230 WILLIAM BRAMWELL POWELL. 



The following estimate of Mr. Powell's character and work 

 as a school superintendent is quoted from an article in a Chicago 

 journal of education {Intelligencer ^ April i, 1904.) 



"During his forty years of service Mr. Powell labored un- 

 ceasingly and untiringly to improve the public school system. 

 In his chosen profession he felt the most profound devotion, the 

 greatest pride and pleasure. He was an advanced thinker, a 

 prophet, and as such was often in advance of his time in the 

 scope and grandeur of his ideals. His interests were centered 

 in the welfare of the children, believing that the proper educa- 

 tional training is that which best prepares for life, not merely 

 from the standpoint of earning a livelihood, but that education 

 which elevates above sordid, material views ; that which makes 

 the brain and heart capable of appreciating the good and beau- 

 tiful, susceptible to the allurements of the larger life. 



" He felt it to be the child's birthright to have the best in edu- 

 cation that human effort can give. Influenced by these ideals, 

 he was a pioneer in methods of object teaching, of training by 

 seeing and doing. Believing that all education is based upon 

 experience, and that only through the child's own experience 

 can he be held to understand and appreciate the experiences of 

 others as found in books, he strove to give the child such expe- 

 riences as lead to the interpretation of the natural world and to 

 an understanding of the social whole. To provide for these ex- 

 periences he early introduced into his course the study of nature 

 and the study of institutional life. He collected libraries that 

 the children might broaden their text-book knowledge with a 

 knowledge of and a sympathy with life." 



The following passage from the same article does some justice 

 to Mr. Powell's work in securing manual and industrial train- 

 ing in the public school system under his charge : 



"A firm believer in the value of hand work, he was among 

 the first to prepare a way for and to establish manual training 

 and domestic science schools. Music, drawing and physical 

 training also became part of the regular course in his schools ; 

 all of this before most schools had advanced beyond the three 

 R's. In the Washington schools he strove as strenuously to 

 provide the best facilities in manual training, in cooking and in 



