Missouri Ruralist from Topeka, Kansas • 2

2 MISSOURI RURALIST December 5, 1914. dhiools That Do TMms Let Us Tell You At How Small Cost Missouri Boys and Girls Need the Rural High School ii j. rr.vr chatin Farmer and Teacher, Illy, 31 Imho url You can have the light neantHt to daylight in honno ana ham. Turned oil' and on with a simple pull. No matches, no risk or firoH.

No dirt or smoko or odor. Costs loss than coal oil. For cooking, Quick and cool. The Victor Frost-Proof Acetylene Gas Generator Is the only above-ground, out door frost proof plant. Saves cost of cave.

Haves dirt ami labor. Huns 3 or 4 months without attention. Simple, strong and durable. Write today for free IN 1 ii rated circular, and extlinate of coat, without obligation. Tell us number of rooms.

Moore Bros ULUS- tated LEAFLET which is, in the last analysis, the only safeguard of that property. Probably some day he will discern his relationship to his Uncle Cain and cease to inquire, Am I to educate my brothers children? Lets Use Our Share. Farmer folks are practical so we will take the practical viewpoint: The state pays one-fourth for the building and one-half to three-fourths the maintenance of the rural high school. What does the state do it with? Why, with our own money, of course. Now theres some of our money more than half-up there so why not put a little more with it and buy something, not for tho state but for ourselves? If we dont we will simply he turning our money thats in the state treasury over to some neighbor who will use it.

Will establishing a rural high school increase onr taxes? Yes, it will, some, hut look what benefits we get out of it. An improvement that will enhance the market value of every acre of land in the district; a school that will give our hoys and girls equal educational advantages with those in the cities; an advertisement that will bring the better classes of homemakers as new neighbors; an agency that will work for good roads and destroy the isolation of the farm home. The rural high school will he a place around which will gravitate farmers organizations ami co-operative associations, farm womens clubs, young folks literary and social circles everything that i conducive of better citizenship and "promotes the general welfare. The country school cant stay like it is we will have to go forward or backward. Lets "hist! Maryville, Missouri We went every mao wto carries fun tohave' ft free copy oi our new and interestin') booklet, Powder It tells you all about tha different kinds ol ammunition, and explain wby Robin Hood AMMUNITION imm' aaaxn it Cfifi kelp you to a fuller fame bad by bitting tba mark wben others would fail R.

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Will tjie country school patron vote for the high school? If convinced that it will accomplish the desired result he will. Lets look at the matter this way; The old, one-room school served successfully and well its day and generation, hut it does not follow that it will equally serve another day and generation. There was a time when the farm did not need and could not use all its boys and girls and they were prepared as recruits in the ranks of trade and commerce. Now the farm plays the fife and drum and enlistments are slow. Then the farm had a vast free range and a fertile soil with which to feed the small urban minority.

Now the farm has no range and a depleted soil with which to feed a large urban majority. Then the curriculum was designed to meet the needs of the students; now it is planned for the opposite course. The rural school of today is weak for the reason that the rural teacher with one-third to one-fifth of the time for recitation as the city grade teacher is required to teach practically the same subjects. Some will answer, "grade the rural school, hut my experience in and observation of rural schools has firmly convinced me the rural school with its present extensive curriculum, poor attendance and short terms never will he satisfactorily graded. Even if it should he the teacher would still he handicapped by lack of time.

Too Many Useless Studies. The country school of yesterday was strong because it assiduously adhered to the shorter and better practice of the Three Its. Better work would be done- and more efficient scholars turned out from the country school today (and that should be the aim of all education) if the students efforts were confined to reading, writing, spelling, arithmetic, and agriculture. The banker or railroad official does not require an employe to explain the nebular hypothesis or scan the opening lines of the Aeneid. Then why should the farmers son, his fathers assistant and successor, be expected to demonstrate that xny and square times 814 equals a hundred dollar "boss? All admit that a master of one trade is better than a jack-of-all.

Then why not apply this principle to the school room? Give a hoy a few hooks and he will master them and becoming a good reader will continue his education out of school. Give him a wheel-barrow full of hooks and he generally loses interest in all. Of course the advocacy of an abbreviated curriculum is based on the assumption that the one-room school is to be retained, hut why not have the high school and change its course of study to meet the farm scholars needs? The opposition to securing the rural high school will come, just as all opposition to all progress always comes, from the well-to-do of the community. With the usual short-sightedness of vested interests the man with property cannot see the economy of taxing himself for the support of an institution TWO lawswere enacted by the last Missouri legislature that will bo very beneficial to country people if the provisions are taken advantage of. These are the laws providing for free text books, under certain conditions, und the law which provides for the building of a joint high school.

