July 26, 1907] 



SCIENCE 



105 



and the establishnieiit of schools has played 

 a notable part in their policy. The hardy 

 frontiersman has seldom blazed a trail 

 which schools have not promptly followed. 



This regard for school education is not 

 singular with the American people, but it 

 has been singularly universal with them, 

 and a comprehensive educational system 

 has resulted which reaches even to the 

 remote byways of the country. An educa- 

 tional system which meets the needs of the 

 country, however, must be something more 

 than a mere comprehensive school system 

 in touch with the people. It must not only 

 offer education in general, but it must also 

 offer those special educations which are 

 nece^ary for the fullest development of 

 each branch of human endeavor and serv- 

 ice. In satisfaction of this condition, the 

 great variety of professional schools have 

 been established — divinity schools, law 

 schools, medical schools, schools for the pro- 

 fessional engineer — and, on the other hand, 

 trades schools of various characters. In 

 the latter respect, however, this nation has 

 been at fault. Some trades schools have 

 been established and maintained, and 

 manual training has come to be highly re- 

 garded—perhaps here and there too highly 

 regarded in the high schools, though insuf- 

 ficiently established in the grade schools; 

 but the development of trades schools has 

 been insufficient to the country's need, and 

 foremen's schools are still almost unknown. 



A wise enactment looking towards the 

 establishment of these schools throughout 

 the nation was passed by the national con- 

 gress during the period of the civil war, 

 whereby each state of the United States 

 was allotted an acreage from the national 

 public lauds in proportion to its national 

 representation, the proceeds to be applied 

 more particularly to instruction in agri- 

 culture and the mechanic arts, without ex- 

 cluding other subjects of study. This wise 



enactment, born in the midst of civil strife, 

 has been the foundation of many of the 

 great state universities which make a 

 notable feature of various of our western 

 states. The United States Congress of 

 recent years has added continuing appro- 

 priations of money for the same purposes, 

 but more particularly with the design of 

 supporting agricultural research. 



These appropriations have been used 

 with wisdom and with great advantage to 

 the nation and its people; but, as far as 

 mechanic arts are concerned, the term has 

 been construed liberally and the work of 

 the colleges using these appropriations has 

 been largely in the grade of professional 

 engineering work, or trending in that 

 direction. The demand for university- 

 trained engineers has been marvelous 

 and the "land-grant" appropriations 

 have been insufficient to support more 

 than one educational effort in this line, and 

 in many states they have been insufficient 

 to support even one fully, so that it has 

 been excusable in the past for the state 

 colleges and universities to limit their ac- 

 tivities. The diversion of fine private be- 

 quests from their apparently intended use 

 for the foundation of trades and foremen's 

 schools, to a support of attempted pro- 

 fessional engineering schools alongside of 

 engineering schools already in existence, 

 seems to me not so excusable. 



In agriculture, the situation has been dif- 

 ferent. The individual farmer, as a rule, 

 is unable to carry on extended and ex- 

 pensive experiments for the benefit of him- 

 self and his fellows, and the agricultural 

 schools have turned their attention toward 

 helping the individual farmers or dairy- 

 men by teaching them how best to carry 

 on their trades. Some of our best schools 

 of agriculture are what, in industrial lines, 

 would be called foremen's schools, that is, 

 they teach of the particular craft involved 



