered at each institution. In life experiences they
ranged from grey haired grandparents to expectant
youths, in grade ability from first to fifth.
One executive president of five mills who has sent
annually twenty men and twenty women to each school
bearing all expenses and when necessary assisting with
the support of the families says:
The money contributed to these schools, in my opinion, is
the best investment we have ever made.
SOUTH CAROLINA LEADS UNION
South Carolina has a definite program for her fight
against illiteracy and this in connection with marvel­
ously improved public schools has enabled the State to
lead the Union during the decade 1910-1920 in the per­
centage reduction of illiteracy.
If we are looking for concrete human interest ex­
pressions in order to become certain of the value in
citizenship derived from adult educational and Ameri­
canization work, perhaps the following little narrative
by Pauline Freeman, one of our South Carolina night
school pupils will serve this purpose as well as any :
When I was about four months old I had pneumonia and
typhoid fever and it left me an invalid girl. We were farming
at that time and I had to go to the field and sit beneath the
trees. Sometimes I would sit in my little chair or on the
ground or in my little wagon. I tried to find amusement by
trying to push myself with my left hand, as the fever had
drawed my right hand. I always wanted to help work but I
couldn’t, I just had to sit there and look at the field. I didn’t
have anything to play with except my little dog, Leo. Leo
would always stay around me and kept me company. I did
not know what school and books were at that time.
We moved to Brandon Mill, Greenville, about eleven years
ago. I think Brandon is the best mill in the state. The people
at Brandon certainly have been nice to me, especially President
Smith and Mr. Wrenn, and Miss -Florrie Lee Lawtori. I thank
every one for their kindness.
In 1921 the Adult School started and Miss Madge Harris
came around and asked me if I wanted to take lessons. I told
her I didn’t know and she patted me on the back and told me I
could try. She told me she would come back that next week.
.1 was looking in my trunk that day. Miss Harris came back
bn Monday afternoon and gave ine a lesson. I began to read
and write. I found studying hard at first but my teacher
worked faithfully and taught me. She taught me Bible stories,
The Lord’s. Prayer, and the Twenty-Third Psalm. I am always
studying arid writing froin morning till night. Miss Harris
taught me for two years. Miss Lillian Shirley taught me one
year, but her sister Miss Helen Shirley, took her place for
two months. I think this is the greatest work in the world.
I cannot say just how much the night school means to me.
I am getting Library books to read. I like them fine.
DOES IT PAY
. To those with a life vision narrowed down to the
JUNE 1925
scope of their work-a-day world, this work of educating
the adult too often appears to be misspent energy and
waste of money. For the benefit of such and for the
heartening of those who are backing this work with
will and substance, let ihe cite one of the many sltories
that come to the desk of the Supervisor of Adult
Schools, which amply sustains the contention that the
adult school is a paying proposition.
Four years ago there was filed in this office a
teacher’s record book containing pictures and specimens
of the various pupils taught by a teacher during the
August Lay-by School Campaign. One picture was
particularly striking. It was a little kodak of a man
and wife with eight children, all un-kempt and bare­
footed. The oldest child was about sixteen, the
youngest, a baby in arms. Under the picture was a
statement that this family had moved to South Carolina
from Tennessee and that no member of the family had
attended school long enough to read and write. Every
member old enough had enrolled in the Lay-by School.
This picture made such an impression upon me
that I often wished to follow up the history of the
family. A few days ago I met the teacher of the
family. As a result of this meeting the following story
was related:
The father had killed his brother several years ago. When I
first invited him to come to the Lay-by School in 1921, he was
not interested in school but he afterwards became interested.
He had a lovely family, but they had grown up in complete
darkness. They have attended the summer schools for the
past three years. Last year for the first time in seven years
they went to church. The father allowed me to take a preacher
to see him and later he joined the church, as well as six other
members of the family. So interested was Mr.----- last year
in the Lay-by School that he sent to a distant town for his
nephew, a young man twenty years of age, and kept him dur­
ing the school term that he might learn to read and write.
Is this not evidence that a lack of opportunity in
one state often becomes a disadvantage to another
state, since people are constantly moving from state to
state, and is it not a plea for public action in favor of
Adult Education?
WORK AND PLAY
Walt Mason, in “Rippling Rhymes”
T IS WELL to do some playing when the day of toil is
done; when we’ve spent twelve hours at haying, we’re
entitled to some fun; when behind a plow or seeder we have
trudged, the weary day, it is fitting, gentle reader, to indulge
in harmless play. When we’ve earned the precious dollars
that will pay the monthly bills, let us don our standup collars
and enjoy the pace that kills. But we.cannot dance a measure
Or slide down the cellar doors with a fair degree of pleasure,
if we haven’t done our chores. We feel guilty and dejected
as we fox trot here and there, if the tasks have been neglected
that demand our skill and care. Some there are forever play­
ing, with no duties on their mind, down the path of pleasure
straying, fun before and fun behind: But they’re bored and
weary critters who in sloth forever bask, and each passing
hour embitters men who have no honest task. There is always
most enjoyment for the man who spends his day in some
earnest, sane employment, drawing down a well-earned pay.
Oh, the play-time has its splendor for the man of nerve and
brawn who has torn his pink suspenders mowing whiskers
off the lawn. Knowing that he’s stocked the larder, filled
the tank with gasoline, we admire his pep and ardor as he
gambols on the green.
I
A grapefruit is only a lemon that had an opportunity and
saw it. Get busy.
—The Weekly App.