1 believe the greatest advantage of the free text hook law will he that it enables teachers to grade the schools. The rural high school law provides that three or four contiguous districts may, by an election, consolidate and establish a joint high school. To aid the school the state pays $25 a square mile of territory up to 32 square miles, being the limit, per annum for maintenance of the school, and one-fourth of the cost of building up to Certain provisions and requirements are made which are easily complied with and which the districts would not wish to he without. It is not necessary to discuss the law in detail as its provisions are easily understood. Lets consider why a rural high school should he built.

We hear a great deal about the decrease of rural population and the congestion of the cities. The last census shows a decrease of rural population in approximately two-thirds of the counties in Missouri. The greatest increase of population was in the counties of Buchanan, dackson and St. Louis. In these counties are situated the cities of St.

Joseph, Kansas City and St. Louis. A great deal is being hoard as to the remedy to he employed to check this urban emigration. As a rural teacher I believe the greatest agency for keeping the hoys and girls on the farm is the country school the school not as it is hut as it should be. The greatest reason this agency has so signally failed to do this in the past is because of its absolute inadequacy to the task required and its obstinate disposition to mark time while the rest of the world heeds the command of "Forward, March! There are four principal causes for this proneness to stagnation.

The first cause is inadequate buildings and equipment; the second, insufficient time; the third, incompetent teachers; the fourth, indifferent patrons. The first condition is a result of the third and fourth. Wide-awake teachers and interested parents can and do provide better school conditions. The second is the fruit of our chaotic system. The third is a fact because a large per cent of the rural teachers are beginners who, when they prove efficiency, will not remain in a position that pays so beggarly a return.

Those who do remain generally do so at the expense of both themselves and the school. The fourth reason really strikes the root of the whole matter. The parent is neglectful because long since he recognized the fact that the school is not doing what he wants it to do what he built it to do. Singularly enough he fails to recognize the fact that he has been and is the largest factor responsible for the schools inefficiency. Will the high school correct this A GREAT BIG 435 FEATHER BED $105 1 Pair 6 lb.

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6 American Feather A Pillow Bppt.1.18 Nashville. Tenn. He Showed the Missourians May a former Oklahoman hoard the alfalfa special? I came to Missouri two years ago and was much surprised to see so little alfalfa grown here. There was one small field in the valley whore my farm lies but most of the people were buying hay and feeding corn fodder. I asked some of my neighbors why they did not grow alfalfa and they told me it had been tried and the result was a failure.

In the fall of 1912 began breaking ground for an alfalfa field. May 1, 1914, the ground was plowed 9 to 10 inches deep and harrowed with a spring-tooth harrow until some of the neighbors said I was wearing it out. May 10 tho alfalfa was sown broadcast, using a little hand seeder, and lightly harrowed. Alfalfa must not be covered deep or it will not come up. I dipped the field four times last summer to keep the weeds down and this year I cut five crops of hay from it.

Every cutting averaged three-fourths of a ton to the acre. Last year was very hard on alfalfa hut my land is rich creek bottom and it did well. There is a great deal of this creek bottom land in southwest Missouri and alfalfa will make the section famous if the farmers will only sow it. After five cuttings my alfalfs is knee high November 1, and I will pasture it this winter. For fertilizer I applied chicken manure, wood ashes and barnyard manure.

This mixture was placed on tho thin spots and the plants are growing fine. Any person can grow alfalfa if lie will put the ground in proper condition. If the soil is thin about 100 pounds of bone meal to the aero will produce results. Failure is usually the result of careless preparation of the ground. 1 sow 15 pounds of seed to the acre.

Tin-field is cut when about half in blooiu. I do not believe it pays to pasture alfalfa except with hogs. Stock ma? cat the plant so close that it will injure the crown but hogs root it up and keep the soil loose. What this crop needs is a renovator. Renovate the field after every cutting and you will never have grass or weeds in it.

I spring-tooth harrow and tear tlic ground up till it looks like a plowed field hut the alfalfa comes up thicker than ever. I have never used a nurse crop but some authorities report excellent results by that method. Cattle should not be allowed to feed on alfalfa when it is wet or covered with dew. Tt causes bloat and sometimes tho animals die. Joseph U.

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